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MY DEAR WORMWOOD,

I was delighted to hear from Triptweeze that your patient has made some very desirable new acquaintances and that you seeather that the ed married couple who called at his office are just the sort of people ant hihtly sceptical about everything in the world I gather they ore even vaguely pacifist, not onanything that concerns the great mass of their fellow men and from a dash of purely fashionable and literary coood use of all his social, sexual, and intellectual vanity Tell me more Did he commit himself deeply? I don’t mean in words There is a subtle play of looks and tones and laughs by which a Mortal can imply that he is of the sa That is the kind of betrayal you should specially encourage, because the man does not fully realise it himself; and by the time he does you will have made withdrawal difficult

No doubt he must very soon realise that his own faith is in direct opposition to the assumptions on which all the conversation of his new friends is based I don’t think that matters much provided that you can persuade himent of the fact, and this, with the aid of sha as the postponement lasts he will be in a false position He will be silent when he ought to speak and laugh when he ought to be silent He will assume, at first only by his manner, but presently by his words, all sorts of cynical and sceptical attitudes which are not really his But if you play him well, theythey are pretending to be This is elementary The real question is how to prepare for the Ene as possible the moment at which he realises this new pleasure as a te about "the World" as one of the great standard teht seem difficult to do But fortunately they have said very little about it for the last few decades In h I see much (indeed s about Worldly Vanities, the Choice of Friends, and the Value of Time All that, your patient would probably classify as "Puritanisiven to that word is one of the really solid triumphs of the last hundred years? By it we rescue annually thousands of humans from temperance, chastity, and sobriety of life

Sooner or later, however, the real nature of his new friends must become clear to him, and then your tacticsenough fool you can get him to realise the character of the friends only while they are absent; their presence can be made to sweep away all criticism If this succeeds, he can be induced to live, as I have knownperiods, two parallel lives; he will not only appear to be, but actually be, a differentthis, there is a subtler andmethod He can be made to take a positive pleasure in the perception that the two sides of his life are inconsistent This is done by exploiting his vanity He can be taught to enjoy kneeling beside the grocer on Sunday just because he rerocer could not possibly understand the urbane and ; and contrariwise, to enjoy the bawdy and blasphemy over the coffee with these admirable friends all the more because he is aware of a "deeper", "spiritual" world within him which they cannot understand You see the idea - the worldly friends touch hirocer on the other, and he is the complete, balanced, co permanently treacherous to at least two sets of people, he will feel, instead of shame, a continual undercurrent of self-satisfaction Finally, if all else fails, you can persuade him, in defiance of conscience, to continue the new acquaintance on the ground that he is, in soood" by theat their jokes, and that to cease to do so would be "priggish", "intolerant", and (of course) "Puritanical"

Meanwhile you will of course take the obvious precaution of seeing that this new developlect his work and hisevasiveness or rudeness, will be invaluable for the aggravation of the domestic tension,

Your affectionate uncle

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