Talk was given by Clem Lane, editor of the Chicago Daily News, sometime around nineteen forty-nine in Sioux City, Iowa. I, Bob Anderson, was so very impressed with this talk that when I told him so, he gave me a copy of this talk with the permission to use as I saw fit. I’m transferring it from copy to tape on January thirty-one, nineteen eighty. For the benefit of the few people here tonight, I want to say that an AA speaker’s voice is primarily his own views. These views are not necessarily the views of the group as a whole, nor any considerable proportion of the group. I want to emphasize that tonight because of what I have to say is on a subject that has not been generally discussed before in AA. The title of my talk will be, “The Devil, You Say.” That’s what I plan to talk about, the devil, the prince of darkness, the father of lies, Beelzebub, Mephistopheles, Satan, or whatever you choose to call him.

I plan to talk about him as the source, the inspiration, the external cause of the temptations and urges that comes to us in AA, the maker of hurdles that are put in our path, the siren call that would lure us from the happiness that is AA. Now, there may be those among you who will say, “Gosh, I’m having enough trouble to work out my ideas about a higher power, about God, and now comes this butter brain to talk about the devil, to talk about a lower power. What goes on here anyway?” And that’s a fair question, and I’ll try to answer it as I go along. I think there can be no argument that we all, are all tempted at times to do the wrong, to do something contrary to the principles of the Twelve Steps of the recovery program. Let me go a step further and suggest that there are three possible sources of these temptations. They could come from God. They could come from ourselves. They could come from the devil. Let’s examine the possibility that they come from God.

In AA, we appeal to a higher power for personal help, to God, and we know that we get that help. The fact that we are here, the fact that we are sober demonstrates that we get that help. There are thousands upon thousands of testimonials in AA alone that that help is to be had from God for the asking. And we know that God wills only good for us. Every day we spend in AA gives deeper, profounder knowledge of that. It just doesn’t make sense then that God, who wills only good for us, could be the author of these temptations, temptations which threaten seriously to enmesh us in evil. The second possible source for temptations is ourselves. This is the rationalistic theory, that these are natural phenomena, that they stem from within, that they well up from our subconscious minds. Now, this being AA and a highly individualistic program, you may believe that if you wish. I won’t quarrel with you about your belief.