A letter from an affectionate Uncle - on God’s character.
Dear Wormwood,
To anticipate the Enemy’s strategy, we must consider His aims. The Enemy wants to birng the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being anymore or less or otherwise glad at having it done he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoce in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour’s talents- or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures, even himself, as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long term- policy I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self love- a charity and gratitute for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours. For we must never forget what is the most repellent and inexplicable trait in our Enemy; He really loves the hairless bipeds He has created and alwyays gives back to them with His right what He has taken away with His left…
Remember always, that He really likes the little vermin, and sets an absurd value on he distinctness of every one of them. When He talks about their losing their selves, He only means abandoning the clamour of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.
- Excerpts taken from Screwtape Letters
