We have never seen a mine so rich as the
volumes before us. The variety of Pepys's tastes and pursuits
led him into almost every department of life. He was a man of
business, a man of information if not of learning; a man of
taste; a man of whim; and to a certain degree a man of pleasure.
He was a statesman, a BEL ESPRIT, a virtuoso, and a connoisseur.
His curiosity made him an unwearied as well as an universal
learner, and whatever he saw found its way into his tables.
Thus, his Diary absolutely resembles the genial cauldrons at the
wedding of Camacho, a souse into which was sure to bring forth at
once abundance and variety of whatever could gratify the most
eccentric appetite.
"If the curious, affect dramatic antiquities--a line which has
special charms for the present age--no book published in our time
has thrown so much light upon plays, playwrights, and play-
actors.
"Then those who desire to be aware of the earliest discoveries,
as well in sciences, as in the useful arts, may read in Pepys's
Memoirs, how a slice of roast mutton was converted into pure
blood; and of those philosophical glass crackers, which explode
when the tail is broken off (Rupert's Drops) of AURUM FULMINANS,
applied to the purpose of blowing ships out of the water; and of
a newly contrived gun, which was to change the whole system of
the art of war; but which has left it pretty much upon the old
footing.
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