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VII

MY DEAR WORMWOOD,

I wonder you should ask norance of your own existence That question, at least for the present phase of the struggle, has been answered for us by the High Command Our policy, for the moment, is to conceal ourselves Of course this has not always been so We are really faced with a cruel dilemma When the hu results of direct terrorisicians On the other hand, when they believe in us, we cannot make thereat hopes that we shall learn in due tiise their science to such an extent that what is, in effect, belief in us, (though not under that name) will creep in while the human mind remains closed to belief in the Enemy The "Life Force", the worship of sex, and some aspects of Psychoanalysis, may here prove useful If once we can produce our perfect work - the Materialist Magician, the uely calls "Forces" while denying the existence of "spirits" - then the end of the ill be in sight But in the meantime we must obey our orders I do not think you will havethe patient in the dark The fact that "devils" are predoination will help you If any faint suspicion of your existence begins to arise in his hts, and persuade him that since he cannot believe in that (it is an old textbooktheotten my promise to consider whether we should make the patient an extreme patriot or an extreme pacifist All extreed Not always, of course, but at this period Soes are lukewarm and complacent, and then it is our business to soothe thees, of which the present is one, are unbalanced and prone to faction, and it is our business to inflaether by sonore, tends to develop inside itself a hothouse reat deal of pride and hatred which is entertained without shaht to be iinally for the Enemy’s own purposes, this remains true We want the Church to be small not only that fewer men may know the Enemy but also that those who do htousness of a secret society or a clique The Church herself is, of course, heavily defended and we have never yet quite succeeded in giving her all the characteristics of a faction; but subordinate factions within her have often produced admirable results, from the parties of Paul and of Apollos at Corinth down to the High and Low parties in the Church of England

If your patient can be induced to become a conscientious objector he will autoanised, unpopular society, and the effects of this, on one so new to Christianity, will alood But only almost certainly Has he had serious doubts about the lawfulness serving in a just war before this present war of serving began? Is he a reat that he will have no half-conscious s about the real motives of his pacifism? Can he, when nearest to honesty (no human is ever very near), feel fully convinced that he actuated wholly by the desire to obey the Enemy? If he is that sort of ood, and the Enemy will probably protect hi to a sect Your best plan, in that case, would be to atteht es can often be ed But if he is the man I take him to be, try Pacifism

Whichever he adopts, yourthe Patriotision Then let hiard it as the radually nurse hiion becomes merely part of the "cause", in which Christianity is valued chiefly because of the excellent arguments it can produce in favour of the British war-effort or of Pacifisainst is that in which temporal affairs are treated primarily as material for obedience Once you have made the World an end, and faith a means, you have almost won your man, and it makes very little difference what kind of worldly end he is pursuing Provided that s, pamphlets, policies, movements, causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraious" (on those tereful down here,

Your affectionate uncle

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