Preview
Copywork
About This Passage
Screwtape is complaining here, but what he complains about is one of life's quiet joys. He admits that if the devils left people alone, they would be 'transported' — filled with delight — by simple things that are new and familiar at the same time: the snowdrops that come up every January but feel fresh again, the sunrise that happens every morning yet still looks beautiful, the plum pudding that returns every Christmas and is loved each time. This mixing of 'novelty and familiarity' is a special kind of happiness: the thing is the same dear thing as last year, and yet it comes to us new. Copying this sentence helps a reader notice and treasure the happiness of things that return — and to see that you do not need something brand-new to be glad.
If we neglect our duty, men will be not only contented but transported by the mixed novelty and familiarity of snowdrops this January, sunrise this morning, plum pudding this Christmas.
Full copywork activity with handwriting lines available in the complete study guide.
Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Tell the story of Screwtape's twenty-fifth letter to Wormwood in your own words. What good gift did the Enemy give people by making both change and sameness pleasant? And how do the devils twist the love of new things into something that never lets people be happy?
Discussion Questions
- Screwtape says the Enemy joined change and sameness together in the seasons, so 'spring is always felt as a novelty yet always as the recurrence' of the same beloved spring. Why is it a special kind of happiness when something is both new and familiar, like Christmas or a fresh sunrise each morning? Which detail in the letter to Wormwood helps you decide?
- Screwtape wants to twist the gentle love of new things into a 'demand for absolute novelty' — always needing something newer and never enjoying what you have. Why does always wanting the newest thing make a person less happy instead of more? Name the detail in the letter to Wormwood that shows what happens to a person's pleasure.
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Vocabulary Builder
Item 1
To become different, or the act of becoming different.
Item 2
One of the four parts of the year, like spring or winter.
Item 3
A steady pattern of things returning again and again.
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Critical Thinking
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