Sunday 30 December 1666
(Lord’s day). Lay long, however up and to church, where Mills made a good sermon. Here was a collection for the sexton; but it come into my head why we should be more bold in making the collection while the psalm is singing, than in the sermon or prayer. Home, and, without any strangers, to dinner, and then all the afternoon and evening in my chamber preparing all my accounts in good condition against to-morrow, to state them for the whole year past, to which God give me a good issue when I come to close them!
So to supper and to bed.
10 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
John Evelyn's Diary
December 30: Dr. Dolben deane of Westminster, & now made Bishop of Rochester our Diocese [ http://www.pepysdiary.com/encyclo… ], preached at our Parish-Church his first sermon on 1. Tim: 3.16 [ "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory." ] , of the wonder of our B[lessed]:S[aviour's]: Incarnation &c: after sermon Confirmed many young children, solemnly prepar’d the weeke before, among whom my sonn John was bro[u]ght, and then his Lordship dined at my house.
http://www.gyford.com/archive/200…
Bradford • Link
"with no strangers": the suggestion is confirmed that Pepys does not like dinner company at home on one day of the week, at least.
The image of our man brooding over when the collection plate is passed in church calls irreverently and irrelevantly to mind some anonymous lines in parody of Longfellow's exemplary character, "The Village Blacksmith":
"He goes on Sunday to the church to hear the Parson shout.
He puts a penny in the plate and takes a pound note out
And drops a conscience-stricken tear in case he is found out."
Australian Susan • Link
My father, a Church Warden, once made the (flippant) suggestion that the vicar should choose a very long hymn for the offertory hymn, thus creating time for the plate to be passed round twice - few would notice, he said, but put money in on auto-pilot and the parish would benefit!
JWB • Link
"...all my accounts...for the whole year past, to which God give me a good issue when I come to close them!"
Schroedinger's cat!
cape henry • Link
One of my best friends in high school was the son of a Baptist preacher, and never was a human more interested in the contents of those plates than his mother.
Terry Foreman • Link
"My father, a Church Warden, once made the (flippant) suggestion that the vicar should choose a very long hymn for the offertory hymn...."
Been done -- at St. Olave's -- see Sunday 6 January 1660/61 "To church again, where, before sermon, a long Psalm was set that lasted an hour, while the sexton gathered his year’s contribucion through the whole church." http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
CGS • Link
Plates are empty and the tythes are missing.
Cactus Wren • Link
@ Australian Susan and Terry Foreman: shades of the scene in _To Kill a Mockingbird_ where the pastor at the AME church holds his congregation hostage (in the Mississippi summer heat) until they cough up enough to tide Tom Robinson's family over for a week.
A. De Araujo • Link
"Making the collection while the psalm is singing"
The whole industry of making us part with our money.
Second Reading
San Diego Sarah • Link
What an unusual day. Since Pepys usually mentions if Elizabeth goes to church with him, I am assuming he went to church alone, he ate lunch alone, he did his accounts alone, he had supper alone, and he probably went to bed alone.
Of course, his boy would have been at his side throughout. Boys don't count.