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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Reconstruct the argument of Screwtape's twenty-eighth letter to Wormwood in sequence — the rebuke for delighting in the prospect of the patient's death, the startling conclusion that the devils' present aim is the man's 'bodily safety' so that Wormwood 'should be guarding him like the apple of your eye,' the claim that 'if only he can be kept alive, you have time itself for your ally,' the two campaigns of the middle years (wearing 'out a soul by attrition' and the prosperity that 'knits a man to the World'), and the deeper admission that the Enemy has 'oddly destined these mere animals to life in His own eternal world' so that an 'inveterate ... appetite for Heaven' keeps 'blowing our whole structure away.' Then state the single corruption you take to organize the letter, and weigh why time, rather than any one temptation, is the weapon Screwtape most prizes.
Discussion Questions
- Screwtape insists the patient's death 'at this moment, is precisely what we want to avoid' and that Wormwood 'should be guarding him like the apple of your eye' — the very 'bodily safety' for which 'the patient's lover and his mother are praying.' Why does the tempter's immediate goal here coincide exactly with the prayer of those who love the man, and what does that strange convergence reveal about the difference between what Hell actually wants and what merely looks, from inside the war, like good fortune or disaster? Use his words to Wormwood, and explain why your reading is stronger.
- Screwtape says a 'great human philosopher nearly let our secret out' with the warning that 'where Virtue is concerned' 'Experience is the mother of illusion,' but 'thanks to a change in Fashion, and also, of course, to the Historical Point of View, we have largely rendered his book innocuous' — the same Historical Point of View he boasted of in the previous letter. Reading the two letters together, why is it more useful to Hell to leave a dangerous truth in print yet strip it of force than to suppress it outright, and why does the habit of asking when a thing was said rather than whether it is true accomplish exactly that? Use details from this letter and the earlier one to Wormwood, and explain why your reading is stronger.
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Critical Thinking
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