26 May: Boreham on Samuel Pepys

A Wizard's Cauldron
On this, the anniversary of the death, in 1703, of Samuel Pepys, we remind ourselves that it was on May 31, 1669, that Pepys bade a sad farewell to his eyes and to his diary. He was 36 when the lost entry was penned: "And so I betake myself to that course which is almost as much as to see myself go into my grave, for which, and all the discomforts that will accompany my being blind, the good God prepare me."

The diary was not written for publication; about that there can be no doubt at all. The pains that Mr. Pepys took to make his entries in a mysterious cypher that he alone could interpret; the fact that the diary remained untranslated and unpublished until well into the 19th century; and the circumstance that the writer shamelessly records episodes and emotions that are altogether to his own discredit, drive us to the conclusion that as he entered up his journal, Mr. Pepys never for a moment envisaged a public scrutiny of his brutally candid folios.

It was George Grenville, Master of Magdalen College, Cambridge, who let the cat out of the bag. Grenville was impressed by the fact that Evelyn's famous diary contained numerous references to a Mr. Samuel Pepys. These passages piqued Grenville's curiosity. He discovered that stored away among the dusty lumber of the college library were the six manuscript volumes which represented the entire compilation of this self-same Samuel Pepys. They were indited in some mysterious system of shorthand of which nobody had any record; but Grenville handed them over to one John Smith, an undergraduate at St. John's College, who took a pride in elucidating just such mysteries.

As a result, the diary was published for the first time in 1825, more than a century and a half after that last pathetic entry had been penned.

The Inner Spirit Of History Presented
Considered as history, the diary is a perfect gold mine. It was not designed as history, yet, as Osmund Airy says, without it the history of the Court of Charles II could never have been written. Mr. Pepys tells us in his own quaint and individualistic style all that the sombre historians of that fascinating and eventful period should have told us, but didn't.

The historians tell us the things that bore us; Pepys tells us the things that we are really curious to know. Sir Walter Scott, who mastered the high art of presenting us with the essence of history under the guise of colourful romance, regarded Samuel Pepys as the ideal historian. No volumes ever written, Sir Walter insists, are so wonderfully rich.

Pepys' curiosity made him an unwearied as well as a universal learner, and all that he saw found its way into his pages. Thus, Sir Walter concludes, the diary of Samuel Pepys resembles the genial cauldrons of Comacho, a souse into which was thrown such an abundance and variety that the most fastidious appetite would be fully gratified.

In judging the diary it must be remembered that Pepys lived his eventful life in the most dissolute period of English history, and is unconsciously infected by the temper of the time. Moreover he was in immediate touch with, and under the direct authority of, the fountainhead of the general pollution. It would have been passing strange if, under such conditions, his pages had contracted no stain. It may reasonably be argued that the diary otherwise, would not have mirrored, as it now does, the heart throbs of the society in which its author moved.

Lord Ponsonby, who made the collection and examination of old diaries the occupation of all his leisure, declares that the least delicate entries in Pepys' are important as demonstrating his absolute honesty as a diarist, and in no way suggest any coarseness in his disposition. Considering the people he met daily and the things he saw daily, the marvel is, Lord Ponsonby avers, that there is so little in the diary to shock us.

His Bark Worse Than His Bite
It is a little unfortunate that so much stress has been laid on those passages that describe the sparks which flew when Samuel and his wife fell out. It is only because of the stark sincerity of the manuscript that such entries occur at all.

Let no man suppose that the pair lived a cat and dog life. Elizabeth St. Michel, the daughter of a Huguenot refugee, was only 15 when she married. She was surpassingly beautiful, and her young husband, who was 22, was inordinately proud of her. Five years after their marriage he takes her to a fashionable wedding at Goring House. The feast is adorned by the loveliest ladies in London, but in all that galaxy of beauty Mr. Pepys can see no face or form of his own Elizabeth. He may occasionally tweak her nose or box her ears, but he worships the ground she treads just the same. And a few years later he spends much time and money in having her portrait painted, first by Hales, and then by Cooper.

Our literature contains a few books that are solitary, distinctive, unique. Among these most exceptional works the diary of Samuel Pepys holds a conspicuous place. It is said that nobody has ever read Spenser's "Faerie Queen" or Cervantes' "Don Quixote" right through.The same is probably true of Pepys' diary, but we have all enjoyed it in small doses. It has been more often parodied than any other prose work, and parody is the pinnacle of compliment. Then, too, the whimsical little mannerisms of Mr. Pepys have crept into all our vocabularies. His "up betimes" and his "and so to bed" are echoed every day. His work fills a great place in our literature and in our lives, and the world would seem a strange place without it.

F W Boreham

Image: Samuel Pepys