My Dear Wormwood,

So, you have allowed your patient to feel a small glimmer of that disgusting grace offered from the Enemy. Why in Hell's name did you allow him to break out of his isolation? Did you not see the danger when your patient's friend started telling him about his own experiences with addiction? The hope in that servant of the Enemy's eye is exactly what you should have avoided. Could you not see that hope is like the Spanish Influenza in that spreads from one person to another quickly, easily and deadly for your purpose. You were left reeling and bewildered after that awful hope took hold and found a place in his heart. You deserve this pain you feel now; you know it and I hope you start feeling the punishment that awaits you if you allow more monumental failures like this to occur.

Here are two methods that you should have done instead. Like a frightened turtle, you should have your patient withdraw into his self. Your patient has become used to seeing the world as if he is an observer in his own body. He has been taught to withdraw emotionally because he feels such shame about his own actions. And always remember that shame is different then guilt. Guilt can come from the Enemy as a method of inducing repentance and change while shame is used to beat your patient over the head again and again like a giant's club. Guilt says "I have done something bad" while shame says "I am bad through and through". The shame, which is under your control, would have been effective if you had kept your head. Instead of allowing him to open up about his own feelings, you should have told your patient be ashamed of his own actions and jealous of his friend. That jealousy could have been used to make your man hate his friend and cut off all contact with him. Like the alcoholic banging his head on the bar muttering about his former drinking buddies who went and got sober. That is the goal you should have striven for.

On the other hand, you might have had your patient respond with flippancy. A quick-witted joke would have been just the trick to have your patient focus again on himself. He would have been quite taken with his own cleverness and thrown the honesty his friend shared back in his face. Not Taking Things Seriously is one of the most effective weapons that Our Father Below has produced in this generation. To even appear to care about something is almost a sacrilege in modern American society. Everything is a joke to most people, everything is up for mockery, nothing is held sacred, nothing is truly valued. To respond with humor as a cover for real feelings is one of the finest defenses against the Enemy. To laugh and shrug off a chance at emotional intimacy has broken hearts and ruined marriages and separated parents from children and friend from friend. The delicacy in which Our Father Below has brought about this great attack has been a significant achievement and yet you did not take advantage of it. However, there is still much that can be done to bring your patient back down.

I spoke of resentment in passing in my last correspondence and now it is time to give you a fuller understanding of the ways that this dart can sink into your patient's mind to bring him back into the chains of addiction. To begin, your patient is not only addicted to lust but also to a host of other negative character traits and resentment is prominent among them. Much like a magician you must distract your patient with thought of avoiding lust so that he does not suspect that you are working on building up his resentment. The following method is standard practice.

Here is the resentment cycle with which you must lead your patient by the nose. Something happens which has the potential to upset or create negative feelings in your man. The "something" can be a real incident or just his perceptions of that incident or even something that does not concern him in the slightest. Remember though that it is at the point of the incident occuring that you must strike. We cannot, and neither can the Enemy, make humans do anything. That is against the rules the Enemy has set for this world although we will bring His rule and rules to an end. What we can do is tempt your patient to take offense from the aforementioned incident. If he is of the Enemy's camp your man will realize what is happening to him and turn to Him, but most humans hang onto that offense and resentment is thus born. Here is what you must do afterwards.

Based on that real or imagined incident, enmity is planted in your patient's head and heart against the offending party

That enmity (or resetnment if you prefer) produces feelings of satisfaction and pleasure in your patient because he is "right".

That new false reality that is in your patient's head hides the wrong done by your patient, he thinks that he does not have to deal with it.

This is where you come in Wormwoood, bring the incident back into the mind of your patient again and again!

Once that happens your patient will be the judge and jury against the offending party and your man will want to recaprute that original resentful high. He will decide yet again how much he is right and how much the other person is wrong.

The feelings of pleasure return and when it dissipates your man will reach for resentment again and again and again. Always prod him in that direction of

Now this new drug of resentment has a life of its own that has nothing to do with the original incident. In order to feed this drug teach your man to look for any and all reasons to be offended. This will keep your man angry and upset all the time and he will eventually go back to the only drug that he know. Lust.

Your affectionate uncle,

Screwtape