Ego mediates between id and superego from "summary" of A General Introduction to Psychoanalysis BY Sigmund Freud by Sigmund Freud
In our mental life there are three provinces, the id, the ego, and the super-ego, which are in eternal strife with one another. The id is the dark, inaccessible part of our personality, the chaos, the unorganized, unregulated part, the 'it'. The ego, on the other hand, stands for reason and common sense. The super-ego is the representative of all moral restrictions, the conscience. The ego is that part of the id which has been modified by the direct influence of the external world. It is, indeed, the precipitate of abandoned object-cathexes, a residue representing all that was once hated in the id. The ego is the seat of our conscious and the medium through which the id communicates with the external world. It tries to mediate between the id and the super-ego, and seeks to bring about harmony among the conflicting demands of the id, the super-ego, and the external world. The ego has a difficult task to perform. It has to curb the instinctual demands of the id, reconcile these with the demands of the external world, and keep the super-ego in check. The ego is like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior...
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