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Devil's food
Alice Thomas Ellis
Ican't decide whether the possession Of a religious temperament is a curse or a blessing. Since God does exist I suppose it's just as well to be aware of the fact, so that one can be careful not to upset Hum but the very idea of getting on the wrong side of Him can — quite correctly — be a scource of some anxiety. For example, I don't want to be martyred. I really trulY don't, and thus I feel ungenerous andcowardly. On St Valentine's Day I don t think about sweethearts and ribbons and ,o roses. I think about St Valentine and wonder how they put him to death, and whether he minded awfully. Reading about the death of Thdrese of Lisieux I worrY about the poor little thing's sufferings• which is ridiculous since after that she went straight to Heaven, which was all she ever wanted to do. I want that too, but I don t want to have to be heroic about it. I don't want to wake up in the night to . see the devil by the dressing table, reaching out for me,. and I think I shall get into the habit of keeping holy water in the house (for nothing is so effiCacious) just in case. There isn't really much fear of this as the devil doesn't waste his time on sinners, preferring to tease and torment the truly virtuous, but it's a nasty thought. I was wondering the other day why it is that nobody has recently reported a sighting of • him, and then I thought that with mass communications and the media he doesn't need to stir himself. He's lying down there lo Hell with his feet up since one only has to open the Sun or the News of the World to be faced with evil in most of its manifestations and to be tainted by its effects.
Much of our 'entertainment' is to the soul what junk food is to the body — at the very least lacking in nourishment, and sometimes positively bristling with sal- monella. I watched a bit of Dallas the other evening and it did nothing to ease my melancholy. It's no use saying it's merely ridiculous, it's horrid. Brookside and East- Enders have become rather horrid too. Why — you will be asking yourselves — if I find television so unappealing do I watch it? Well, I'll tell you why. I can't be bothered to light a fire every day and imagine pictures in the glowing embers, so I turn on the telly with the sound down and sit reading improving literature while it flickers away in the background. Frequent- ly other family members come in and turn the sound up, and so I am familiar with Many regular programmes, most of which I can't stand. Yes, I know it's, silly.
Perhaps, in the Easter holidays, we will be treated to some Biblical epics, my appreciation of which is also far from pure. At the sight of Yvonne de Carlo as the wife of Moses, Victor Mature in a skirt and almost anyone in a toga I weep with hysteria. And I love the voice of God VO. It has the same timbre as that of the man in the lager ads. Then there's Gina Lollobri- gida rolling down the steps of the temple in a white negligee being the Queen of Sheba (who, I heard somewhere, had hairy legs) and having the cosiest chat with Jahweh about her future demeanour. One would like to think that one enjoyed these Old Testament movies for their spiritual con- tent, but as they haven't got any one can only be thankful that they're so jolly funny.
A family member has just turned up the sound on the news— which is unmitigated- ly bad. So I shall spend the rest of the day reading either Thomas a Kempis or P. G. Wcidehouse •and think on those things that are lovely and of good report. And I might invest in a hair shirt (there's a joke there somewhere) just as long as I don't have to be eaten by a wild beast. I've got the skin of a wild beast in the form of a coat. I suppose I could wear it fur-side inside.
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