IN two books a fresh light has recently been thrown on the character and position of Samuel Pepys. Mr. Mynors Bright has given us a new transcription of the Diary, increasing it in bulk by near a third, correcting many errors, and completing our knowledge of the man in some curious and important points. We can only regret that he has taken liberties with the author and the public. It is no part of the duties of the editor of an established classic to decide what may or may not be “tedious to the reader.” The book is either an historical document or not, and in condemning2 Lord Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns3 himself. As for the time-honoured phrase, “unfit for publication,” without being cynical4, we may regard it as the sign of a precaution more or less commercial; and we may think, without being sordid5, that when we purchase six huge and distressingly6 expensive volumes, we are entitled to be treated rather more like scholars and rather less like children. But Mr. Bright may rest assured: while we complain, we are still grateful. Mr. Wheatley, to divide our obligation, brings together, clearly and with no lost words, a body of illustrative material. Sometimes we might ask a little more; never, I think, less. And as a matter of fact, a great part of Mr. Wheatley’s volume might be transferred, by a good editor of Pepys, to the margin9 of the text, for it is precisely10 what the reader wants.
In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to read our author. Between them they contain all we can expect to learn for, it may be, many years. Now, if ever we should be able to form some notion of that unparalleled figure in the annals of mankind — unparalleled for three good reasons: first, because he was a man known to his contemporaries in a halo of almost historical pomp, and to his remote descendants with an indecent familiarity, like a tap-room comrade; second, because he has outstripped11 all competitors in the art or virtue12 of a conscious honesty about oneself; and, third, because, being in many ways a very ordinary person, he has yet placed himself before the public eye with such a fulness and such an intimacy13 of detail as might be envied by a genius like Montaigne. Not then for his own sake only, but as a character in a unique position, endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a unique light upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely worthy14 of prolonged and patient study.
The Diary.
That there should be such a book as Pepys’s Diary is incomparably strange. Pepys, in a corrupt15 and idle period, played the man in public employments, toiling16 hard and keeping his honour bright. Much of the little good that is set down to James the Second comes by right to Pepys; and if it were little for a king, it is much for a subordinate. To his clear, capable head was owing somewhat of the greatness of England on the seas. In the exploits of Hawke, Rodney, or Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys of the Navy Office had some considerable share. He stood well by his business in the appalling17 plague of 1666. He was loved and respected by some of the best and wisest men in England. He was President of the Royal Society; and when he came to die, people said of his conduct in that solemn hour — thinking it needless to say more — that it was answerable to the greatness of his life. Thus he walked in dignity, guards of soldiers sometimes attending him in his walks, subalterns bowing before his periwig; and when he uttered his thoughts they were suitable to his state and services. On February 8, 1668, we find him writing to Evelyn, his mind bitterly occupied with the late Dutch war, and some thoughts of the different story of the repulse19 of the Great Armada: “Sir, you will not wonder at the backwardness of my thanks for the present you made me, so many days since, of the Prospect20 of the Medway, while the Hollander rode master in it, when I have told you that the sight of it hath led me to such reflections on my particular interest, by my employment, in the reproach due to that miscarriage21, as have given me little less disquiet22 than he is fancied to have who found his face in Michael Angelo’s hell. The same should serve me also in excuse for my silence in celebrating your mastery shown in the design and draught23, did not indignation rather than courtship urge me so far to commend them, as to wish the furniture of our House of Lords changed from the story of ‘88 to that of ‘67 (of Evelyn’s designing), till the pravity of this were reformed to the temper of that age, wherein God Almighty24 found his blessings26 more operative than, I fear, he doth in ours his judgments28.”
This is a letter honourable29 to the writer, where the meaning rather than the words is eloquent30. Such was the account he gave of himself to his contemporaries; such thoughts he chose to utter, and in such language: giving himself out for a grave and patriotic31 public servant. We turn to the same date in the Diary by which he is known, after two centuries, to his descendants. The entry begins in the same key with the letter, blaming the “madness of the House of Commons” and “the base proceedings32, just the epitome33 of all our public proceedings in this age, of the House of Lords;” and then, without the least transition, this is how our diarist proceeds: “To the Strand34, to my bookseller’s, and there bought an idle, rogueish French book, L’ESCHOLLE DES FILLES, which I have bought in plain binding35, avoiding the buying of it better bound, because I resolve, as soon as I have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand in the list of books, nor among them, to disgrace them, if it should be found.” Even in our day, when responsibility is so much more clearly apprehended36, the man who wrote the letter would be notable; but what about the man, I do not say who bought a roguish book, but who was ashamed of doing so, yet did it, and recorded both the doing and the shame in the pages of his daily journal?
We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape ourselves when we address our fellows; at a given moment we apprehend37 our character and acts by some particular side; we are merry with one, grave with another, as befits the nature and demands of the relation. Pepys’s letter to Evelyn would have little in common with that other one to Mrs. Knipp which he signed by the pseudonym38 of DAPPER DICKY; yet each would be suitable to the character of his correspondent. There is no untruth in this, for man, being a Protean39 animal, swiftly shares and changes with his company and surroundings; and these changes are the better part of his education in the world. To strike a posture40 once for all, and to march through life like a drum-major, is to be highly disagreeable to others and a fool for oneself into the bargain. To Evelyn and to Knipp we understand the double facing; but to whom was he posing in the Diary, and what, in the name of astonishment41, was the nature of the pose? Had he suppressed all mention of the book, or had he bought it, gloried in the act, and cheerfully recorded his glorification42, in either case we should have made him out. But no; he is full of precautions to conceal43 the “disgrace” of the purchase, and yet speeds to chronicle the whole affair in pen and ink. It is a sort of anomaly in human action, which we can exactly parallel from another part of the Diary.
Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints against her husband, and written it in plain and very pungent44 English. Pepys, in an agony lest the world should come to see it, brutally45 seizes and destroys the tell-tale document; and then — you disbelieve your eyes — down goes the whole story with unsparing truth and in the cruellest detail. It seems he has no design but to appear respectable, and here he keeps a private book to prove he was not. You are at first faintly reminded of some of the vagaries46 of the morbid47 religious diarist; but at a moment’s thought the resemblance disappears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify48; it is not from repentance49 that he chronicles his peccadilloes51, for he tells us when he does repent50, and, to be just to him, there often follows some improvement. Again, the sins of the religious diarist are of a very formal pattern, and are told with an elaborate whine52. But in Pepys you come upon good, substantive53 misdemeanours; beams in his eye of which he alone remains54 unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the animal nature, and laughable subterfuges55 to himself that always command belief and often engage the sympathies.
Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to himself in the world, sowed his wild oats late, took late to industry, and preserved till nearly forty the headlong gusto of a boy. So, to come rightly at the spirit in which the Diary was written, we must recall a class of sentiments which with most of us are over and done before the age of twelve. In our tender years we still preserve a freshness of surprise at our prolonged existence; events make an impression out of all proportion to their consequence; we are unspeakably touched by our own past adventures, and look forward to our future personality with sentimental57 interest. It was something of this, I think, that clung to Pepys. Although not sentimental in the abstract, he was sweetly sentimental about himself. His own past clung about his heart, an evergreen58. He was the slave of an association. He could not pass by Islington, where his father used to carry him to cakes and ale, but he must light at the “King’s Head” and eat and drink “for remembrance of the old house sake.” He counted it good fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew his old walks, “where Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and talk, with whom I had the first sentiments of love and pleasure in a woman’s company, discourse60 and taking her by the hand, she being a pretty woman.” He goes about weighing up the ASSURANCE, which lay near Woolwich underwater, and cries in a parenthesis61, “Poor ship, that I have been twice merry in, in Captain Holland’s time;” and after revisiting the NASEBY, now changed into the CHARLES, he confesses “it was a great pleasure to myself to see the ship that I began my good fortune in.” The stone that he was cut for he preserved in a case; and to the Turners he kept alive such gratitude62 for their assistance that for years, and after he had begun to mount himself into higher zones, he continued to have that family to dinner on the anniversary of the operation. Not Hazlitt nor Rousseau had a more romantic passion for their past, although at times they might express it more romantically; and if Pepys shared with them this childish fondness, did not Rousseau, who left behind him the CONFESSIONS63, or Hazlitt, who wrote the LIBER AMORIS, and loaded his essays with loving personal detail, share with Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two things go hand in hand; or, to be more exact, it is the first that makes the second either possible or pleasing.
But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return once more to the experience of children. I can remember to have written, in the fly-leaf of more than one book, the date and the place where I then was — if, for instance, I was ill in bed or sitting in a certain garden; these were jottings for my future self; if I should chance on such a note in after years, I thought it would cause me a particular thrill to recognise myself across the intervening distance. Indeed, I might come upon them now, and not be moved one tittle — which shows that I have comparatively failed in life, and grown older than Samuel Pepys. For in the Diary we can find more than one such note of perfect childish egotism; as when he explains that his candle is going out, “which makes me write thus slobberingly;” or as in this incredible particularity, “To my study, where I only wrote thus much of this day’s passages to this *, and so out again;” or lastly, as here, with more of circumstance: “I staid up till the bellman came by with his bell under my window, AS I WAS WRITING OF THIS VERY LINE, and cried, ‘Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning.’” Such passages are not to be misunderstood. The appeal to Samuel Pepys years hence is unmistakable. He desires that dear, though unknown, gentleman keenly to realise his predecessor65; to remember why a passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, with a sigh) the tones of the bellman, the chill of the early, windy morning, and the very line his own romantic self was scribing at the moment. The man, you will perceive, was making reminiscences — a sort of pleasure by ricochet, which comforts many in distress7, and turns some others into sentimental libertines66: and the whole book, if you will but look at it in that way, is seen to be a work of art to Pepys’s own address.
Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable67 attitude preserved by him throughout his Diary, to that unflinching — I had almost said, that unintelligent — sincerity68 which makes it a miracle among human books. He was not unconscious of his errors — far from it; he was often startled into shame, often reformed, often made and broke his vows70 of change. But whether he did ill or well, he was still his own unequalled self; still that entrancing EGO64 of whom alone he cared to write; and still sure of his own affectionate indulgence, when the parts should be changed, and the Writer come to read what he had written. Whatever he did, or said, or thought, or suffered, it was still a trait of Pepys, a character of his career; and as, to himself, he was more interesting than Moses or than Alexander, so all should be faithfully set down. I have called his Diary a work of art. Now when the artist has found something, word or deed, exactly proper to a favourite character in play or novel, he will neither suppress nor diminish it, though the remark be silly or the act mean. The hesitation71 of Hamlet, the credulity of Othello, the baseness of Emma Bovary, or the irregularities of Mr. Swiveller, caused neither disappointment nor disgust to their creators. And so with Pepys and his adored protagonist72: adored not blindly, but with trenchant73 insight and enduring, human toleration. I have gone over and over the greater part of the Diary; and the points where, to the most suspicious scrutiny74, he has seemed not perfectly75 sincere, are so few, so doubtful, and so petty, that I am ashamed to name them. It may be said that we all of us write such a diary in airy characters upon our brain; but I fear there is a distinction to be made; I fear that as we render to our consciousness an account of our daily fortunes and behaviour, we too often weave a tissue of romantic compliments and dull excuses; and even if Pepys were the ass1 and cowardly that men call him, we must take rank as sillier and more cowardly than he. The bald truth about oneself, what we are all too timid to admit when we are not too dull to see it, that was what he saw clearly and set down unsparingly.
It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on in the same single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was not such an ass, but he must have perceived, as he went on, the extraordinary nature of the work he was producing. He was a great reader, and he knew what other books were like. It must, at least, have crossed his mind that some one might ultimately decipher the manuscript, and he himself, with all his pains and pleasures, be resuscitated78 in some later day; and the thought, although discouraged, must have warmed his heart. He was not such an ass, besides, but he must have been conscious of the deadly explosives, the gun-cotton and the giant powder, he was hoarding79 in his drawer. Let some contemporary light upon the journal, and Pepys was plunged80 for ever in social and political disgrace. We can trace the growth of his terrors by two facts. In 1660, while the Diary was still in its youth, he tells about it, as a matter of course, to a lieutenant81 in the navy; but in 1669, when it was already near an end, he could have bitten his tongue out, as the saying is, because he had let slip his secret to one so grave and friendly as Sir William Coventry. And from two other facts I think we may infer that he had entertained, even if he had not acquiesced82 in, the thought of a far-distant publicity83. The first is of capital importance: the Diary was not destroyed. The second — that he took unusual precautions to confound the cipher77 in “rogueish” passages — proves, beyond question, that he was thinking of some other reader besides himself. Perhaps while his friends were admiring the “greatness of his behaviour” at the approach of death, he may have had a twinkling hope of immortality84. MENS CUJUSQUE IS EST QUISQUE, said his chosen motto; and, as he had stamped his mind with every crook85 and foible in the pages of the Diary, he might feel that what he left behind him was indeed himself. There is perhaps no other instance so remarkable of the desire of man for publicity and an enduring name. The greatness of his life was open, yet he longed to communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries bowed before him, he must buttonhole posterity86 with the news that his periwig was once alive with nits. But this thought, although I cannot doubt he had it, was neither his first nor his deepest; it did not colour one word that he wrote; and the Diary, for as long as he kept it, remained what it was when he began, a private pleasure for himself. It was his bosom87 secret; it added a zest88 to all his pleasures; he lived in and for it, and might well write these solemn words, when he closed that confidant for ever: “And so I betake myself to that course which is almost as much as to see myself go into the grave; for which, and all the discomforts89 that will accompany my being blind, the good God prepare me.”
A Liberal Genius.
Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he had taken physic, composing “a song in praise of a liberal genius (such as I take my own to be) to all studies and pleasures.” The song was unsuccessful, but the Diary is, in a sense, the very song that he was seeking; and his portrait by Hales, so admirably reproduced in Mynors Bright’s edition, is a confirmation90 of the Diary. Hales, it would appear, had known his business; and though he put his sitter to a deal of trouble, almost breaking his neck “to have the portrait full of shadows,” and draping him in an Indian gown hired expressly for the purpose, he was preoccupied91 about no merely picturesque93 effects, but to portray94 the essence of the man. Whether we read the picture by the Diary or the Diary by the picture, we shall at least agree that Hales was among the number of those who can “surprise the manners in the face.” Here we have a mouth pouting95, moist with desires; eyes greedy, protuberant96, and yet apt for weeping too; a nose great alike in character and dimensions; and altogether a most fleshly, melting countenance97. The face is attractive by its promise of reciprocity. I have used the word GREEDY, but the reader must not suppose that he can change it for that closely kindred one of HUNGRY, for there is here no aspiration98, no waiting for better things, but an animal joy in all that comes. It could never be the face of an artist; it is the face of a VIVEUR— kindly99, pleased and pleasing, protected from excess and upheld in contentment by the shifting versatility100 of his desires. For a single desire is more rightly to be called a lust8; but there is health in a variety, where one may balance and control another.
The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the most eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done with the most lively pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all the shows of the world and all the secrets of knowledge, filled him brimful of the longing101 to travel, and supported him in the toils102 of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he was never happier than when he read or talked of the Eternal City. When he was in Holland, he was “with child” to see any strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing with them in a palace near the Hague, his pen fails him to express his passion of delight, “the more so because in a heaven of pleasure and in a strange country.” He must go to see all famous executions. He must needs visit the body of a murdered man, defaced “with a broad wound,” he says, “that makes my hand now shake to write of it.” He learned to dance, and was “like to make a dancer.” He learned to sing, and walked about Gray’s Inn Fields “humming to myself (which is now my constant practice) the trillo.” He learned to play the lute103, the flute104, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it was not the fault of his intention if he did not learn the harpsichord106 or the spinet107. He learned to compose songs, and burned to give forth108 “a scheme and theory of music not yet ever made in the world.” When he heard “a fellow whistle like a bird exceeding well,” he promised to return another day and give an angel for a lesson in the art. Once, he writes, “I took the Bezan back with me, and with a brave gale109 and tide reached up that night to the Hope, taking great pleasure in learning the seamen’s manner of singing when they sound the depths.” If he found himself rusty110 in his Latin grammar, he must fall to it like a schoolboy. He was a member of Harrington’s Club till its dissolution, and of the Royal Society before it had received the name. Boyle’s HYDROSTATICS was “of infinite delight” to him, walking in Barnes Elms. We find him comparing Bible concordances, a captious111 judge of sermons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. We find him, in a single year, studying timber and the measurement of timber; tar69 and oil, hemp112, and the process of preparing cordage; mathematics and accounting113; the hull114 and the rigging of ships from a model; and “looking and improving himself of the (naval) stores with” — hark to the fellow! — “great delight.” His familiar spirit of delight was not the same with Shelley’s; but how true it was to him through life! He is only copying something, and behold115, he “takes great pleasure to rule the lines, and have the capital words wrote with red ink;” he has only had his coal-cellar emptied and cleaned, and behold, “it do please him exceedingly.” A hog’s harslett is “a piece of meat he loves.” He cannot ride home in my Lord Sandwich’s coach, but he must exclaim, with breathless gusto, “his noble, rich coach.” When he is bound for a supper party, he anticipates a “glut of pleasure.” When he has a new watch, “to see my childishness,” says he, “I could not forbear carrying it in my hand and seeing what o’clock it was an hundred times.” To go to Vauxhall, he says, and “to hear the nightingales and other birds, hear fiddles116, and there a harp105 and here a Jew’s trump118, and here laughing, and there fine people walking, is mighty25 divertising.” And the nightingales, I take it, were particularly dear to him; and it was again “with great pleasure that he paused to hear them as he walked to Woolwich, while the fog was rising and the April sun broke through.
He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by preference, two agreeable things at once. In his house he had a box of carpenter’s tools, two dogs, an eagle, a canary, and a blackbird that whistled tunes76, lest, even in that full life, he should chance upon an empty moment. If he had to wait for a dish of poached eggs, he must put in the time by playing on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he must read in the book of Tobit or divert his mind with sly advances on the nearest women. When he walked, it must be with a book in his pocket to beguile119 the way in case the nightingales were silent; and even along the streets of London, with so many pretty faces to be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted120, his trail was marked by little debts “for wine, pictures, etc.,” the true headmark of a life intolerant of any joyless passage. He had a kind of idealism in pleasure; like the princess in the fairy story, he was conscious of a rose-leaf out of place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he could not enjoy nor shine in a conversation when he thought himself unsuitably dressed. Dearly as he loved eating, he “knew not how to eat alone;” pleasure for him must heighten pleasure; and the eye and ear must be flattered like the palate ere he avow121 himself content. He had no zest in a good dinner when it fell to be eaten “in a bad street and in a periwig-maker’s house;” and a collation122 was spoiled for him by indifferent music. His body was indefatigable123, doing him yeoman’s service in this breathless chase of pleasures. On April 11, 1662, he mentions that he went to bed “weary, WHICH I SELDOM AM;” and already over thirty, he would sit up all night cheerfully to see a comet. But it is never pleasure that exhausts the pleasure-seeker; for in that career, as in all others, it is failure that kills. The man who enjoys so wholly and bears so impatiently the slightest widowhood from joy, is just the man to lose a night’s rest over some paltry124 question of his right to fiddle117 on the leads, or to be “vexed to the blood” by a solecism in his wife’s attire125; and we find in consequence that he was always peevish126 when he was hungry, and that his head “aked mightily127” after a dispute. But nothing could divert him from his aim in life; his remedy in care was the same as his delight in prosperity; it was with pleasure, and with pleasure only, that he sought to drive out sorrow; and, whether he was jealous of his wife or skulking128 from a bailiff, he would equally take refuge in the theatre. There, if the house be full and the company noble, if the songs be tunable129, the actors perfect, and the play diverting, this odd hero of the secret Diary, this private self-adorer, will speedily be healed of his distresses130.
Equally pleased with a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a tune59 upon the fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was pleased yet more by the beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the mere92 scenic131 attitude in life of his fellow-creatures. He shows himself throughout a sterling132 humanist. Indeed, he who loves himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plenitude of knowledge, is the best equipped of all to love his neighbours. And perhaps it is in this sense that charity may be most properly said to begin at home. It does not matter what quality a person has: Pepys can appreciate and love him for it. He “fills his eyes” with the beauty of Lady Castlemaine; indeed, he may be said to dote upon the thought of her for years; if a woman be good-looking and not painted, he will walk miles to have another sight of her; and even when a lady by a mischance spat133 upon his clothes, he was immediately consoled when he had observed that she was pretty. But, on the other hand, he is delighted to see Mrs. Pett upon her knees, and speaks thus of his Aunt James: “a poor, religious, well-meaning, good soul, talking of nothing but God Almighty, and that with so much innocence134 that mightily pleased me.” He is taken with Pen’s merriment and loose songs, but not less taken with the sterling worth of Coventry. He is jolly with a drunken sailor, but listens with interest and patience, as he rides the Essex roads, to the story of a Quaker’s spiritual trials and convictions. He lends a critical ear to the discourse of kings and royal dukes. He spends an evening at Vauxhall with “Killigrew and young Newport — loose company,” says he, “but worth a man’s being in for once, to know the nature of it, and their manner of talk and lives.” And when a rag-boy lights him home, he examines him about his business and other ways of livelihood135 for destitute136 children. This is almost half-way to the beginning of philanthropy; had it only been the fashion, as it is at present, Pepys had perhaps been a man famous for good deeds. And it is through this quality that he rises, at times, superior to his surprising egotism; his interest in the love affairs of others is, indeed, impersonal137; he is filled with concern for my Lady Castlemaine, whom he only knows by sight, shares in her very jealousies138, joys with her in her successes; and it is not untrue, however strange it seems in his abrupt139 presentment, that he loved his maid Jane because she was in love with his man Tom.
Let us hear him, for once, at length: “So the women and W. Hewer and I walked upon the Downes, where a flock of sheep was; and the most pleasant and innocent sight that ever I saw in my life. We found a shepherd and his little boy reading, far from any houses or sight of people, the Bible to him; so I made the boy read to me, which he did with the forced tone that children do usually read, that was mighty pretty; and then I did give him something, and went to the father, and talked with him. He did content himself mightily in my liking140 his boy’s reading, and did bless God for him, the most like one of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in my life, and it brought those thoughts of the old age of the world in my mind for two or three days after. We took notice of his woolen141 knit stockings of two colours mixed, and of his shoes shod with iron, both at the toe and heels, and with great nails in the soles of his feet, which was mighty pretty; and taking notice of them, ‘Why,’ says the poor man, ‘the downes, you see, are full of stones, and we are faine to shoe ourselves thus; and these,’ says he, ‘will make the stones fly till they ring before me.’ I did give the poor man something, for which he was mighty thankful, and I tried to cast stones with his horne crooke. He values his dog mightily, that would turn a sheep any way which he would have him, when he goes to fold them; told me there was about eighteen score sheep in his flock, and that he hath four shillings a week the year round for keeping of them; and Mrs. Turner, in the common fields here, did gather one of the prettiest nosegays that ever I saw in my life.”
And so the story rambles142 on to the end of that day’s pleasuring; with cups of milk, and glowworms, and people walking at sundown with their wives and children, and all the way home Pepys still dreaming “of the old age of the world” and the early innocence of man. This was how he walked through life, his eyes and ears wide open, and his hand, you will observe, not shut; and thus he observed the lives, the speech, and the manners of his fellow-men, with prose fidelity143 of detail and yet a lingering glamour144 of romance.
It was “two or three days after” that he extended this passage in the pages of his journal, and the style has thus the benefit of some reflection. It is generally supposed that, as a writer, Pepys must rank at the bottom of the scale of merit. But a style which is indefatigably145 lively, telling, and picturesque through six large volumes of everyday experience, which deals with the whole matter of a life, and yet is rarely wearisome, which condescends146 to the most fastidious particulars, and yet sweeps all away in the forthright147 current of the narrative148, — such a style may be ungrammatical, it may be inelegant, it may be one tissue of mistakes, but it can never be devoid149 of merit. The first and the true function of the writer has been thoroughly150 performed throughout; and though the manner of his utterance151 may be childishly awkward, the matter has been transformed and assimilated by his unfeigned interest and delight. The gusto of the man speaks out fierily152 after all these years. For the difference between Pepys and Shelley, to return to that half-whimsical approximation, is one of quality but not one of degree; in his sphere, Pepys felt as keenly, and his is the true prose of poetry — prose because the spirit of the man was narrow and earthly, but poetry because he was delightedly alive. Hence, in such a passage as this about the Epsom shepherd, the result upon the reader’s mind is entire conviction and unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the thing fell out, not otherwise; and you would no more change it than you would change a sublimity153 of Shakespeare’s, a homely154 touch of Bunyan’s, or a favoured reminiscence of your own.
There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet was not one. The tang was in the family; while he was writing the journal for our enjoyment155 in his comely156 house in Navy Gardens, no fewer than two of his cousins were tramping the fens157, kit158 under arm, to make music to the country girls. But he himself, though he could play so many instruments and pass judgment27 in so many fields of art, remained an amateur. It is not given to any one so keenly to enjoy, without some greater power to understand. That he did not like Shakespeare as an artist for the stage may be a fault, but it is not without either parallel or excuse. He certainly admired him as a poet; he was the first beyond mere actors on the rolls of that innumerable army who have got “To be or not to be” by heart. Nor was he content with that; it haunted his mind; he quoted it to himself in the pages of the Diary, and, rushing in where angels fear to tread, he set it to music. Nothing, indeed, is more notable than the heroic quality of the verses that our little sensualist in a periwig chose out to marry with his own mortal strains. Some gust56 from brave Elizabethan times must have warmed his spirit, as he sat tuning159 his sublime160 theorbo. “To be or not to be. Whether ‘tis nobler” — “Beauty retire, thou dost my pity move” — “It is decreed, nor shall thy fate, O Rome;” — open and dignified161 in the sound, various and majestic162 in the sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly no timid, spirit that selected such a range of themes. Of “Gaze not on Swans,” I know no more than these four words; yet that also seems to promise well. It was, however, on a probable suspicion, the work of his master, Mr. Berkenshaw — as the drawings that figure at the breaking up of a young ladies’ seminary are the work of the professor attached to the establishment. Mr. Berkenshaw was not altogether happy in his pupil. The amateur cannot usually rise into the artist, some leaven163 of the world still clogging164 him; and we find Pepys behaving like a pickthank to the man who taught him composition. In relation to the stage, which he so warmly loved and understood, he was not only more hearty165, but more generous to others. Thus he encounters Colonel Reames, “a man,” says he, “who understands and loves a play as well as I, and I love him for it.” And again, when he and his wife had seen a most ridiculous insipid166 piece, “Glad we were,” he writes, “that Betterton had no part in it.” It is by such a zeal167 and loyalty168 to those who labour for his delight that the amateur grows worthy of the artist. And it should be kept in mind that, not only in art, but in morals, Pepys rejoiced to recognise his betters. There was not one speck169 of envy in the whole human-hearted egotist.
Respectability.
When writers inveigh170 against respectability, in the present degraded meaning of the word, they are usually suspected of a taste for clay pipes and beer cellars; and their performances are thought to hail from the OWL’S NEST of the comedy. They have something more, however, in their eye than the dulness of a round million dinner parties that sit down yearly in old England. For to do anything because others do it, and not because the thing is good, or kind, or honest in its own right, is to resign all moral control and captaincy upon yourself, and go post-haste to the devil with the greater number. We smile over the ascendency of priests; but I had rather follow a priest than what they call the leaders of society. No life can better than that of Pepys illustrate171 the dangers of this respectable theory of living. For what can be more untoward172 than the occurrence, at a critical period and while the habits are still pliable173, of such a sweeping174 transformation175 as the return of Charles the Second? Round went the whole fleet of England on the other tack176; and while a few tall pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely course by the stars and their own private compass, the cock-boat, Pepys, must go about with the majority among “the stupid starers and the loud huzzas.”
The respectable are not led so much by any desire of applause as by a positive need for countenance. The weaker and the tamer the man, the more will he require this support; and any positive quality relieves him, by just so much, of this dependence177. In a dozen ways, Pepys was quite strong enough to please himself without regard for others; but his positive qualities were not co-extensive with the field of conduct; and in many parts of life he followed, with gleeful precision, in the footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. In morals, particularly, he lived by the countenance of others; felt a slight from another more keenly than a meanness in himself; and then first repented178 when he was found out. You could talk of religion or morality to such a man; and by the artist side of him, by his lively sympathy and apprehension179, he could rise, as it were dramatically, to the significance of what you said. All that matter in religion which has been nicknamed other-worldliness was strictly180 in his gamut181; but a rule of life that should make a man rudely virtuous182, following right in good report and ill report, was foolishness and a stumbling-block to Pepys. He was much thrown across the Friends; and nothing can be more instructive than his attitude towards these most interesting people of that age. I have mentioned how he conversed183 with one as he rode; when he saw some brought from a meeting under arrest, “I would to God,” said he, “they would either conform, or be more wise and not be catched;” and to a Quaker in his own office he extended a timid though effectual protection. Meanwhile there was growing up next door to him that beautiful nature William Pen. It is odd that Pepys condemned184 him for a fop; odd, though natural enough when you see Pen’s portrait, that Pepys was jealous of him with his wife. But the cream of the story is when Pen publishes his SANDY FOUNDATION SHAKEN, and Pepys has it read aloud by his wife. “I find it,” he says, “so well writ18 as, I think, it is too good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a serious sort of book, and NOT FIT FOR EVERYBODY TO READ.” Nothing is more galling185 to the merely respectable than to be brought in contact with religious ardour. Pepys had his own foundation, sandy enough, but dear to him from practical considerations, and he would read the book with true uneasiness of spirit; for conceive the blow if, by some plaguy accident, this Pen were to convert him! It was a different kind of doctrine186 that he judged profitable for himself and others. “A good sermon of Mr. Gifford’s at our church, upon ‘Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven.’ A very excellent and persuasive187, good and moral sermon. He showed, like a wise man, that righteousness is a surer moral way of being rich than sin and villainy.” It is thus that respect. able people desire to have their Greathearts address them, telling, in mild accents, how you may make the best of both worlds, and be a moral hero without courage, kindness, or troublesome reflection; and thus the Gospel, cleared of Eastern metaphor188, becomes a manual of worldly prudence189, and a handybook for Pepys and the successful merchant.
The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has no idea of truth except for the Diary. He has no care that a thing shall be, if it but appear; gives out that he has inherited a good estate, when he has seemingly got nothing but a lawsuit190; and is pleased to be thought liberal when he knows he has been mean. He is conscientiously191 ostentatious. I say conscientiously, with reason. He could never have been taken for a fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a manner nicely suitable to his position. For long he hesitated to assume the famous periwig; for a public man should travel gravely with the fashions not foppishly before, nor dowdily192 behind, the central movement of his age. For long he durst not keep a carriage; that, in his circumstances would have been improper193; but a time comes, with the growth of his fortune, when the impropriety has shifted to the other side, and he is “ashamed to be seen in a hackney.” Pepys talked about being “a Quaker or some very melancholy194 thing;” for my part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because nothing half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. But so respectability and the duties of society haunt and burden their poor devotees; and what seems at first the very primrose195 path of life, proves difficult and thorny197 like the rest. And the time comes to Pepys, as to all the merely respectable, when he must not only order his pleasures, but even clip his virtuous movements, to the public pattern of the age. There was some juggling198 among officials to avoid direct taxation199; and Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing ashamed of this dishonesty, designed to charge himself with 1000 pounds; but finding none to set him an example, “nobody of our ablest merchants” with this moderate liking for clean hands, he judged it “not decent;” he feared it would “be thought vain glory;” and, rather than appear singular, cheerfully remained a thief. One able merchant’s countenance, and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! Had he found one brave spirit, properly recognised by society, he might have gone far as a disciple200. Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him full of sordid scandal, and make him believe, against the testimony201 of his senses, that Pen’s venison pasty stank202 like the devil; but, on the other hand, Sir William Coventry can raise him by a word into another being. Pepys, when he is with Coventry, talks in the vein203 of an old Roman. What does he care for office or emolument204? “Thank God, I have enough of my own,” says he, “to buy me a good book and a good fiddle, and I have a good wife.” And again, we find this pair projecting an old age when an ungrateful country shall have dismissed them from the field of public service; Coventry living retired205 in a fine house, and Pepys dropping in, “it may be, to read a chapter of Seneca.”
Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys continued zealous206 and, for the period, pure in his employment. He would not be “bribed to be unjust,” he says, though he was “not so squeamish as to refuse a present after,” suppose the king to have received no wrong. His new arrangement for the victualling of Tangier he tells us with honest complacency, will save the king a thousand and gain Pepys three hundred pounds a year, — a statement which exactly fixes the degree of the age’s enlightenment. But for his industry and capacity no praise can be too high. It was an unending struggle for the man to stick to his business in such a garden of Armida as he found this life; and the story of his oaths, so often broken, so courageously207 renewed, is worthy rather of admiration208 that the contempt it has received.
Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry’s influence, we find him losing scruples209 and daily complying further with the age. When he began the journal, he was a trifle prim196 and puritanic; merry enough, to be sure, over his private cups, and still remembering Magdalene ale and his acquaintance with Mrs. Ainsworth of Cambridge. But youth is a hot season with all; when a man smells April and May he is apt at times to stumble; and in spite of a disordered practice, Pepys’s theory, the better things that he approved and followed after, we may even say were strict. Where there was “tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking,” he felt “ashamed, and went away;” and when he slept in church, he prayed God forgive him. In but a little while we find him with some ladies keeping each other awake “from spite,” as though not to sleep in church were an obvious hardship; and yet later he calmly passes the time of service, looking about him, with a perspective glass, on all the pretty women. His favourite ejaculation, “Lord!” occurs but once that I have observed in 1660, never in ‘61, twice in ‘62, and at least five times in ‘63; after which the “Lords” may be said to pullulate like herrings, with here and there a solitary210 “damned,” as it were a whale among the shoal. He and his wife, once filled with dudgeon by some innocent freedoms at a marriage, are soon content to go pleasuring with my Lord Brouncker’s mistress, who was not even, by his own account, the most discreet211 of mistresses. Tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking, become his natural element; actors and actresses and drunken, roaring courtiers are to be found in his society; until the man grew so involved with Saturnalian manners and companions that he was shot almost unconsciously into the grand domestic crash of 1668.
That was the legitimate212 issue and punishment of years of staggering walk and conversation. The man who has smoked his pipe for half a century in a powder magazine finds himself at last the author and the victim of a hideous213 disaster. So with our pleasant-minded Pepys and his peccadilloes. All of a sudden, as he still trips dexterously214 enough among the dangers of a double-faced career, thinking no great evil, humming to himself the trillo, Fate takes the further conduct of that matter from his hands, and brings him face to face with the consequences of his acts. For a man still, after so many years, the lover, although not the constant lover, of his wife, — for a man, besides, who was so greatly careful of appearances, — the revelation of his infidelities was a crushing blow. The tears that he shed, the indignities215 that he endured, are not to be measured. A vulgar woman, and now justly incensed216, Mrs. Pepys spared him no detail of suffering. She was violent, threatening him with the tongs217; she was careless of his honour, driving him to insult the mistress whom she had driven him to betray and to discard; worst of all, she was hopelessly inconsequent, in word and thought and deed, now lulling218 him with reconciliations219, and anon flaming forth again with the original anger. Pepys had not used his wife well; he had wearied her with jealousies, even while himself unfaithful; he had grudged220 her clothes and pleasures, while lavishing221 both upon himself; he had abused her in words; he had bent222 his fist at her in anger; he had once blacked her eye; and it is one of the oddest particulars in that odd Diary of his, that, while the injury is referred to once in passing, there is no hint as to the occasion or the manner of the blow. But now, when he is in the wrong, nothing can exceed the long-suffering affection of this impatient husband. While he was still sinning and still undiscovered, he seems not to have known a touch of penitence223 stronger than what might lead him to take his wife to the theatre, or for an airing, or to give her a new dress, by way of compensation. Once found out, however, and he seems to himself to have lost all claim to decent usage. It is perhaps the strongest instance of his externality. His wife may do what she pleases, and though he may groan224, it will never occur to him to blame her; he has no weapon left but tears and the most abject225 submission226. We should perhaps have respected him more had he not given way so utterly227 — above all, had he refused to write, under his wife’s dictation, an insulting letter to his unhappy fellow-culprit, Miss Willet; but somehow I believe we like him better as he was.
The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must have stamped the impression of this episode upon his mind. For the remaining years of his long life we have no Diary to help us, and we have seen already how little stress is to be laid upon the tenor228 of his correspondence; but what with the recollection of the catastrophe229 of his married life, what with the natural influence of his advancing years and reputation, it seems not unlikely that the period of gallantry was at an end for Pepys; and it is beyond a doubt that he sat down at last to an honoured and agreeable old age among his books and music, the correspondent of Sir Isaac Newton, and, in one instance at least the poetical230 counsellor of Dryden. Through all this period, that Diary which contained the secret memoirs231 of his life, with all its inconsistencies and escapades, had been religiously preserved; nor, when he came to die, does he appear to have provided for its destruction. So we may conceive him faithful to the end to all his dear and early memories; still mindful of Mrs. Hely in the woods at Epsom; still lighting232 at Islington for a cup of kindness to the dead; still, if he heard again that air that once so much disturbed him, thrilling at the recollection of the love that bound him to his wife.
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ass
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| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
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condemning
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| v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的现在分词 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地 | |
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condemns
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| v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的第三人称单数 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地 | |
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cynical
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| adj.(对人性或动机)怀疑的，不信世道向善的 | |
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sordid
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| adj.肮脏的，不干净的，卑鄙的，暗淡的 | |
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distressingly
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| adv. 令人苦恼地；悲惨地 | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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lust
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| n.性(淫)欲；渴(欲)望；vi.对…有强烈的欲望 | |
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margin
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| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
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precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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outstripped
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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corrupt
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toiling
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| 长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的现在分词 )； 艰难缓慢地移动，跋涉 | |
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appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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writ
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| n.命令状，书面命令 | |
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repulse
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| n.击退，拒绝；vt.逐退，击退，拒绝 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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miscarriage
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| n.失败，未达到预期的结果；流产 | |
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disquiet
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| n.担心，焦虑 | |
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draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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almighty
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| adj.全能的，万能的；很大的，很强的 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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blessings
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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judgments
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| 判断( judgment的名词复数 )； 鉴定； 评价； 审判 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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epitome
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| n.典型，梗概 | |
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strand
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| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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apprehended
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| 逮捕，拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 )； 理解 | |
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apprehend
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| vt.理解，领悟，逮捕，拘捕，忧虑 | |
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pseudonym
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protean
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posture
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| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
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astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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glorification
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conceal
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pungent
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| adj.（气味、味道）刺激性的，辛辣的；尖锐的 | |
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brutally
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| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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vagaries
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| n.奇想( vagary的名词复数 )；异想天开；异常行为；难以预测的情况 | |
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morbid
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| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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edify
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| v.陶冶；教化；启发 | |
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repentance
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| n.懊悔 | |
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repent
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| v.悔悟，悔改，忏悔，后悔 | |
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peccadilloes
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| n.轻罪，小过失( peccadillo的名词复数 ) | |
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whine
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| v.哀号，号哭；n.哀鸣 | |
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substantive
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| adj.表示实在的；本质的、实质性的；独立的；n.实词，实名词；独立存在的实体 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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subterfuges
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| n.（用说谎或欺骗以逃脱责备、困难等的）花招，遁词( subterfuge的名词复数 ) | |
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gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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58
evergreen
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| n.常青树；adj.四季常青的 | |
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59
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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60
discourse
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| n.论文，演说；谈话；话语；vi.讲述，著述 | |
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61
parenthesis
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| n.圆括号，插入语，插曲，间歇，停歇 | |
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62
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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63
confessions
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| n.承认( confession的名词复数 )；自首；声明；（向神父的）忏悔 | |
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64
ego
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| n.自我，自己，自尊 | |
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65
predecessor
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| n.前辈，前任 | |
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66
libertines
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| n.放荡不羁的人，淫荡的人( libertine的名词复数 ) | |
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67
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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68
sincerity
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| n.真诚，诚意；真实 | |
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69
tar
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| n.柏油，焦油；vt.涂或浇柏油/焦油于 | |
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70
vows
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| 誓言( vow的名词复数 )； 郑重宣布，许愿 | |
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71
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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72
protagonist
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| n.(思想观念的)倡导者；主角，主人公 | |
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73
trenchant
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| adj.尖刻的，清晰的 | |
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74
scrutiny
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| n.详细检查，仔细观察 | |
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75
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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76
tunes
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|
| n.曲调，曲子( tune的名词复数 )v.调音( tune的第三人称单数 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
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77
cipher
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| n.零；无影响力的人；密码 | |
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78
resuscitated
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| v.使（某人或某物）恢复知觉，苏醒( resuscitate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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79
hoarding
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| n.贮藏；积蓄；临时围墙；囤积v.积蓄并储藏（某物）( hoard的现在分词 ) | |
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80
plunged
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|
| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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81
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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82
acquiesced
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| v.默认，默许( acquiesce的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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83
publicity
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| n.众所周知，闻名；宣传，广告 | |
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84
immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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85
crook
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| v.使弯曲；n.小偷，骗子，贼；弯曲(处) | |
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86
posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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87
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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88
zest
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| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
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89
discomforts
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| n.不舒适( discomfort的名词复数 )；不愉快，苦恼 | |
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90
confirmation
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| n.证实，确认，批准 | |
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91
preoccupied
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|
| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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92
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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93
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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94
portray
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| v.描写，描述；画(人物、景象等) | |
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95
pouting
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| v.撅（嘴）( pout的现在分词 ) | |
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96
protuberant
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| adj.突出的，隆起的 | |
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97
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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98
aspiration
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| n.志向，志趣抱负；渴望；(语)送气音；吸出 | |
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99
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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100
versatility
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| n.多才多艺，多样性，多功能 | |
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101
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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102
toils
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| 网 | |
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103
lute
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| n.琵琶，鲁特琴 | |
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104
flute
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| n.长笛；v.吹笛 | |
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105
harp
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| n.竖琴；天琴座 | |
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106
harpsichord
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|
| n.键琴（钢琴前身） | |
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107
spinet
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| n.小型立式钢琴 | |
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108
forth
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|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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109
gale
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| n.大风，强风，一阵闹声（尤指笑声等） | |
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110
rusty
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|
| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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111
captious
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| adj.难讨好的，吹毛求疵的 | |
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112
hemp
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| n.大麻；纤维 | |
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113
accounting
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| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
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114
hull
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| n.船身；(果、实等的)外壳；vt.去(谷物等)壳 | |
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115
behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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116
fiddles
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| n.小提琴( fiddle的名词复数 )；欺诈；（需要运用手指功夫的）细巧活动；当第二把手v.伪造( fiddle的第三人称单数 )；篡改；骗取；修理或稍作改动 | |
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117
fiddle
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| n.小提琴；vi.拉提琴；不停拨弄，乱动 | |
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118
trump
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| n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭 | |
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119
beguile
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| vt.欺骗，消遣 | |
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120
saluted
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| v.欢迎，致敬( salute的过去式和过去分词 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
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121
avow
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| v.承认，公开宣称 | |
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122
collation
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| n.便餐；整理 | |
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123
indefatigable
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| adj.不知疲倦的，不屈不挠的 | |
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124
paltry
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| adj.无价值的，微不足道的 | |
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125
attire
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| v.穿衣，装扮[同]array；n.衣着；盛装 | |
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126
peevish
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|
| adj.易怒的，坏脾气的 | |
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127
mightily
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| ad.强烈地；非常地 | |
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128
skulking
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| v.潜伏，偷偷摸摸地走动，鬼鬼祟祟地活动( skulk的现在分词 ) | |
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129
tunable
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| adj.可调的；可调谐 | |
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130
distresses
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| n.悲痛( distress的名词复数 )；痛苦；贫困；危险 | |
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131
scenic
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| adj.自然景色的，景色优美的 | |
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132
sterling
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| adj.英币的(纯粹的，货真价实的)；n.英国货币(英镑) | |
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133
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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134
innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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135
livelihood
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| n.生计，谋生之道 | |
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136
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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137
impersonal
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| adj.无个人感情的，与个人无关的，非人称的 | |
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138
jealousies
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| n.妒忌( jealousy的名词复数 )；妒羡 | |
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139
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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140
liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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141
woolen
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| adj.羊毛(制)的；毛纺的 | |
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142
rambles
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| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的第三人称单数 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
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143
fidelity
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| n.忠诚，忠实；精确 | |
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144
glamour
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| n.魔力，魅力；vt.迷住 | |
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145
indefatigably
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| adv.不厌倦地，不屈不挠地 | |
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146
condescends
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|
| 屈尊，俯就( condescend的第三人称单数 )； 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
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147
forthright
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| adj.直率的，直截了当的 [同]frank | |
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148
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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149
devoid
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| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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150
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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151
utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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152
fierily
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| 如火地，炽热地，猛烈地 | |
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153
sublimity
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| 崇高，庄严，气质高尚 | |
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154
homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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155
enjoyment
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| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
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156
comely
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| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
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157
fens
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| n.（尤指英格兰东部的）沼泽地带( fen的名词复数 ) | |
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158
kit
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| n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物 | |
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159
tuning
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| n.调谐，调整，调音v.调音( tune的现在分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
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160
sublime
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| adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的 | |
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161
dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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162
majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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163
leaven
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| v.使发酵；n.酵母；影响 | |
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164
clogging
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| 堵塞，闭合 | |
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165
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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166
insipid
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| adj.无味的，枯燥乏味的，单调的 | |
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167
zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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168
loyalty
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| n.忠诚，忠心 | |
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169
speck
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| n.微粒，小污点，小斑点 | |
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170
inveigh
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| v.痛骂 | |
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171
illustrate
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| v.举例说明，阐明；图解，加插图 | |
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172
untoward
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| adj.不利的，不幸的，困难重重的 | |
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173
pliable
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| adj.易受影响的；易弯的；柔顺的，易驾驭的 | |
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174
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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175
transformation
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| n.变化；改造；转变 | |
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176
tack
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| n.大头钉；假缝，粗缝 | |
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177
dependence
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| n.依靠，依赖；信任，信赖；隶属 | |
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178
repented
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| 对（自己的所为）感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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179
apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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180
strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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181
gamut
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| n.全音阶，(一领域的)全部知识 | |
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182
virtuous
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| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
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183
conversed
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| v.交谈，谈话( converse的过去式 ) | |
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184
condemned
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|
| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
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185
galling
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| adj.难堪的,使烦恼的,使焦躁的 | |
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186
doctrine
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| n.教义；主义；学说 | |
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187
persuasive
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| adj.有说服力的，能说得使人相信的 | |
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188
metaphor
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| n.隐喻，暗喻 | |
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189
prudence
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| n.谨慎，精明，节俭 | |
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lawsuit
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| n.诉讼，控诉 | |
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conscientiously
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| adv.凭良心地；认真地，负责尽职地；老老实实 | |
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dowdily
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| adv.懒散地，下流地 | |
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improper
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| adj.不适当的，不合适的，不正确的，不合礼仪的 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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primrose
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| n.樱草，最佳部分， | |
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prim
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| adj.拘泥形式的，一本正经的；n.循规蹈矩，整洁；adv.循规蹈矩地，整洁地 | |
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thorny
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| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
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juggling
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| n. 欺骗, 杂耍(=jugglery) adj. 欺骗的, 欺诈的 动词juggle的现在分词 | |
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taxation
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| n.征税，税收，税金 | |
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disciple
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| n.信徒，门徒，追随者 | |
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testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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202
stank
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| n. (英)坝，堰，池塘 动词stink的过去式 | |
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vein
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| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
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emolument
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| n.报酬，薪水 | |
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retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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zealous
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| adj.狂热的，热心的 | |
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courageously
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| ad.勇敢地，无畏地 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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scruples
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| n.良心上的不安( scruple的名词复数 )；顾虑，顾忌v.感到于心不安，有顾忌( scruple的第三人称单数 ) | |
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solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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dexterously
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| adv.巧妙地，敏捷地 | |
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indignities
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| n.侮辱，轻蔑( indignity的名词复数 ) | |
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incensed
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| 盛怒的 | |
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tongs
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| n.钳；夹子 | |
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lulling
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| vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的现在分词形式） | |
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reconciliations
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| 和解( reconciliation的名词复数 )； 一致； 勉强接受； （争吵等的）止息 | |
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grudged
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| 怀恨（grudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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lavishing
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| v.过分给予，滥施( lavish的现在分词 ) | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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penitence
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| n.忏悔，赎罪；悔过 | |
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groan
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| vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音 | |
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abject
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| adj.极可怜的，卑屈的 | |
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submission
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| n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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tenor
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| n.男高音（歌手），次中音（乐器），要旨，大意 | |
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catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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poetical
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| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
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memoirs
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| n.回忆录；回忆录传( mem,自oir的名词复数) | |
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lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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