The man, you will perceive, was
making reminiscences - a sort of pleasure by ricochet, which
comforts many in distress, and turns some others into
sentimental libertines: 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 remarkable attitude
preserved by him throughout his Diary, to that unflinching -
I had almost said, that unintelligent - sincerity 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 vows of change. But
whether he did ill or well, he was still his own unequalled
self; still that entrancing EGO 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.
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