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Both psychoanalysis and its metascience are similarly problematic. It is not a concern of psychoanalysis to answer the question of the essence of psychoanalysis; on the contrary, it is the prerogative of metascience. The understanding of the essence of psychoanalysis depends on its domain and the metascientific frame of reference. It is not possible, however, to combine every sort of conception of psychoanalysis with every metascience. Generally, the claim that the characterisation of a science, its technical application, domain and selected metascience are dependent on one another is quite valid. For reasons of shortage of space, my main concern is to attempt to show the validity of this claim by offering a rough explication of psychoanalysis. There are, namely, several opinions on the essence of psychoanalysis. Since it serves as a general model for the human sciences (Apel, 1973), it is well-fitted, mutatis mutandis, for a study of the relations between science and metascience.