A sunny Wednesday in early June 1665, and Samuel Pepys was suffering in the heat. It was “the hottest day that ever I felt in my life”, he confided to his diary, “and it is confessed so by all other people the hottest they ever knew in England”.
Pepys spent some of the day strolling with friends in the New Exchange, a shopping arcade on the south side of the Strand, before repairing to Vauxhall’s Spring Gardens, where he “walked an hour or two with great pleasure”. There was something on his mind, though. For as long as he could remember, relations with England’s neighbours had been distinctly fraught, and Lord Sandwich’s fleet was currently engaged in a struggle with the Dutch. London simmered with rumours about the outcome of the battle, but there was no certainty: as Pepys put it, “ill reports run up and down of his being killed, but without ground”.
By evening, “weary with walking and with the mighty heat of the weather”, the diarist had returned to his house in the City. The day had been pleasant enough, but now something else was troubling him. In Drury Lane, he had seen “two or three houses marked with a red cross upon the doors, and ‘Lord have mercy upon us’ writ there”. Pepys knew immediately what that meant. Plague — the first sign of the epidemic that would kill an estimated 100,000 people, a quarter of the capital’s population, in the next 18 months. To calm his nerves, he noted: “I was forced to buy some roll-tobacco to smell to and [chew], which took away the apprehension.”
Reading Pepys’s diary, you sometimes forget that he was born almost four centuries ago. In many respects he was utterly different from us, with assumptions and anxieties we can scarcely understand; and yet often he feels almost thrillingly contemporary, as if you might bump into him in the street tomorrow afternoon. Indeed, you merely have to re-read that diary entry, and you might be looking in a mirror: the stifling heat, the fears of disease, the foreign wars, the fake news.
The past is never just a mirror, of course, and it’s the height of narcissism to cast our predecessors as mere foreshadowings of ourselves. But there are times when, for obvious reasons, a particular historical moment catches the imagination — as is the case today with Pepys’s moment, the mid-17th century.
Just look, for example, at the titles in Britain’s bookshops. For a long time, commercial publishers were terrified of the 17th century. The Stuarts weren’t as sexy as the Tudors, and the age of Oliver Cromwell seemed too dark, too violent, too religious, too complicated for ordinary readers. Why read about perhaps the most significant moment in all our history — the titanic revolutionary conflict of the 1640s and 1650s, when armies surged across the map of our islands, a king was tried and executed, and a farmer from East Anglia tried to turn Britain into a religious commonwealth — when you could read yet another book about Catherine Howard?
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
SubscribeVery nice essay, thank you.
“…People in the 17th century, like us, were struggling to come to terms with an extraordinary advance in information technology — in their case, the printing press…”.
Indeed, but unlike the 17th century, we in the 21st century seem to have been cowed by our information technology revolution. What I mean is, where are our great intellects, diarists and philosophers and poets and so on? Where are *our* Descarteses and Spinozas and Miltons, and Lockes and Hobbeses? Where is our Peyps? Instead of a creative explosion in the humanities (alongside the one in the sciences), we seem to have an explosion of ephemera, where even the most substantial figures seem to be spending half their time sprinkling shitposts on social media. No wonder no one gets round to producing any great works of the type someone will still be looking at and admiring, four centuries on.
“where are our great intellects, diarists and philosophers and poets and so on?”
Podcasts, blogs, YouTube, and still … books.
rappers?!!!!!
The most exalted voices of the age!
I was thinking of people more like Iain McGilchrist – who I was introduced to by our beloved UnHerd, and am still persuing via his talks on YouTube.
The most exalted voices of the age!
I was thinking of people more like Iain McGilchrist – who I was introduced to by our beloved UnHerd, and am still persuing via his talks on YouTube.
Can you think of any names however….?
rappers?!!!!!
Can you think of any names however….?
excellent, Prash
but instead of their sort of Grand ”A new age of pleasure-loving debauchery” we get a society of degenerate, squalid, deviant, pathetic, solitary, wastrels wan* ing to bad porn wile drunk and stoned, and sharing their vacuous lives on cell-phones to people they could not really call friends. It is just not the same.
Yuval Noah Harari sends his regards.
So does Robert Filmer! 😉
So does Robert Filmer! 😉
You obviously haven’t enjoyed very much debauchery to make that comment!
Drugs, drink, and sex can be addictive and destructive behaviours (so can cakes and soft drinks); they can also be fantastic fun.
Yuval Noah Harari sends his regards.
You obviously haven’t enjoyed very much debauchery to make that comment!
Drugs, drink, and sex can be addictive and destructive behaviours (so can cakes and soft drinks); they can also be fantastic fun.
Peterson, Murray, Anderson, Hitchens, even Sandbrook & Holland perhaps? Charles Moore’s diary in the Spectator is always amusing. That is in the non-US anglosphere. I am sure there are others accross the pond. The difficulty with finding a new Hobbes or Locke is that they were pioneering for their time – much like “woke” academics are today.
Oh, come on. Fine as these gentlemen are, they are not exactly Descartes or Locke. Who exactly is hypothesising new frameworks of human existence? I can think of, say Penrose or Searle or Chomsky or Wolfram and so on, but for the number of people on earth right now compared to the 17th century, I can’t help feeling a little short changed here.
“Who exactly is hypothesising new frameworks of human existence?”
The ‘transhuman’ crowd?
Absolutely there are some interesting ideas coming out of the Transhumanist movement, but nothing I would class as philosophically groundbreaking yet. For the avoidance of doubt, I separate out the Transhumanists from the Transgenderists. I know people will tell me they are one and the same, but I don’t view them as such at all. Genuine Transhumanists very often have a solid lock on Science and Mathematics, and look at trends, data and probabilities, often in a Bayesian context. Transgenderists are invariably a bunch of f**king idiots, more often than not from Humanities backgrounds or working in HR or something, who wouldn’t know a Turing Machine from their tushy.
Philosophy and History belong to the Humanities too. A giant brain-in-a-jar (so to speak) with great scientific and mathematical knowledge and insight, but no appreciation of history, philosophy, literature, or music, is just as blinkered as a “poetry expert” who can barely count, in my opinion.
Sincerely,
AJ M.,
Humanistic
DilettanteGeneralist (with a literature degree or two)I must say I’m pretty down on philosophy in general. Arguing fundamental ideas in isolation purely with words (which do not and cannot in the human world have rigid meanings) might not even be possible. And what the hell progress has actually been made in the thousands of years of philosophy, floating away from any mooring in empirical reality?
I must say I’m pretty down on philosophy in general. Arguing fundamental ideas in isolation purely with words (which do not and cannot in the human world have rigid meanings) might not even be possible. And what the hell progress has actually been made in the thousands of years of philosophy, floating away from any mooring in empirical reality?
Philosophy and History belong to the Humanities too. A giant brain-in-a-jar (so to speak) with great scientific and mathematical knowledge and insight, but no appreciation of history, philosophy, literature, or music, is just as blinkered as a “poetry expert” who can barely count, in my opinion.
Sincerely,
AJ M.,
Humanistic
DilettanteGeneralist (with a literature degree or two)Absolutely there are some interesting ideas coming out of the Transhumanist movement, but nothing I would class as philosophically groundbreaking yet. For the avoidance of doubt, I separate out the Transhumanists from the Transgenderists. I know people will tell me they are one and the same, but I don’t view them as such at all. Genuine Transhumanists very often have a solid lock on Science and Mathematics, and look at trends, data and probabilities, often in a Bayesian context. Transgenderists are invariably a bunch of f**king idiots, more often than not from Humanities backgrounds or working in HR or something, who wouldn’t know a Turing Machine from their tushy.
Hmmm. A hard one to please. I don’t know if hypothesising new frameworks of human existence is the be all and end all of philosophical acheivement – look what Nietsche or Marx did to the last hundred years (and in some cases are still doing) or the French revolutionaries did to the 19th century. Poetry has definitely declined, I will give you that and for me the best rap music is head and shoulders above anything newly “in print’.
You’d have to work very hard to persuade me that rap music isn’t extremely limited by its very structure and subject matter!
You’d have to work very hard to persuade me that rap music isn’t extremely limited by its very structure and subject matter!
Most of those frameworks have been hypothesized to death. While I’m not a materialist, I’d say Sir Isaac Newton’s physical insights were of more use to mankind than Descartes’ arid dualism, though I have higher esteem for Locke, whose works directly inspired some of the better parts of the American Revolution.
In 1650, with great leisure and a great library, it was remotely possible to read almost all that was regarded as essential (at least in the West). Now– depending on what you consider essential–that probably couldn’t be done in 10 lifetimes.
We need to digest and improve upon what we already have. Innovation, like “disruption” as a virtue-in-itself is a faulty torch that helps to fuel to some of the worst idiocy of the Tech Bros and Social Engineers, which most of us can agree to disapprove of here among the UnHerd.
To be fair, there are just so many more intellectuals writers today, so they are unlikely to stand out. It’s easier to be the first Newton than say, Richard Feynman, who was almost certainly his intellectual equal. I found a few fascinating books by writes I wasn’t aware of straight off in a large Waterstones branch the other day, which looked original and promising.
Descartes and Locke were also significantly misguided on major issues. However at least they were able to write what they believed. Unfortunately the humanities in particular have been largely taken over by irrational “woke” progressivism.
“Who exactly is hypothesising new frameworks of human existence?”
The ‘transhuman’ crowd?
Hmmm. A hard one to please. I don’t know if hypothesising new frameworks of human existence is the be all and end all of philosophical acheivement – look what Nietsche or Marx did to the last hundred years (and in some cases are still doing) or the French revolutionaries did to the 19th century. Poetry has definitely declined, I will give you that and for me the best rap music is head and shoulders above anything newly “in print’.
Most of those frameworks have been hypothesized to death. While I’m not a materialist, I’d say Sir Isaac Newton’s physical insights were of more use to mankind than Descartes’ arid dualism, though I have higher esteem for Locke, whose works directly inspired some of the better parts of the American Revolution.
In 1650, with great leisure and a great library, it was remotely possible to read almost all that was regarded as essential (at least in the West). Now– depending on what you consider essential–that probably couldn’t be done in 10 lifetimes.
We need to digest and improve upon what we already have. Innovation, like “disruption” as a virtue-in-itself is a faulty torch that helps to fuel to some of the worst idiocy of the Tech Bros and Social Engineers, which most of us can agree to disapprove of here among the UnHerd.
To be fair, there are just so many more intellectuals writers today, so they are unlikely to stand out. It’s easier to be the first Newton than say, Richard Feynman, who was almost certainly his intellectual equal. I found a few fascinating books by writes I wasn’t aware of straight off in a large Waterstones branch the other day, which looked original and promising.
Descartes and Locke were also significantly misguided on major issues. However at least they were able to write what they believed. Unfortunately the humanities in particular have been largely taken over by irrational “woke” progressivism.
Oh, come on. Fine as these gentlemen are, they are not exactly Descartes or Locke. Who exactly is hypothesising new frameworks of human existence? I can think of, say Penrose or Searle or Chomsky or Wolfram and so on, but for the number of people on earth right now compared to the 17th century, I can’t help feeling a little short changed here.
We have spent the past 20 years outsourcing much of our humanity – we disassociate with our addictions and drugs, we outsource our critical thinking to memes and algorithms, we virtualise our identify to whatever flavour we want, the advent of Neuralink will start the transhumanist arms race, and the evasion of death through digital consciousness is all the rage (and if that’s not within your reach, Canada has some interesting Assisted Dying criteria that you can sign up for). The lack of serious thought has many causes, but in my view our resistance to being embodied is the fundamental cause. Very few of us actually live in the now.
Well said. We are living in escapist times, with certain major new developments.
In my view, our underlying deficits are not primarily intellectual, but existential or spiritual. We are not deep-thinkers as a global population, true–but when have we been? Most of what survives from previous centuries (especially the 18th and earlier) was written by the Intellectual One-Percent, not characteristic of the common person. A lack of meaning or purpose, or even a sense that any meaning or purpose is possible, seems to underlie the malaise for many, in this age of hyperconnected alienation.
And yet… when someone puts forward an alternative perspective on how meaning and spirituality might be redeveloped within our human framework, you try to find ways to disagree, which at times appears to be disagreeing for the sake of disagreement; and simply because it doesn’t follow the pattern of meaning and spirituality that you prefer.
Either that, or it becomes misrepresented as “materialist”.
I can certainly be argumentative and contrarian. I did think your most recent opening comment was more in opposition to religion than in favor of spirituality, and also part of a series of anti-deistic comments I disagree with for the most part, but not in every way.
I’m a God-leaning agnostic: I feel certain there is Something, but of course I can’t prove that and I don’t claim to understand what It is.
A perceived trashing of major religious traditions or texts tends to get me defensive or even combative, and I know I’m too easily “triggered” in that way. Sometimes I also respond to multiple comments in the form of a reply to one. I shouldn’t do that.
I always find your comments worthwhile and typically agree with most of what you say. I regret that I seem to have offended you with my tone, which I know can be highhanded and self-important (or maybe it’s more accurate to say that it can be other things too). I’m working on it.
I suspect we’re pretty much of the same mindset, from what you describe – and that in itself can be quite annoying!!
I don’t trash major religious traditions, though; pointing out why they may be leading people to search down the wrong paths isn’t disrespectful of their achievements in helping humanity through its initial phases.
My biggest concern is when the exchanges lead to others taking sides in a too-defensive manner, which is probably what led to the debate over the weekend getting pulled… in fact – we were cancelled. That was plain wrong of Unherd, or those who forced the Unherd algorithms into doing so. The debate itself is vital, and i look forward to furthering it at some other point.
A fair reply. I shouldn’t have implied you “trashed” religion (even in my “perception”). That was a bit defensive or overstated.
I know what you mean about being cancelled. I’ve found that when comments get a lot of downvotes, especially quickly, they get voted off the island, into a usually temporary oblivion. They tend to come back after 12-plus hours, but it is still a bit unfair and unnecessary, unless there is something blatantly libelous or aggressively vulgar or what not. The same thing happens with certain key words in an otherwise inoffensive post. (Why does it take 12 hours to vet their actual content?)
Your comments are typically a hit, but many of mine have be “time-outed” or quarantined. I’ll try not to explode the discussion with my attitude if/when the topic comes up again. Cheers.
A fair reply. I shouldn’t have implied you “trashed” religion (even in my “perception”). That was a bit defensive or overstated.
I know what you mean about being cancelled. I’ve found that when comments get a lot of downvotes, especially quickly, they get voted off the island, into a usually temporary oblivion. They tend to come back after 12-plus hours, but it is still a bit unfair and unnecessary, unless there is something blatantly libelous or aggressively vulgar or what not. The same thing happens with certain key words in an otherwise inoffensive post. (Why does it take 12 hours to vet their actual content?)
Your comments are typically a hit, but many of mine have be “time-outed” or quarantined. I’ll try not to explode the discussion with my attitude if/when the topic comes up again. Cheers.
AJ Mac – you’re pretty much the perfect Unherder.
Thanks, Richard Ross. Many would disagree, which is perfect too.
Thanks, Richard Ross. Many would disagree, which is perfect too.
I suspect we’re pretty much of the same mindset, from what you describe – and that in itself can be quite annoying!!
I don’t trash major religious traditions, though; pointing out why they may be leading people to search down the wrong paths isn’t disrespectful of their achievements in helping humanity through its initial phases.
My biggest concern is when the exchanges lead to others taking sides in a too-defensive manner, which is probably what led to the debate over the weekend getting pulled… in fact – we were cancelled. That was plain wrong of Unherd, or those who forced the Unherd algorithms into doing so. The debate itself is vital, and i look forward to furthering it at some other point.
AJ Mac – you’re pretty much the perfect Unherder.
I can certainly be argumentative and contrarian. I did think your most recent opening comment was more in opposition to religion than in favor of spirituality, and also part of a series of anti-deistic comments I disagree with for the most part, but not in every way.
I’m a God-leaning agnostic: I feel certain there is Something, but of course I can’t prove that and I don’t claim to understand what It is.
A perceived trashing of major religious traditions or texts tends to get me defensive or even combative, and I know I’m too easily “triggered” in that way. Sometimes I also respond to multiple comments in the form of a reply to one. I shouldn’t do that.
I always find your comments worthwhile and typically agree with most of what you say. I regret that I seem to have offended you with my tone, which I know can be highhanded and self-important (or maybe it’s more accurate to say that it can be other things too). I’m working on it.
And yet… when someone puts forward an alternative perspective on how meaning and spirituality might be redeveloped within our human framework, you try to find ways to disagree, which at times appears to be disagreeing for the sake of disagreement; and simply because it doesn’t follow the pattern of meaning and spirituality that you prefer.
Either that, or it becomes misrepresented as “materialist”.
Well said. We are living in escapist times, with certain major new developments.
In my view, our underlying deficits are not primarily intellectual, but existential or spiritual. We are not deep-thinkers as a global population, true–but when have we been? Most of what survives from previous centuries (especially the 18th and earlier) was written by the Intellectual One-Percent, not characteristic of the common person. A lack of meaning or purpose, or even a sense that any meaning or purpose is possible, seems to underlie the malaise for many, in this age of hyperconnected alienation.
Perhaps the late Alan Clark or even Tony Benn for Pepys.
As for philosophy. A.N. Whitehead* said it all years ago with this:-
“The safest general characterisation of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.”
(* 1861-1947.)
I can buy into Alan Clark as a latter day cut-price Pepys. Tony Benn, less so.
They were all good political diaries. Crosland another.
They were all good political diaries. Crosland another.
I can buy into Alan Clark as a latter day cut-price Pepys. Tony Benn, less so.
I think think that is a very relevant point and it is about control of information and propaganda. Before the printing press the church controlled information and would not allow access to the bible. Even with the printing press many people could not read or afford them. In time we had the burning of books with unacceptable views. Now we have the internet where anybody can express any view and it can go round the world in seconds. It can turn an opinion into a fact based on the number of likes. But equally the internet has valid views and now we see a move to suppress them. Our intellectuals have been cancelled.
I worry about the lack of poets. When I was a boy, there were several world-class ones still writing (Betjeman, Heaney, Hughes) and they seemed to me to be part of an unbroken line of British and Irish poets going back to Shakepeare and Donne and Milton.
It seems the line is now broken. Simon Armitage is fine in his way but is he really part of this legacy?
Absolutely, and in the US there was the extraordinary Plath, uncomfortable as she is to read. No Greats around now anywhere in the Anglosphere that I can see. We are in the midst of a Poets Wiinter.
Legacies of great power, like the English poetic tradition, lie dormant but do not die. There was quite a dry spell between Milton and Blake/Wordsworth/Keats wasn’t there? (I like Dryden and Pope, Gray, etc., but the other four, to me, belong in a deeper line, extending past even national roots into an ancient bardic tradition).
A fallow period, to be sure, but announcement’s of Poetry’s death are either premature or greatly exaggerated.
You are probably right AJ. I certainly hope so.
You are probably right AJ. I certainly hope so.
He is not.
That’s really no disrespect either, because much of his output is admirable.
Absolutely, and in the US there was the extraordinary Plath, uncomfortable as she is to read. No Greats around now anywhere in the Anglosphere that I can see. We are in the midst of a Poets Wiinter.
Legacies of great power, like the English poetic tradition, lie dormant but do not die. There was quite a dry spell between Milton and Blake/Wordsworth/Keats wasn’t there? (I like Dryden and Pope, Gray, etc., but the other four, to me, belong in a deeper line, extending past even national roots into an ancient bardic tradition).
A fallow period, to be sure, but announcement’s of Poetry’s death are either premature or greatly exaggerated.
He is not.
That’s really no disrespect either, because much of his output is admirable.
Fair enough, but consider: How many of those writers were celebrated in their own time?
If “those writers’ refers to the ones PK mentioned viz Descartes, Spinoza, Milton, Locke, Hobbes and Pepys, then the answer is: all of them, apart from Pepys who of course wrote his diary for himself with no thoughts of publication.
If “those writers’ refers to the ones PK mentioned viz Descartes, Spinoza, Milton, Locke, Hobbes and Pepys, then the answer is: all of them, apart from Pepys who of course wrote his diary for himself with no thoughts of publication.
“where are our great intellects, diarists and philosophers and poets and so on?”
Podcasts, blogs, YouTube, and still … books.
excellent, Prash
but instead of their sort of Grand ”A new age of pleasure-loving debauchery” we get a society of degenerate, squalid, deviant, pathetic, solitary, wastrels wan* ing to bad porn wile drunk and stoned, and sharing their vacuous lives on cell-phones to people they could not really call friends. It is just not the same.
Peterson, Murray, Anderson, Hitchens, even Sandbrook & Holland perhaps? Charles Moore’s diary in the Spectator is always amusing. That is in the non-US anglosphere. I am sure there are others accross the pond. The difficulty with finding a new Hobbes or Locke is that they were pioneering for their time – much like “woke” academics are today.
We have spent the past 20 years outsourcing much of our humanity – we disassociate with our addictions and drugs, we outsource our critical thinking to memes and algorithms, we virtualise our identify to whatever flavour we want, the advent of Neuralink will start the transhumanist arms race, and the evasion of death through digital consciousness is all the rage (and if that’s not within your reach, Canada has some interesting Assisted Dying criteria that you can sign up for). The lack of serious thought has many causes, but in my view our resistance to being embodied is the fundamental cause. Very few of us actually live in the now.
Perhaps the late Alan Clark or even Tony Benn for Pepys.
As for philosophy. A.N. Whitehead* said it all years ago with this:-
“The safest general characterisation of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.”
(* 1861-1947.)
I think think that is a very relevant point and it is about control of information and propaganda. Before the printing press the church controlled information and would not allow access to the bible. Even with the printing press many people could not read or afford them. In time we had the burning of books with unacceptable views. Now we have the internet where anybody can express any view and it can go round the world in seconds. It can turn an opinion into a fact based on the number of likes. But equally the internet has valid views and now we see a move to suppress them. Our intellectuals have been cancelled.
I worry about the lack of poets. When I was a boy, there were several world-class ones still writing (Betjeman, Heaney, Hughes) and they seemed to me to be part of an unbroken line of British and Irish poets going back to Shakepeare and Donne and Milton.
It seems the line is now broken. Simon Armitage is fine in his way but is he really part of this legacy?
Fair enough, but consider: How many of those writers were celebrated in their own time?
Very nice essay, thank you.
“…People in the 17th century, like us, were struggling to come to terms with an extraordinary advance in information technology — in their case, the printing press…”.
Indeed, but unlike the 17th century, we in the 21st century seem to have been cowed by our information technology revolution. What I mean is, where are our great intellects, diarists and philosophers and poets and so on? Where are *our* Descarteses and Spinozas and Miltons, and Lockes and Hobbeses? Where is our Peyps? Instead of a creative explosion in the humanities (alongside the one in the sciences), we seem to have an explosion of ephemera, where even the most substantial figures seem to be spending half their time sprinkling shitposts on social media. No wonder no one gets round to producing any great works of the type someone will still be looking at and admiring, four centuries on.
“But then as I wandered I fell to thinking as to whether such confession be as it seems, or whether all other people be so influenced, cajoled, and frighted by the incessant promptings of the British Broadcasting Corporation, My Lord Attenborough (though he be now well into his dotage), and the proclamations of Mistress Thunberg. For these, and others of their cabal, do scarcely seem to let up from their hectoring about the end of times, that their opinions, being a curious mixture of Natural Philosophy and the Puritan sentiment, do make the minds of all men likely to run mad with distraction….”
May I modestly suggest Professor Alec Ryrie? He gives a thoughtful and often wickedly funny account of the 1640s and 1650s. The era was packed with political and religious loonies of all persuasions. The land was infested by Ranters, Levellers, Diggers, Seekers and, worst of all, the Quakers. They created a stir out of all proportion to their numbers. It was like having Al Quaeda and the Taliban taking over your suburb. Plus there was a Civil War, abolition of Parliament and the execution of the King. No wonder people were happy for Charles II to come back.
https://youtu.be/mK5-UaRSSSs
Thanks for the link.
Thanks for the link.
May I modestly suggest Professor Alec Ryrie? He gives a thoughtful and often wickedly funny account of the 1640s and 1650s. The era was packed with political and religious loonies of all persuasions. The land was infested by Ranters, Levellers, Diggers, Seekers and, worst of all, the Quakers. They created a stir out of all proportion to their numbers. It was like having Al Quaeda and the Taliban taking over your suburb. Plus there was a Civil War, abolition of Parliament and the execution of the King. No wonder people were happy for Charles II to come back.
https://youtu.be/mK5-UaRSSSs
“But then as I wandered I fell to thinking as to whether such confession be as it seems, or whether all other people be so influenced, cajoled, and frighted by the incessant promptings of the British Broadcasting Corporation, My Lord Attenborough (though he be now well into his dotage), and the proclamations of Mistress Thunberg. For these, and others of their cabal, do scarcely seem to let up from their hectoring about the end of times, that their opinions, being a curious mixture of Natural Philosophy and the Puritan sentiment, do make the minds of all men likely to run mad with distraction….”
Dominic’s excitement for what comes next demands faith in an ever-lasting upwards march of our civilisation. But our civilisation, rooted as all civilisations are in culture, religion and procreation, is coming to a close. The people that followed the civil war were the children of those that had gone before, inheritors of a culture and religion with an added dose of a powerful lessons learned. The people that follow us bring new cultures, new religions, and share nothing of the lessons we have learned.
So what if our own civilisation has peaked and instead of history repeating, history goes into reverse? Then what follows isn’t a parallel but a mirror. We would be in the midst of an information technology revolution giving birth to a new medieval world. New types of lords with great power over the rest of us, new types of peasants whose lives are severely restricted, and a new self-serving overbearing church that provides the moral framework justifying the new unfairness for some sort of greater good.
In terms of strength of belief and willingness to act and force everyone else to submit, you’d have to say the three most powerful “belief” systems today are wokeism, environmentalism, and Islam. All of these have a core that is medieval in outlook so it is not unreasonable to assume the future they are competing to create will be medieval whether there is a winner or a compromise.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that we already live in an age of pleasure-loving debauchery, a coffee shop in all hamlets, and a beefsteak served on every high street. This is the status quo. And it was the status quo that was destroyed by new forces claiming to represent the future.
Islam isn’t so keen on certain kinds of debauchery, the woke seem to think me drinking coffee is imperialist and/or racist, and the environmentalists are trying to end beef farming. I don’t have the same faith Dominic does…
Dominic’s excitement for what comes next demands faith in an ever-lasting upwards march of our civilisation. But our civilisation, rooted as all civilisations are in culture, religion and procreation, is coming to a close. The people that followed the civil war were the children of those that had gone before, inheritors of a culture and religion with an added dose of a powerful lessons learned. The people that follow us bring new cultures, new religions, and share nothing of the lessons we have learned.
So what if our own civilisation has peaked and instead of history repeating, history goes into reverse? Then what follows isn’t a parallel but a mirror. We would be in the midst of an information technology revolution giving birth to a new medieval world. New types of lords with great power over the rest of us, new types of peasants whose lives are severely restricted, and a new self-serving overbearing church that provides the moral framework justifying the new unfairness for some sort of greater good.
In terms of strength of belief and willingness to act and force everyone else to submit, you’d have to say the three most powerful “belief” systems today are wokeism, environmentalism, and Islam. All of these have a core that is medieval in outlook so it is not unreasonable to assume the future they are competing to create will be medieval whether there is a winner or a compromise.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that we already live in an age of pleasure-loving debauchery, a coffee shop in all hamlets, and a beefsteak served on every high street. This is the status quo. And it was the status quo that was destroyed by new forces claiming to represent the future.
Islam isn’t so keen on certain kinds of debauchery, the woke seem to think me drinking coffee is imperialist and/or racist, and the environmentalists are trying to end beef farming. I don’t have the same faith Dominic does…
Interesting essay.
“Still, if the 17th-century parallel really does hold up, then think what’s just around the corner!… The revival of the coffee house.”
Yes, indeed. Look no further than Unherd’s very own Unherd Club in Westminster. I wonder who will be their latter-day Pepys?
haha
haha
Interesting essay.
“Still, if the 17th-century parallel really does hold up, then think what’s just around the corner!… The revival of the coffee house.”
Yes, indeed. Look no further than Unherd’s very own Unherd Club in Westminster. I wonder who will be their latter-day Pepys?
Not so much witchcraft as witch hunting. On both sides of the Atlantic.
And the hunts in England (East Anglia, Pendle etc) and in Salem were small beer compared to the frenzies in some parts of Europe (even Scotland).
The witch hunts in England were born in Scotland. They came South when James VI of Scotland became James I of England.
perhaps we need some more packs of witch hounds… Just imagine them in full cry after Markle, the Jock woman politician, and one or two others Tally Ho… as I wave my cap hurtling over a fence in Monte Cito or Glasgee!!!!
perhaps we need some more packs of witch hounds… Just imagine them in full cry after Markle, the Jock woman politician, and one or two others Tally Ho… as I wave my cap hurtling over a fence in Monte Cito or Glasgee!!!!
The witch hunts in England were born in Scotland. They came South when James VI of Scotland became James I of England.
Not so much witchcraft as witch hunting. On both sides of the Atlantic.
And the hunts in England (East Anglia, Pendle etc) and in Salem were small beer compared to the frenzies in some parts of Europe (even Scotland).
I was delighted to read this “long-distance” comparison by Mr. Sandbrook. Nostalgic for a time of actual Civil War anyone? From a jesting perspective, I’d say nostalgia’s not as good as it used to be.
There is something of extraordinary resonance about the mid-17th century, though–especially in England (at least in my memory). To illustrate, I’ll just name three famous Johns: Milton, Dryden, and Locke. Certainly Wordsworth, not a reactionary, looked back with fondness on the Puritan Poet: “Milton, thou shouldst be living at this hour: / England hath need of thee: she is a fen / Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen”. Aside from the archaic diction, that sounds like a lot of common, present-day complaints to me.
“Like today’s war in Ukraine, the Thirty Years War became a kind of Rorschach test: what you saw depended on your existing religious and political prejudices”. This seems quite accurate and extends well beyond the single major issue of that war. We see through competing lenses that we regard as clear, but we are almost constitutionally-unable to see the lens itself, and many refuse even to question the clarity thereof. “Why beholdest thou the mote” and all that, right?
Great article!
I was delighted to read this “long-distance” comparison by Mr. Sandbrook. Nostalgic for a time of actual Civil War anyone? From a jesting perspective, I’d say nostalgia’s not as good as it used to be.
There is something of extraordinary resonance about the mid-17th century, though–especially in England (at least in my memory). To illustrate, I’ll just name three famous Johns: Milton, Dryden, and Locke. Certainly Wordsworth, not a reactionary, looked back with fondness on the Puritan Poet: “Milton, thou shouldst be living at this hour: / England hath need of thee: she is a fen / Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen”. Aside from the archaic diction, that sounds like a lot of common, present-day complaints to me.
“Like today’s war in Ukraine, the Thirty Years War became a kind of Rorschach test: what you saw depended on your existing religious and political prejudices”. This seems quite accurate and extends well beyond the single major issue of that war. We see through competing lenses that we regard as clear, but we are almost constitutionally-unable to see the lens itself, and many refuse even to question the clarity thereof. “Why beholdest thou the mote” and all that, right?
Great article!
No matter what technology we create, it doesn’t change our fundamental nature, to sit around our cave dissing the hunters who don’t bring us back what we want, when we want it and how it’s served.
No matter what technology we create, it doesn’t change our fundamental nature, to sit around our cave dissing the hunters who don’t bring us back what we want, when we want it and how it’s served.
‘‘Still, if the 17th-century parallel really does hold up, then think what’s just around the corner! A new age of pleasure-loving debauchery”
I thought that next was the Royal Fleet being destroyed at anchor on the Thames in London by the Dutch, and the Great Fire of London destroying the city….
I suppose covid – and – the insane war in Ukraine, both of which Boris created would be parallels, and do leave UK devastated as is on track now …, they are the self inflicted disaster –
1600s London rebuilt in Brick, and the new Fleet took on the world…..
But I would not hope for that, I think at this point we part with the later 1600s and modern days just keeps going down hill – look at what is in Parliament, not one Statesman. Not one Great writer, No – Donne, Bacon, Shakespeare…No scientist but the Fauci-esk monsters shilling for Pharma…no Philosophers, no Warriors, no person who stands out in greatness in all UK since Thatcher….
decline is in the cards, self inflicted decline, not 45% of London is even related to Pepys Londoners, and they are mostly old Boomers shivering in cold winter rooms from now on…. it has moved on….Greatness does not lie ahead…..
‘‘Still, if the 17th-century parallel really does hold up, then think what’s just around the corner! A new age of pleasure-loving debauchery”
I thought that next was the Royal Fleet being destroyed at anchor on the Thames in London by the Dutch, and the Great Fire of London destroying the city….
I suppose covid – and – the insane war in Ukraine, both of which Boris created would be parallels, and do leave UK devastated as is on track now …, they are the self inflicted disaster –
1600s London rebuilt in Brick, and the new Fleet took on the world…..
But I would not hope for that, I think at this point we part with the later 1600s and modern days just keeps going down hill – look at what is in Parliament, not one Statesman. Not one Great writer, No – Donne, Bacon, Shakespeare…No scientist but the Fauci-esk monsters shilling for Pharma…no Philosophers, no Warriors, no person who stands out in greatness in all UK since Thatcher….
decline is in the cards, self inflicted decline, not 45% of London is even related to Pepys Londoners, and they are mostly old Boomers shivering in cold winter rooms from now on…. it has moved on….Greatness does not lie ahead…..
Return of The Whig would be far more useful than the wig…
Return of The Whig would be far more useful than the wig…
Here in Australia, the one thing I really do look forward to is the return of the wig. Officers of Parliament and the courts should LOOK like officers of Parliamant and the courts, dammit.
The return of true debachery ran from about 1967 to the first AIDS diagnosis, and although with the advent of the Internet it has become indeed nasty, poor and brutish, but more particularly – ahem – solitary and short, it continues. The revival of the coffee-house is well under way. The triumph of the beefsteak is stirring in the carnivore diet movement.
It remains only for the revival of the wig for Dominic’s quadrella of resurrections to be achieved. For my part, Bring It On.
Here in Australia, the one thing I really do look forward to is the return of the wig. Officers of Parliament and the courts should LOOK like officers of Parliamant and the courts, dammit.
The return of true debachery ran from about 1967 to the first AIDS diagnosis, and although with the advent of the Internet it has become indeed nasty, poor and brutish, but more particularly – ahem – solitary and short, it continues. The revival of the coffee-house is well under way. The triumph of the beefsteak is stirring in the carnivore diet movement.
It remains only for the revival of the wig for Dominic’s quadrella of resurrections to be achieved. For my part, Bring It On.
If we’re looking for historical rhythms I’m not sure if we’ve reached the Restoration yet. We’re 1630 at best with a bankrupt and out of touch ruling class unable to reconcile two opposing forces from left snd right.
If we’re looking for historical rhythms I’m not sure if we’ve reached the Restoration yet. We’re 1630 at best with a bankrupt and out of touch ruling class unable to reconcile two opposing forces from left snd right.
A needlessly depressing and somewhat slanted essay. Take this for example: re: Ireland. “the true figure was probably lower than 10,000”.
Really, then not so bad then?
Off course 10,000 from a country with a population estimated at about one million in 1640 would be about 50,000 in today’s terms-2023, so a little worse than say Bloody Sunday, or for that matter the whole of the ridiculously named ‘Troubles’.*
Why nothing of the enormous scientific advances of this century? Nor anything about how Europe really began to dominate the planet, firstly with by its command of the oceans, and then snatching the ultimate prize, the Americas.
Still Mr Sandbrook you didn’t go for the fourteenth century, the normal haven of ‘doomsayers’, for which you are to be congratulated.
(* Incidentally Ireland’s population had doubled by 1700.)
I respect your take, informative as usual, but I found the essay to be quite lighthearted–far less depressing or dark than what I typically read here.
I respect your take, informative as usual, but I found the essay to be quite lighthearted–far less depressing or dark than what I typically read here.
A needlessly depressing and somewhat slanted essay. Take this for example: re: Ireland. “the true figure was probably lower than 10,000”.
Really, then not so bad then?
Off course 10,000 from a country with a population estimated at about one million in 1640 would be about 50,000 in today’s terms-2023, so a little worse than say Bloody Sunday, or for that matter the whole of the ridiculously named ‘Troubles’.*
Why nothing of the enormous scientific advances of this century? Nor anything about how Europe really began to dominate the planet, firstly with by its command of the oceans, and then snatching the ultimate prize, the Americas.
Still Mr Sandbrook you didn’t go for the fourteenth century, the normal haven of ‘doomsayers’, for which you are to be congratulated.
(* Incidentally Ireland’s population had doubled by 1700.)
I love reading Robert Harris’s historical novels, and Act of Oblivion was no exception, except for one exception – no spoilers, after all it’s only been 360 years – but I can’t think of any way to describe my qualm without letting the feline beast out of the portmanteau. Anyone else have a similar complaint?
The recent desecration of General Franco’s grave in Spain was NOT a good omen.
Has anyone here read either or both of the Cromwell biographies that Sandbrook gave favorable mention? If so, please tell me whether they are worthwhile, or which is better.
Have you read, ‘Cromwell: An honourable enemy’ by Tom Reilly?
Not yet. I’ll take that as a recommendation and look into it.
‘Lay’ heavy going. ‘Hutton’ volume II should be better.
Much obliged.
I haven’t read Paul Lay’s book on Cromwell, but I have read his book ‘Providence Lost’ which covers the period just after the civil wars, it is a very good overview of why the Puritans failed to subdue Britain.A book which makes a good companion to this is Diane Purkiss’ ‘The English Civil war’ its very good at outlining the long term trends and roots of the conflict among the people.
“The best thing about Scotland is the road back to England” or similar?
A delightfully written piece that has cheered me up no end!