Sunday 29 January 1659/60

In the morning I went to Mr. Gunning’s, where he made an excellent sermon upon the 2d of the Galatians, about the difference that fell between St. Paul and St. Peter (the feast day of St. Paul being a day or two ago), whereby he did prove, that, contrary to the doctrine of the Roman Church, St. Paul did never own any dependance, or that he was inferior to St. Peter, but that they were equal, only one a particular charge of preaching to the Jews, and the other to the Gentiles.

Here I met with Mr. Moore, and went home with him to dinner to Mr. Crew’s, where Mr. Spurrier being in town did dine with us. From thence I went home and spent the afternoon in casting up my accounts, and do find myself to be worth 40l. and more, which I did not think, but am afraid that I have forgot something.

To my father’s to supper, where I heard by my brother Tom how W. Joyce would the other day have Mr. Pierce and his wife to the tavern after they were gone from my house, and that he had so little manners as to make Tom pay his share notwithstanding that he went upon his account, and by my father I understand that my uncle Fenner and my aunt were much pleased with our entertaining them.

After supper home without going to see Mrs. Turner.

36 Annotations

First Reading

Susanna  •  Link

Went to Mr. Gunning's

Peter Gunning seems at this time to have been preaching at the chapel at Burleigh or Exeter House, on the Strand, near Covent Garden.

http://www.motco.com/Map/81002/Se…

Warren Keith Wright  •  Link

Uh-oh---politics, and now religion. Well, Paul would say that, wouldn't he (in his epistle to the "foolish Galatians").
In the interests of clarification, not disputation, is this rough distinction correct?---that since Peter (petra) is the "rock" upon which Jesus is said to have said He would build His church, naturally the Catholic Church takes Peter as prior and superior, while the Anglican Church would object, and promote the latecomer Paul as his equal.
---At least, according to Mr. Gunning, "a great controversialist" as the footnote attests. The claim of succession through Peter is spelled out by Jesus only in Matthew 16:18, not in the other Gospels.

Martin K. Foys  •  Link

Lord Montagu's residence --

He's not listed in this entry, but I've been curious as to where in London Pepys' lord Montagu would have lived at this point, and whether this Montagu is connected to the Ralph Montague that builds Montague House on Great Russell (then at the very edge of the city) in 1676.

David Quidnunc  •  Link

Diarist John Evelyn was at Gunning's too

Evelyn (a far more pious man than Pepys) confirms Pepys's account:

"Mr. Gunning . . . 29 [of January] -- on 2. Gal[atians]: 5 ad. 12 &c: proving very solidly, that St. Paule was equal to St. Peter, as to power, & magnifying this Apostle of the Gentiles."

Evelyn may have written more on the sermon -- the one-volume, abridged Oxford edition of his diary systematically excludes Evelyn's accounts of sermons, probably a good thing for most readers.

(Of course, we Roman Catholics beg to differ with Gunning, Pepys and Evelyn on just what precedent Paul set in his disputes with Peter.)

Notice that Evelyn has the verses noted in his diary. How would he have written them down during the sermon (or did he impress them on his memory so he would have that information when he wrote in his diary later?) Perhaps he brought his Bible, or a New Testament or prayer book to the service and underlined the spot (did they have pencils or bits of lead to write with back then?). Pepys only has the chapter, so it seems to me more likely that he just remembered it.

Paul Chapin  •  Link

"do find myself to be worth 40l. and more, which I did not think, but am afraid that I have forgot something." I know the feeling, Sam. Love the comment.

To give some perspective on what level of wealth this amounted to, can anyone tell us what the normal approximate annual income would have been for someone of Pepys' social and economic standing?

David Quidnunc  •  Link

Moore, Moore & Moore Questions

This is the third time a Mr. Moore shows up in the diary. Same guy, or two, or three?

Tomalin names a Henry Moore, Montagu's "man of business" (p. 155), but that refers to a later period and doesn't seem to help identify these three mentions:

17 Jan. -- This Moore is in love with Mrs. Jem or (as Latham & Matthews have it) Jane. In a note (here: http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… ) Glyn identifies this man as Henry Moore, a lawyer.

This Moore is associated with Crewe, because when Pepys goes to see him, it appears he goes to Crewe's home for that purpose: "I . . . went with the coach to Mr. Crew's, thinking to have spoke with Mr. Moore and Mrs. Jem . . ."

19 Jan. -- Pepys, Shepley and this Moore are dining with Jemima on a turkey. Then Pepys and Moore go to the French Ordinary, where Downing is hosting some guests.

Today -- Pepys meets Moore at Gunning's chapel and goes to dinner with him at Crewe's.

Does anyone have Moore information?

michael f vincent  •  Link

re: earnings (as not filed on his tax form)
from the the book by Geoffry Trease, Samuel Pepys and his world. Putnam 1972
"1658 ...Jane Birch.... She was paid three pounds a year. Pepy's own salary from George Downing was only fifty."
page 24.

Susanna  •  Link

Pepys' income

Pepys' income seems to have been firmly middle class (or, to use a period term, "of the middling sort"), although at this point at the lower end of its range. He was, however, still a young man on his way up in the world.

This is an interesting discussion on the middle class of London of Pepys' time and of the 18th Century:

http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/f…

mark  •  Link

Evelyn may well have known the bible well enough to be able to identify chapter and verse easily. The christian church uses well travelled portions of the bible so its not unlikely that a pious person would know the text intimately

Eric Walla  •  Link

"I understand that my uncle Fenner and my aunt were much pleased with our entertaining them."

So did we already have it clear from before? Obviously the Joyces were being entertained out of family duty or in hope of pleasing Uncle Fenner (which essentially amounts to the same thing). No love lost on the Joyces, that's established.

Nix  •  Link

Some observations on money and credit:

In reading Pepys' discussions of money, credit, 'notes', debts, wealth, etc., it is clear that the financial system under which he lives is drasticallly different from what we have now.

The important thing to remember is that financial transactions were not institutionalized: 'Banks' were not large, impersonal institutions — they were individuals who made their living handling money for others.

Because there was no paper money, the only currency was metal coinage. This was highly inconvenient for transactions of any size, so a person purchasing something for, say, 20 l. would give a promissory note. The note could say 'I will pay you this whenever you ask' — a demand note. The maker of the note was, at least theoretically, obliged to pay over in cash whenever the payee showed up at his home or place of business (they were quite often the same, particularly in the case of tradesmen). Or it could say I will pay you this in 30 days' or 60 or six months or whatever.

The person to whom the note was offered as payment had to make the same sorts of judgments creditors make today: How confident am I that I can collect this debt? They didn't have credit reports in those days, so the basis for the decision would include the reputation of the payor (if he was known), the appearance of the payor (that is one reason why clothing was viewed as so important), the address for payment (both as evidence of substance and to evaluate how far you'd have to go — how much trouble it would be to collect it), etc.

Having the paper, what was the creditor to do with it? He could retain it and try to collect it when it came due. But (a) collection was likely outside his 'core competency', as they say in business today, and (b) his capital was tied up until he could collect it. So the practice arose of 'discounting' — essentially, selling the note to a third party for something less than face value. That passed the risk of non-collectability as well as the time delay on to the third party — the greater the perceived risk, the greater the discount from the face value. Offering cash for notes was one of the earliest functions of bankers, and you can still see its remnants: Your checks don't say 'Pay to Smith', they say 'Pay to the Order of Smith' — that is, Mr. Banker, please give the cash to whoever buys this note from Smith. And the indorsement on the back of the check is the way Jones shows the bank (and ultimately the court) that he did in fact buy the note from Smith.

Sorry to go on and on, but I hope this provides some clarification on these murky financial doings.

P.S. — A while back, people were asking about Pepys' possible misuse of government funds. My impression is that, in those days, one of the perks of public office was that you had the use of funds from the time they were given to you until they had to be paid out. You were responsible for being sure they were there when they were needed, but in the meantime you could lend them out and earn some interest. That is, after all, what banks do even today.

David Cattarin  •  Link

Pencils or bits of lead? If I recall correctly, graphite pencils weren't much used before 1650, so it is most likely that true lead-based pencils would have been used. I'll check the dates.

In any case, a very interesting history of the pencil was written by Henry Petroski. You'll be surprised that graphite was once considered a national asset and protected as such.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos…

language hat  •  Link

Don't apologize, Nix!
That was an extremely useful and interesting analysis.

Michael f vincent  •  Link

RE: On my account (tab). It was very popular in my youth, before Hire Purchash (HP) took hold . The Tradesmen settled their accounts quarterly or annually and they had to go to the back door to collect. They hated it, they had carry the bankers and their ilk for a year. The credit card has change a lot of attitudes.

Roger Miller  •  Link

.. went upon his account.

I think Pepys is just saying that William Joyce invited Tom to go for a drink and then made him buy a round.

From a glance ahead it seems that W. Joyce was fond of a tipple or three.

Peter Mehlin  •  Link

Thank you nix for those observations on money and credit. I found them very useful. It is the annotations that make this reading so much more valuable than just sitting down with the book.

tamara  •  Link

re: remuneration
My father's annual salary from his first job (something dreary and clerical) after leaving the army in the mid-50s when I was little was around £600 a year (we were poor as churchmice). Considering 300 years had elapsed I can’t help feeling Pepys wasn’t doing too badly.

David Bell  •  Link

re: renumeration

It may well come up later in the diary, but for a comparison, the traditional pay for a British soldier was "a shilling a day", though it was only fixed at that rate at the end of the 18th Century, and didn't increase until the 1914-18 war. Out of that came various stoppages for food, uniforms, and the like.

I don't have the figures to hand, but the pay for a seaman in the Navy was similar, and they didn't have to pay for their rations.

At 20 shillings to the pound, this gives a fair idea of what Sam was getting, and how many men his disbursements to the Army might be paying for. A full-strength regiment would have a daily payroll that was close to his annual income, though less than a third of that would go to the soldiers as cash.

Compare this to a servant getting about 2d per diem, though not having to pay for board and lodge.

Of course, the soldier wasn't told, until after he'd signed up and taken the King's Shilling, about the stoppages. It looked a better-paid job than it was.

Glyn  •  Link

to the tavern after they were gone from my house

So pubs and taverns were not closed all day on Sunday, but were open for at least part of the day.

Presumably things became more strict in Victorian times.

David Glotzer  •  Link

Why would Pepys specifically mention not going to Mrs. Turner's?

I think it has to do with Pepys’ relationship to the journal itself, as well as to his own thoughts or intentions. Having kept a journal myself for more than 20 years, and if I can generalize from my own experience - which may or may not be accurate to others : one finds that the journal becomes a projected other, like the recipient of a letter but different obviously because of not actually being a person. So if he’d had the intention of going, which we have to presume from his comment, it was natural that he would think of that intention as he was reporting on his movements and then comment to this alter ego of his intimate thoughts.

As others have said, I want to express appreciation for the richness of these annotations which are immeasurably adding to my pleasure in reading the journal and to the reading of Tomalin’s book at the same time.

Jonathan Addleman  •  Link

There's a little mistake in the link on the words "Mr. Crew’s" - a space missing in the html code means the link can't be clicked.

Phil Gyford  •  Link

Thanks Jonathan - I've fixed the link now.

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"Does anyone have Moore information?"

All references to Moore thus far are to Henry Moore, Mountagu's "man of business" and a lawyer at Gray's Inn.

Moore is a friend that Pepys sees often, both on business for Montagu and for Pepys, and socially at coffee houses and taverns, and at Pepys's home.

Source: Robert Latham's index volume (11) to the Latham & Matthews edition of Pepys's Diary. http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo…

Pepys and Moore also meet at the quarters of John Crew, Mountagu's father-in-law.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"So pubs and taverns were not closed all day on Sunday, but were open for at least part of the day."

Pubs had to close when Church services were being held. And those times changed according to the time of year. Daylight was essential.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"the feast day of St. Paul being a day or two ago"

L&M: The feast of the conversion of St Paul, 25 January.

Third Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"David Quidnunc posted https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…
Notice that Evelyn has the verses noted in his diary. How would he have written them down during the sermon (or did he impress them on his memory so he would have that information when he wrote in his diary later?) Perhaps he brought his Bible, or a New Testament or prayer book to the service and underlined the spot (did they have pencils or bits of lead to write with back then?). Pepys only has the chapter, so it seems to me more likely that he just remembered it."

We will see that Pepys, a clerk, knows shorthand -- he's writing the diary with it --and could have made a small note on a chit of paper Evelyn is not a clerk. We find out in the Diary that some wealthy men like him do know iand use shorthand, but /i recall no evidence he used it. On Shorthand: ... See https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…

Alter Kacker  •  Link

As the guy who used to go by the screen name Nix, I’m impressed by the essay on negotiable instruments law I posted 20 years ago! I’m glad for the refresher — I don’t think I could have explained it nearly so well today. 😄

Carol D  •  Link

Nix / Alter - I found your post illuminating 20 years ago, and was very pleased to come across it again this morning! Many thanks.

Sarah C  •  Link

Ditto Carol. I'm on my second round of reading, and trying to be more thorough. Lots of references to money being picked up etc. Your post really helps.

Mountain Man  •  Link

Yes, this is a really lucid explanation. This system had been in place since at least the Middle Ages. The rise of the great Italian banking houses from the 12th century on came through private commercial banks based on international family and commercial connections. They created an international system of facilitating transactions and loans using paper credit. In England, the Bardi and Peruzzi families were prominent bankers. But small-scale credit transactions by English merchants at, for example, the Staple in Calais, were also facilitated by a widely used system of credit on paper.

Croakers Apprentice  •  Link

Alter, Carol, Sarah - I think that one of the delights of this site is that it is as close to a functioning time machine as we're likely to ever be able to achieve - whether we are skipping across the timestreams to Merry England or the more recent Millennium!

JB  •  Link

Love the new name, AK.

I, too, am trying to be more thorough, Sarah. Started in midway-ish through the Second Reading, and mostly only paid attention to the recent annotations, so I’m enjoying the opportunity to delve in deeper this time. Knowing what lies in his future makes it very interesting to see what led up to his thought process from when I was first introduced to the diary.

Phil, thanks again for this whole endeavor, and for the labeling of the 1st-3rd Readings. The ability to see that at a glance really adds to the pleasure of who knew/guessed what/when, and CA’s time machine aspect.

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