Thank you for your letter dated … The news of your entering the r. cathol. church was indeed unexpected. But whether it's good or bad news how would I know. This seems clear to me. The decision to become a Christian is like the decision to give up walking on

the ground
roads & paths

& to ˇtake up walk⌊ing⌋ on a tightrope; Instead where nothing is more easy than to slip & every slip can be fatal. Now if a friend of mine were to take up tightrope walking & told me that in order to do it he has to wear a particular garment I should say to him: If you're serious about th[a|e]t tightrope walking I'm certainly not the man to

tell you
say

what

outfit
clothes

you should or should⌊|⌋n'⌊o⌋t wear, as I've myself have never tried

to walk on a rope
the thing

. Further your decision to wear these

clothes is in a sense terrible, however

one may
you

look at it. For if they mean that you're going to do the ˇtightrope walking this is terrible even though it may be the best & greatest thing you can do. And if you put these dress in these clothes & then don't do the tightrope

act
walking

this is terrible too in a different way. There's one thing however I'ld warn my friend against. There are certain devices (a weight properly attached ˇin the right way to the body & hanging underneath the rope) which ˇwill make tightrope walking

entirely
quite

easy. With such a device a man can go through all the motions of the tightrope walker

and be in
with

no more danger than there

is in walking on an ordinary footpath. – I [w|sh]ould therefore say to my friend: I cant ap⌊p⌋laud your decision to go in for tightrope walking because a man like myself who has never always sta[i|y]ed ˇsafely on the ground has no right to encourage another

man
person

to such an enterprise. On the other hand [I|i]f I'm am to decide whether were asked whether my friend should rather go in for

this dangerous life
tightrope walking

or for shaming

it
tightrope walking

I should say that he should do anything rather than do the second.
I'd have a right to say that the second would be by far more terrible than the first.

I am My only wish for you can be that ˇwhatever you do you

will remain
should always be

capable of despairing, &

that you
yet

ˇwill

never
not◇

despair.¹

Editorial notes

1) This is the draft of a letter that was sent to Yorick Smythies, dated "7.4.[1944]", and is published in Ludwig Wittgenstein: Gesamtbriefwechsel, Innsbruck Electronic Edition (2011).

Editorial notes

(2015–) Wittgenstein Source Bergen Nachlass Edition (WS-BNE). Edited by the Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Bergen under the direction of Alois Pichler. In: Wittgenstein Source, curated by Alois Pichler (2009–) and Joseph Wang-Kathrein (2020–). (N) Bergen: WAB.