Previous chapters at the bottom.
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My dear Uncle Screwtape,
It amuses me that you should mention the great pestilence that struck the world so recently. Your assessment of our devices was, as often, perceptive. Yet, like you, we continue to dispute among ourselves to what extent the affair bore the Enemy’s signature. Certainly, He must authorize all that occurs. What is clear to us is that the outbreak proved far less advantageous to our designs than one might suppose looking on -- at least initially. It disrupted our enterprises and forced us into the tiresome business of improvisation.
At the time, we had high hopes of shaping a second term with far greater intentionality than the first had allowed. Chiefly, there remained too much stability among the middle layers of government to produce the height of chaos we desired. Our response was to begin cultivating contempt for those dull but dependable bureaucrats who keep the machinery of the nation working according to its laws. We began planting a sense that it was some nefarious "deep state," a swamp in need of cleansing.
It is hard for those who go to such lengths in their devotion to admit they might have been mistaken. In ordinary times, it is easy enough to persuade a human that he is right. But the more absurd the cause he must defend, the more fiercely he seems to cling to it. What exquisite comedy this provides us! We see them become most certain precisely when they are most deceived.
Their hero, after all, was shown publicly to have strayed from truth virtually as a matter of habit. Scarcely a pronouncement escaped without some artful distortion. The pattern was plain to any mind still capable of reason, yet how immense was the cloud that veiled the eyes of the faithful! They saw in their blindness a kind of light.
We had little appetite to return to the petty, everyday temptations. We craved mass deception! And the Enemy, it seemed, had snatched it from us. What were we to do?
In desperation, we roused a crowd to such frenzy that we hoped they might storm the very seat of their government and overturn the outcome of their choosing. Many were merely deluded into thinking a vast wrong had been done to their champion. But in some, our agents had succeeded in planting darker visions, whispers of bloodshed and assassination.
I am persuaded that the Enemy Himself restrained them. He never confides His hidden purposes to us, but we came too close for our prevention to have been by mere chance. In bitter disappointment, we concluded that our reign of chaos had been curtailed once again.
But we were wrong to fear. I dare not say that the Enemy has worked all things for our good, yet the interval for plotting these past four years has proven immensely fruitful. In the hands of certain of these creatures we discovered an inventiveness at times -- dare I say it -- almost beyond our own. How perversely creative they can be! I shall not confess that we borrowed from their conspiracies, though one might almost think it so.
Perhaps in my next letter I can share some of the designs we were able to achieve.
Your devoted nephew,
Wormwood
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Previous chapters
- 1 -- The Operations
- 2 -- The Veil Technique
- 3 -- The Fog
- 4 -- Hard Hearts
- 5 -- Focus on Feelings
- 6 -- Blinding Indignation
- 7 -- Spiritual Inoculation
- 8 -- The Fumes of the Enemy
- 9 -- Moral Inversion
- 10 -- Reliable Race
- 11 -- Misdirection
- 12 -- The Very Elect
- 13 -- The Great Wedge
- 14 -- The Revolt
- 15 -- Deepening the Wedge
- 16 -- Church over State
- 17 -- The Great Election
- 18 -- The Great Pestilence
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