Traditions of his Extraordinary Eloquence—Childhood—Unites in Church Fellowship with Christmas Evans, and with him preaches his First Sermon—The Church of Castell Hywel—Settles in the Ministry at Frefach—The Anonymous Preacher—Settles in Swansea—Swansea a Hundred Years Since—Mr. Davies reforms the Neighbourhood—Anecdotes of the Power of his Personal Character—How he Dealt with some Young Offenders—Anecdote of a Captain—The Gentle Character of his Eloquence—The Human Voice a Great Organ—The Power of the “Vox Humana” Stop—A Great Hymn Writer—His Last Sermon.
Weshall, in the next chapter, mention several names of men, mightily influential as Welsh preachers in their own country, and to most English readers utterly unknown. Perhaps the most conspicuous of these lesser known men is, however, David Davies, of Swansea. Dr. Thomas Rees, in every sense a thoroughly competent authority, speaks of him as one of the most powerful pulpit orators in his own, or any other, age; and he quotes the words of a well-known Welsh writer, a minister, who says of David Davies: “In his best days, he was one of the chief of the great Welsh preachers.” This writer continues: “I may be deemed too partial to my own denomination in making such an observation. What, it may beasked, shall be thought of John Elias, Christmas Evans, and others? In point of flowing eloquence, Davies was superior to every one of them, although, with regard to his matter, and the energy, and deep feeling with which he treated his subjects, Elias, in his best days, excelled him.” As to this question of feeling, however, the writer of these pages was talking, some time since, with Dr. Rees himself, about this same David Davies, when the Doctor said: “What the old people tell you about him is wonderful. It was in his voice—he could not help himself; without any effort, five minutes after he began to speak, the whole congregation would be bathed in tears.”
This great, and admirable man was born in the obscure little village of Llangeler, in Carmarthenshire, in June, 1763. His parents, although respectable, not being in affluent circumstances, could give him very few advantages of education. Thus it happened that, eminent as he became as a preacher, as one of the most effective hymn-writers in his language, and as a Biblical commentator, he was entirely a self-made man. However, as is so often the case in such instances, his earnest eagerness in the acquisition of knowledge was manifest when he was yet very young; and he was under the influence of very strong religious impressions at a very early age.
Even when he was quite a child, he would always stand up, and gravely ask a blessing on his meals; and it is said that there was something so impressive, and grave, in the manner of the child, that some careless frequenters of the house always took off their hats, and behaved with grave decorum until the short prayer was ended. His parents were notreligious persons, and, therefore, it is yet more remarkable that one day, while he was still in his earliest years, his father heard him fervently in prayer for them behind a hedge. It is not wonderful to learn that he was greatly affected by it. It does not seem that this depth of religious life accompanied him all the way through his boyhood, and his youth; but a very early marriage—in most instances, so grave, and fatal a mistake—would appear to have been the occasion of the restoration of his religious convictions. He was but twenty when he married Jane Evans, a respectable, and lovely young woman of his own neighbourhood; and now his religious life began in real earnest.
It is surely very remarkable, as we have already seen, that he, and Christmas Evans were admitted into Church fellowship on the same evening,—the Church to which we have already referred,—beneath the pastorate of the eminent scholar, and bard, David Davies, of Castell Hywel. The singularity did not stop here. Christmas Evans, and the young Davies, preached their first sermon in the same little cottage, in the parish of Llangeler, within a week of each other. The two youths were destined to be the most eminent lights of their different denominations, in their own country, in that age; but neither of them continued long in connection with the Church at Castell Hywel; and as they joined at the same time, so about the same time they left.
David Davies, their pastor, was a great man, and an eminent preacher, but he was an Arian, and the Church members were chiefly of the same school of thought; and the convictions of both youths werealtogether of too deep, and matured an order, to be satisfied by the Arian view of the person, and work of Christ. Moreover, they both, by the advice of friends, were looking to the work of the Ministry, for which they must have early shown their fitness; and, as we have noticed in the case of Christmas Evans, there was a rule in the Church at Castell Hywel, that no one should be permitted to preach who had not received an academical training.
This, in addition to their dissatisfaction with services devoted chiefly to the frigid statements of speculative points of doctrine, or the illustration of worldly politics, soon operated to move the young men into other fields. Evans, as we know, united himself with the Baptists; Davies found a congenial ministration at Pencadair, under the direction of a noted evangelical teacher of those parts, the Rev. William Perkins. There his deepest religious convictions became informed, and strengthened. Davies was always a man of emotion; it was his great strength when he became a preacher; and his biographer very pleasingly states the relation of his after-work to this moment of his life, when he says that, “Beneath the teaching of Mr. Perkins, a delightful change came over his feelings; he could now see, in the revealed testimony concerning the work finished by our Divine Surety, and Redeemer, enough to give confidence of approach ‘into the holiest,’ to every one who believes the report of it, as made known to all alike in the Scriptures. We may justly say, ‘Blessed are their eyes who see’ this; who see that God is now ‘reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing unto men their trespasses.’ They,indeed, see the heavens opened, and the angels of God ascending, and descending upon the Son of Man. They see that fulfilled which was set forth of old in vision to Jacob, the restoration of intercourse between earth and heaven through a mediator; and, in the discovery of it, they walk joyfully in the way of peace, and in the gracious presence of their reconciled Father.”
It was after this period that the first sermon was preached, in the cottage to which we have alluded. “The humble beginning of both Davies, and Evans, naturally reminds us,” says Davies’ biographer, “of the progress of an oak from the acorn to the full-grown tree, or that of a streamlet issuing from an obscure valley among the mountains, and swelling, by degrees, into a broad, and majestic river.” David Davies soon became well known in his neighbourhood as a mighty evangelist. Having grounded his own convictions, and even then possessed of a copious eloquence, it is not wonderful to read that dead Churches rose into newness of life, and became, in the course of time, flourishing societies. He was ordained as a co-pastor with the Rev. John Lewis, at Trefach. The chapel became too small, and a new one was built, which received the name of Saron. He became a blessing to Neuaddlwyd, and Gwernogle; his words ran, like flames of fire, through the whole district. It is said that his active spirit, and fervent style of preaching, gave a new tone to the ministry of the Independents throughout the whole Principality. Hearers, who have been unaccustomed to the penetrating, the quietly passionate emotionalness of the great Welsh preachers, can scarcely form anidea of the way in which their at once happy, and invincible words would set a congregation on fire.
The beloved, and revered William Rees, of Liverpool, in his memoir of his father, gives an illustration of this, in connection with a sermon preached by Mr. Davies; and it furnishes a striking proof of the force of his eloquence. The elder Rees speaks of one meeting in particular, which he attended at Denbigh, at the annual gathering of the Independents. A minister from South Wales preached at the service with unusual power, and eloquence. Among the auditors, there was a venerable man, named William Lewis, who possessed a voice loud, and clear as a trumpet, and who was, at that time, a celebrated preacher among the Calvinistic Methodists. The southern minister, in full sail, with the power of the “hwyl” strong upon him, and the whole congregation, of course, in full sympathy, all breathless, and waiting for the next word, came to a point in his sermon where he repeated, says Mr. Rees, in his most pathetic tones, the verse of a hymn, which can only be very poorly conveyed in translation:—
“Streams from the rock, and bread from heaven,Were, by their God, to Israel given;While Sinai’s terrors blazed around,And thunders shook the solid ground,No harm befell His people there,Sustained with all a Father’s care,Perversely sinful though they were.”
“Streams from the rock, and bread from heaven,Were, by their God, to Israel given;While Sinai’s terrors blazed around,And thunders shook the solid ground,No harm befell His people there,Sustained with all a Father’s care,Perversely sinful though they were.”
The drift of the passage was to show that the believer in Christ is just as safe amidst terrors from within, and without. The sentiment touched the electric chord in the hearts of the multitude. OldWilliam Lewis could bear it no longer. Up he started, unable to conceal his feelings. “Oh, yes! oh, yes!” he exclaimed; “blessed be His name! God supported His people amidst all the terrors of Sinai, sinful, and rebellious though they were. That was the most dreadful spot in which men could ever be placed; yet, even there, God preserved His people unharmed. Oh, yes! and there He sustained me, too, a poor, helpless sinner, once exposed to the doom of His law, and trembling before Him!” No sooner had the old man uttered these words, than a flame seemed instantaneously to spread through the whole congregation, which broke forth into exclamations of joy, and praise. But the preacher, who had kindled this wonderful fire, and who could do such things! For some time, Mr. Rees was unable to find out who it was; and it was the younger Rees, long the venerable minister in Liverpool, who discovered afterwards, from one of his father’s old companions, that it was David Davies, from the south,—he who came to be called, in his more mature years, “The great Revivalist of Swansea.”
For, after labouring until the year 1802 in the more obscure regions we have mentioned, where, however, his congregations were immense, and his influence great over the whole Principality, he was invited by the Churches of Mynyddbach, and Sketty—in fact, parts of Swansea—to become their pastor; and on this spot his life received its consummation, and crown.
When Mr. Davies entered the town, it was a remarkably wicked spot; the colliers were more like barbarians than the inhabitants of a civilized country.Gangs of drunken ruffians prowled through its streets, and the suburbs in different directions, ready to assault, and ill-treat any persons who ventured near them. They were accustomed to attack the houses as they passed, throwing stones at the doors, and windows, and could scarcely open their mouths without uttering the most horrid oaths, and blasphemies. It seems almost strange, to our apprehensions now, that the presence of a preacher should effect a change in a neighbourhood; yet nothing is more certain, than the fact that immense social reformations were effected by ministers of the Gospel, both in England, and in Wales.
Mr. Davies had not long entered Swansea before the whole neighbourhood underwent a speedy, and remarkable change. He had a very full, and magnificent voice; a voice of amazing compass, flexibility, and tenderness; a voice with which, according to all accounts, he could do anything—which could roll out a kind of musical thunder in the open air, over great multitudes, or sink to the softest intonations, and whispers, for small cottage congregations. It was well calculated to arrest a rude multitude. And so it came about that Mynyddbach became as celebrated for the work of David Davies, as the far-famed Llangeitho for the great work, and reformation of David Rowlands. The people poured in from the country round to hear him. Then, although very tender, and genial, his manner was so solemn, and he had so intense a power of realizing, to others, the deep, and weighty truths he taught, that he became a terror to evil-doers.
It is mentioned that numbers of butchers fromthe neighbourhood of Cwmamman, and Llangenie, were in the habit of attending Swansea market on Saturdays. Some of them, after selling the meat which they had brought, were accustomed to frequent the public-houses, and to remain there drinking, and carousing until the Sunday morning. It is a well-known, and amusing circumstance, that, in the course of a little time, when proceeding homewards on their ponies, if they caught a glimpse of Mr. Davies coming in an opposite direction, they hastily turned round, and trotted off, until they could find a bystreet, or lane, to avoid his reproving glances, or warnings, which had the twofold advantage of pertinency and serious wit, conveyed in tones sufficiently stentorian to reach their ears. And there was a man, proverbially notorious for his profane swearing, who plied a ferry-boat between Swansea, and Foxhole; whenever he perceived Mr. Davies approaching, he took care to give a caution to any who might be using improper expressions: “Don’t swear, Mr. Davies is coming!”
And there is another story, which shows what manner of man this Davies was. One Saturday night, a band of drunken young men, and boys, threw a quantity of stones against his door, according to their usual mode of dealing with other houses. While they were busy at their work of mischief, he suddenly opened the door, rushed out, and secured two or three of the culprits, who were compelled to give him the names of all their companions. He then told them that he should expect every one of them to be at his house on a day which he mentioned. Accordingly, the whole party came at the appointedhour, but attended by their mothers, who were exceedingly afraid lest the offending lads should be sent to prison in a body. Instead of threatening to take them before the magistrates, Mr. Davies told them to kneel down with him; and having offered up an earnest prayer, and affectionately warned them of the consequences of their evil ways, he dismissed them, requesting, however, that they would all attend at Ebenezer Chapel on the following Sunday. They were, of course, glad to comply with his terms, and to be let off so easily. In after years, several of them became members of his Church, and maintained through life a consistent Christian profession. “And one of them,” said Dr. Rees, when writing the story of his great predecessor, “is an old grey-headed disciple, still living.”
Such anecdotes as these show how far the character of the man aided, and sustained the mighty power of the minister. Our old friend, the venerable William Davies, of Fishguard, says: “I well remember Mr. Davies of Swansea’s repeated preaching tours through Pembrokeshire, and can never forget the emotions, and deep feelings which his matchless eloquence produced on his crowded congregations everywhere; he had a penetrating mind, a lively imagination, and a clear, distinctive utterance; he had a remarkable command of his voice, with such a flow of eloquence, and in the most melodious intonations, that his enraptured audience would almost leap for joy.”
Instances are not wanting, either in the ancient, or modern history of the pulpit, of large audiences rising from their seats, and standing as if all spellbound,while the preacher was pursuing his theme, and, to the close of his discourse, subdued beneath the deepening impression, and rolling flow of words. Perhaps the reader, also, will remember, if he have ever been aware of such scenes, that it is not so much glowing splendour of expression, or the weight of original ideas, still less vehement action, which achieves these results, as a certain marvellous, and melodious fitness of words, even in the representation of common things.
But to return to Mr. Davies. Davies of Fishguard, aforementioned, gives an illustration of his preaching: “The captain of a vessel was a member of my Church at Fishguard, but he always attended Ebenezer, when his vessel was lying at Swansea. One day, he asked another captain, ‘Will you go with me next Sunday, to hear Mr. Davies? I am sure he will make you weep.’ ‘Makemeweep?’ said the other, with a loud oath. ‘Ah! there’s not a preacher in this world can makemeweep.’ However, he promised to go. They took their seats in the front of the gallery. The irreligious captain, for awhile, stared in the preacher’s face, with a defiant air, as if determined to disregard what he might say; but when the master of the assembly began to grow warm, the rough sailor hung down his head, and before long, he was weeping like a child.” Here was an illustration of the great power of this man to move, and influence the affections.
As compared with other great Welsh preachers, Davies must be spoken of as, in an eminent manner, a singer, a prophet of song, and the swell, and cadences of his voice were like the many voices,which blend to make up one complete concert. He was not only a master of the deep bass notes, but he had a rich soprano kind of power, too; for we read that “when he raised his voice to a higher pitch than ordinary, it increased in melody, and power, and its effects were thrilling in the extreme; there were no jarring notes—all was the music of eloquence throughout.” This must not be thought wonderful—it is natural; all men cannot be thus, nor all preachers, however good, and great. There are a few noble organs in the world. The organ itself, however considered, is a wonderful instrument, but there are some built with such extraordinary art that they are capable of producing transcendent effects beyond most other instruments. Davies, the preacher, was one of these amazing organs, in a human frame; but the power of melody was still within his own soul, and it was the wonderful score which he was able to read, and which he compelled his voice to follow, which yet produced these amazing effects.
Surely, it is not more wonderful, that the human voice should have its great, and extraordinary exceptions, than that most wonderful piece of mechanism and art, an organ. We have the organs of Berne, Haarlem, and the Sistine Chapel—such are great exceptions in those powers which art exercises over the kingdom of sound; their building, their architecture, has made them singular, and set them apart as great instruments. But even in these, who does not remember the power of thevox humanastop? We apprehend that few who have heard it in the organs of Berne, or Fribourg, will sympathise with Dr. Burney’s irreverent,and ridiculous condemnation of it, in his “History of Music,” as the “cracked voice of an old woman of ninety, or Punch singing through a comb.” Far from this, the hearer waits with intense anxiety, almost goes to hear this note, and realizes in it, what has been said so truly, that music, as it murmurs through the ear, is the nurse of the soul. But all organs have not thevox humanastop, nor all preachers either. The human voice, like the organ, is a mighty instrument, but it is the soul which informs the instrument with this singular power, so that within its breast all the passions seem to reign in turn. Singular, that we have thought so much of the great organs of the Continent, and have listened with such intensity to the great singers, and have failed to apply the reflection that the greatest preachers must be, in some measure, a combination of both.
Davies was one of those preachers, without whose presence the annual gatherings, in which the Welsh especially delighted, would have been incomplete. On such occasions, he was usually the last of the preachers—the one waited for. As the service proceeded, it naturally happened that some weariness fell over the assembly; numbers of people might be seen in different parts, sitting, or reclining, on the grass; but as soon as David Davies appeared on the platform, there was a gathering in of all the people, pressing forward from all parts of the field, eager to catch every word which fell from the lips of the speaker. When a great singer appears at a concert, who of all the audience would lose a single bar of the melody? He gave out his own hymn in a voicethat reached, without effort, to the utmost limits of the assembled multitude, though he spoke in a quiet, natural tone, without any exertion. He read his text deliberately, but in accents sufficiently loud to be heard with ease by ten thousand people. What is any great singer, without distinctness of enunciation? And distinct enunciation has always been one of the strong points of the great Welsh preachers. Hence, from this reason, he was always impressive, and he seldom preached without using some Scriptural story, which he made to live, through his accent, in the hearts of the people; illustrative similes, and not too many of them; striking thoughts, beneath the pressure of which his manner became more and more impressive, until, at each period, his hearers were overpoweringly affected. Every account of him speaks of his wonderfully impressive voice; and all this gained additional force from his dignified bearing, and appearance, which took captive, and carried away, not only more refined intelligences, but even coarsest natures, while the preacher never approached, for a moment, the verge of vulgarity. Contemporary preachers bore testimony that when the skilful singer had closed his strain, the people could not leave the spot, but remained for a long time after, weeping, and praising.
We have said, already, that Mr. Davies was one of the Welsh hymn-writers; eighty of his hymns are said to be among the best in the Welsh language. He was a strong man, of robust constitution, but, it may be said, he died young; before he had reached his fiftieth year, his excessive labours had told visibly on his health, and for many months before his death, he wasstrongly impressed with the idea that the time of his departure was at hand. He died in the year 1816. The first Sabbath of that year, he preached a very impressive sermon, from the text, “Thus saith the Lord, This year thou shalt die.”
His last sermon was preached about three weeks before he died, when he also administered the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, and gave the right hand of fellowship to thirteen persons, on their admission into the Church. He spoke only a few words during the service, and in those, in faltering accents, told his people he did not expect to be seen amongst them any more. And, indeed, there was every indication, by his weakness, that his words would be fulfilled. Every cheek was bedewed with tears. The hearts of many were ready to burst with grief; for this man’s affections were so great, that he produced, naturally, that grief which we feel when the holders of our great affections seem to be parted from us.
He went home from this meeting to die. The struggle was not long protracted. On the morning of December 26th, 1816, he breathed his last. On the day of the funeral, a large concourse, from the town, and neighbourhood, followed his remains to the grave. These lie in a vault, which now occupies a space in the centre of the new chapel, reared on the site of that in which he ministered so affectionately; and over the pulpit, a chaste, and beautiful mural marble tablet memorialises, and very conspicuously bears the name of David Davies. Of him, also, it might be said: “The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned,that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary.”
Rees Pritchard, and “The Welshman’s Candle”—A Singular Conversion—The Intoxicated Goat—The Vicar’s Memory—“God’s better than All”—Howell Harris—Daniel Rowlands at Llangeitho—Philip Pugh—The Obscure Nonconformist—Llangeitho—Charles of Bala—His Various Works of Christian Usefulness—The Ancient Preachers of Wild Wales characterised—Thomas Rhys Davies—Impressive Paragraphs from his Sermons—Evan Jones, an Intimate Friend of Christmas Evans—Shenkin of Penhydd—A Singular Mode of Illustrating a Subject—Is the Light in the Eye?—Ebenezer Morris—High Integrity—Homage of Magistrates paid to his Worth—“Beneath”—Ebenezer Morris at Wotton-under-Edge—His Father, David Morris—Rough-and-ready Preachers—Thomas Hughes—Catechised by a Vicar—Catching the Congregation by Guile—Sammy Breeze—A Singular Sermon in Bristol in the Old Time—A Cloud of Forgotten Worthies—Dr. William Richards—His Definition of Doctrine—Davies of Castell Hywel, the Pastor of Christmas Evans, and of Davies of Swansea—Some Account of Welsh Preaching in Wild Wales, in Relation to the Welsh Proverbs, Ancient Triads, Metaphysics, and Poetry—Remarks on the Welsh Language and the Welsh Mind—Its Secluded and Clannish Character.
Amongstthe characteristic names of Wales, remarkable in that department to which we shall devote this chapter, whoever may be passed by, the name of Rees Pritchard, the ancient Vicar of Llandovery, ought not to go unmentioned. Wesuppose no book, ever published in Wales, has met the acceptance and circulation of “Canwyll-y-Cymry,” or “The Welshman’s Candle.” Since the day of its publication, it has gone through perfectly countless editions; and there was a time, not long since, when there was scarcely a family in Wales, of any intelligence, which did not possess a copy.
Its author was born in the parish of which he became the vicar, so far back as 1575. He was educated at Oxford. His early life was more remarkable for dissipation of every kind, than for any pursuits compatible with his sacred profession. He was, especially, an inveterate drunkard; the worst of his parishioners were scandalised by his example, and said, “Bad as we may be, we are not half so bad as the parson!” The story of his conversion is known to many, who are not acquainted with his life, and work, and the eminence to which he attained; and it certainly illustrates how very strange have been some of the means of man’s salvation, and how foolish things have confounded the wise. As George Borrow says in his “Wild Wales,” in his account of Pritchard, “God, however, who is aware of what every man is capable, had reserved Rees Pritchard for great, and noble things, and brought about his conversion in a very remarkable manner.”
He was in the habit of spending much of his time in the public-house, from which he was, usually, trundled home in a wheelbarrow, in a state of utter insensibility. The people of the house had a large he-goat, which went in, and out, and mingled with the guests. One day, Pritchard called the goat to him, and offered it some ale, and the creature, so farfrom refusing it, drank it greedily, and soon after fell down in a state of intoxication, and lay quivering, to the great delight of Pritchard, and his companions, who, however, were horrified at this conduct in one, who was appointed to be their example, and teacher. Shortly after, as usual, Pritchard himself was trundled home, utterly intoxicated. He was at home, and ill, the whole of the next day; but on the day following, he went down to the public-house, and called for his pipe, and tankard. The goat came into the room, and again he held the tankard to the creature’s mouth; but it turned away its head in disgust, hurried away, and would come near him no more. This startled the man. “My God!” he said, “is this poor dumb creature wiser than I?” He pursued, in his mind, the train of feeling awakened by conscience; he shrank, with disgust, from himself. “But, thank God!” he said, “I am yet alive, and it is not too late to mend. The goat has taught me a lesson; I will become a new man.” Smashing his pipe, he left his tankard untasted, and hastened home. He, indeed, commenced a new career. He became, and continued for thirty years, a great, and effective preacher; “preaching,” says Mr. Borrow, “the inestimable efficacy of Christ’s blood-shedding.”
Those poetical pieces which he wrote at intervals, and which are called “The Welshman’s Candle,” appear only to have been gathered into a volume, and published, after his death. The room in which he lived, and wrote, appears to be still standing; and Mr. Borrow says: “Of all the old houses in Llandovery, the old Vicarage is, by far, the most worthy of attention, irrespective of the wonderful monumentof God’s providence, and grace, who once inhabited it;” and the old vicar’s memory is as fresh in Llandovery, to-day, as ever it was. While Mr. Borrow was looking at the house, a respectable-looking farmer came up, and was about to pass; “but observing me,” he says, “and how I was employed, he stopped, and looked now at me, and now at the antique house. Presently he said, ‘A fine old place, sir, is it not? But do you know who lived there?’ Wishing to know what the man would say, provided he thought I was ignorant as to the ancient inmate, I turned a face of inquiry upon him, whereupon he advanced towards me, two or three steps, and placing his face so close to mine, that his nose nearly touched my cheek, he said, in a kind of piercing whisper, ‘The Vicar!’ then drawing his face back, he looked me full in the eyes, as if to observe the effect of his intelligence, gave me two or three nods, as if to say, ‘He did indeed,’ and departed.TheVicar of Llandovery had then been dead nearly two hundred years. Truly the man in whom piety, and genius, are blended, is immortal upon earth!” “The Welshman’s Candle” is a set of homely, and very rememberable verses, putting us, as far as we are able to judge, in mind of our Thomas Tusser.
Mr. Borrow gives us a very pleasant taste in the following literal, vigorous translation, which we may presume to be his own:—
“GOD’S BETTER THAN ALL.”“God’s better than heaven, or aught therein;Than the earth, or aught we there can win;Better than the world, or its wealth to me—God’s better than all that is, or can be.“Better than father, than mother, than nurse;Better than riches, oft proving a curse;Better than Martha, or Mary even—Better, by far, is the God of heaven.“If God for thy portion thou hast ta’en,There’s Christ to support thee in every pain;The world to respect thee thou wilt gain;To fear thee, the fiend, and all his train.“Of the best of portions, thou choice didst make,When thou the high God to thyself didst take;A portion, which none from thy grasp can rend,Whilst the sun, and the moon on their course shall wend.“When the sun grows dark, and the moon turns red;When the stars shall drop, and millions dread;When the earth shall vanish, with its pomp, in fire,Thy portion shall still remain entire.“Then let not thy heart, though distressed, complain;A hold on thy portion firm maintain.Thou didst choose the best portion, again I say;Resign it not till thy dying day!”
“GOD’S BETTER THAN ALL.”
“God’s better than heaven, or aught therein;Than the earth, or aught we there can win;Better than the world, or its wealth to me—God’s better than all that is, or can be.
“Better than father, than mother, than nurse;Better than riches, oft proving a curse;Better than Martha, or Mary even—Better, by far, is the God of heaven.
“If God for thy portion thou hast ta’en,There’s Christ to support thee in every pain;The world to respect thee thou wilt gain;To fear thee, the fiend, and all his train.
“Of the best of portions, thou choice didst make,When thou the high God to thyself didst take;A portion, which none from thy grasp can rend,Whilst the sun, and the moon on their course shall wend.
“When the sun grows dark, and the moon turns red;When the stars shall drop, and millions dread;When the earth shall vanish, with its pomp, in fire,Thy portion shall still remain entire.
“Then let not thy heart, though distressed, complain;A hold on thy portion firm maintain.Thou didst choose the best portion, again I say;Resign it not till thy dying day!”
But the age of preachers in Wales, to which the following pages will more immediately refer, commences with those two great men, who were indeed the Whitfield, and the Wesley of Wales—Howell Harris of Trevecca, and Daniel Rowlands of Llangeitho. It is remarkable that these two men, born to be such inestimable, and priceless blessings to their country, were born within a year of each other—Harris at Trevecca, in 1714, Rowlands at Pantybeidy, in Cardiganshire, in 1713. As to Harris, he is spoken of as the most successful preacher that ever ascended a pulpit, or platform in Wales; and yet nothing is more certain, than that he neither aimed to preach, nor will his sermons, so far as anyknowledge can be obtained of them, stand the test of any kind of criticism. This only is certain, their unquestioned, and greatly pre-eminent usefulness.
He did not deliver composed sermons, but unpremeditated addresses, on sin, and its tremendous consequences; on death, and the judgment, and the world to come. It is said, “His words fell like balls of fire, on the careless, and impenitent multitudes.” Himself destined for a clergyman of the Church of England, an Oxford man, and with a fair promise of success in the Church—since before he left Oxford, he had a benefice offered him—he repeatedly applied, in vain, for ordination. Throughout his life, he continued ardently attached to the services of the Church of England.
It was, unhappily, from that Church, in Wales, he encountered his most vehement opposition, and cruel persecution. He, however, roused the whole country,—within the Church of England, and without,—from its state of apathy, and impiety; while we quite agree with his biographer, who says: “Any attempt to account philosophically for the remarkable effects which everywhere attended the preaching of Howell Harris, would be nothing better than an irreverent trifling with a solemn subject. All that can be said, with propriety, is, that he was an extraordinary instrument, raised by Providence, at an extraordinary time, to accomplish an extraordinary work.”
But Llangeitho, and its vicar, seem to demand a more lengthened notice, as coming more distinctly within the region of the palpable, and apprehensible. Daniel Rowlands was a clergyman, and the son of a clergyman. At twenty-two years of age, he wasappointed perpetual curate, or incumbent, of the united parishes of Nantcwnlle and Llangeitho, at a salary of ten pounds a year. He never received any higher preferment in the Church on earth, although so eminent a blessing to his country. He must have been some such man as our William Grimshaw, of Haworth. When he entered upon his curacy, he was quite an unconverted young man, given to occasional fits of intoxication, and in the summer he left his pulpit, to take his part, with his parishioners, in the sports, and games in the neighbouring fields, or on the village green.
But, in the immediate neighbourhood of his own hamlet, ministered a good and consistent Nonconformist, Philip Pugh, a learned, lovable, and lowly man; and, in the smaller round of his sphere, a successful preacher. Daniel Rowlands appears to have been converted under a sermon of the eminent Rev. Griffith Jones of Llanddouror, at Llanddewibrefi; but it was to Philip Pugh that he was led for that instruction, and influence, which instrumentally helped to develop his character. It would seem that Rowlands was a man bound to be in earnest; but conversion set on fire a new genius in the man. He developed, hitherto undiscovered, great preaching power, and his church became crowded. Still, for the first five years of his new course of life, he did not know that more glorious and beautiful Gospel which he preached through all the years following.
He was a tremendous alarmist; the dangers of sin, and the terrors of the eternal judgments, were his topics; and his hearers shrank, and recoiled, whilethey were fascinated to listen. Again, the venerable Nonconformist stepped in; Philip Pugh pointed out his defect. “My dear sir,” said he, “preach the Gospel—preach the Gospel to the people. Give them the balm of Gilead; show the blood of Christ; apply it to their spiritual wounds; show the necessity of faith in a crucified Redeemer.” “I am afraid,” said Rowlands, “that I have not all that faith myself, in its full vigour, and exercise.” “Preach on it,” said Mr. Pugh; “preach on it, until you feel it in that way,—it will come. If you go on preaching in the way you have been doing, you will kill half the people in the country. You thunder out the curses of the law, and preach in such a terrific manner, that nobody can stand before you. Preach the Gospel!” And again the young clergyman followed the advice of his patriarchal friend, and unnumbered thousands in Wales had occasion, through long following years, to bless God for it.
Does not the reader call up a very beautiful picture of these two, in that old and obscure Welsh hamlet, nearly a hundred and fifty years since?—the conversation of such an one as Paul, the aged, with his young son, Timothy; and if anything were needed to increase our sense of admiration of the young clergyman, it would be that he did not disdain to receive lessons from old age, and an old age covered with the indignities attaching to an outlawed Nonconformist. In Wales, there were very many men like Philip Pugh; we may incidentally mention the names of several in the course of these pages—names well worthy of the commendation in Johnson’s perfect lines:
“Their virtues walked their narrow round,Nor made a pause, nor left a void;And sure the Eternal Master foundTheir single talent well employed.“And still they fill affection’s eye,Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;And let not arrogance denyIts praise to merit unrefined.”
“Their virtues walked their narrow round,Nor made a pause, nor left a void;And sure the Eternal Master foundTheir single talent well employed.
“And still they fill affection’s eye,Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;And let not arrogance denyIts praise to merit unrefined.”
Then there opened a great career before Rowlands, and Llangeitho became as a shrine in evangelical Wales. He received invitations to preach in every neighbourhood of the Principality; many churches were opened to him, and where they were not, he took freely, and cheerfully, to the chapels, or the fields. His words, and accents were of that marvellous kind we have identified with Welsh preaching. Later on, and in other times, people said, he found his successor in Davies of Swansea; and the highest honour they could give to Swansea, in Davies’ day, was that “it was another Llangeitho.”
Rowlands had the power of the thunder, and the dew; he pressed an extraordinary vitality into words, which had often been heard before, so that once, while reading the Church Service, in his own church, he gave such a dreadful tenderness to the words, “By thine agony, and bloody sweat!” that the service was almost stopped, and the people broke forth into a passion of feeling. Christmas Evans says: “While Rowlands was preaching, the fashion of his countenance became altered; his voice became as if inspired; the worldly, dead, and careless spirit was cast out by his presence. The people, as it were, drew near to the cloud, towards Christ, and Moses,and Elijah. Eternity, with its realities, rushed upon their vision. These mighty influences were felt, more or less, for fifty years. Thousands gathered at Llangeitho for communion every month, and they came there from every county in Wales.”
Such power there is in human words when divinely wielded; such was the spiritual power of Daniel Rowlands. Well does one writer say, the story of Llangeitho, well written, would read like a chapter in religious romance. It is very doubtful whether we have the record of any other man who drew such numbers to the immediate circle of his ministry, as Rowlands. He did not itinerate so largely as most of the great Welsh preachers. In an obscure spot in the interior of Cardiganshire, in an age of bad roads, and in a neighbourhood where the roads were especially bad, he addressed his immense concourses of people. His monthly communion was sometimes attended by as many as three thousand communicants, of whom, often, many were clergymen. Upwards of a hundred ministers ascribe to him the means of their conversion. Thus, in his day, it was a place of pilgrimages; and even now, there are not a few who turn aside, to stand, with wonder, upon the spot where Rowlands exercised his marvellous ministry.
The four great Welsh preachers, Christmas Evans, John Elias, Williams of Wern, and Davies of Swansea, on whose pulpit powers, and method, we have more distinctly dilated, may be styled the tetrarchs of the pulpit of Wild Wales of these later times. Their eminence was single, and singular. Their immense powers unquestioned: rivals, never, apparently, bytheir own selection, the great Welsh religious mind only rivalled them with each other. After them it might be said, “Great was the company of preachers,”—great, not merely in number, carrying also influence, and usefulness of another kind; perhaps even superior to those honoured names.
How, for instance, can we do sufficient honour to the labours ofCharles of Bala? This truly apostolic man was born at Llanvihangel, in 1755. While yet a boy, he managed to introduce family worship into his father’s house; but it was in his eighteenth year that he heard the great Daniel Rowlands preach, and he says: “From that day I found a new heaven, and a new earth, to enjoy; the change experienced by a blind man, on receiving his sight, is not greater than that which I felt on that day.” In his twentieth year he went to Oxford, and received Deacon’s orders, and was appointed to a curacy in Somersetshire; he took his degree at his University, but he could never obtain priest’s orders; in every instance objection was made to what was called his Methodism.
The doors of the Establishment were thus closed against him, and he was compelled to cast in his lot with the Welsh Methodists, in 1785. Before this, he had preached for Daniel Rowlands in his far-famed church at Llangeitho, and the great old patriarch simply uttered a prophecy about him when he said, “Mr. Charles is the gift of God to North Wales.” He was an eminent preacher, but it was rather in other ways that he became illustrious, in the great religious labours of his country. Moving about to preach, from place to place, his heart became painfully impressed, and distressed, by thegreat ignorance of the people everywhere, and that such multitudes were unable to read the Word of God; so he determined on the establishment of schools upon a singular principle.
It was two or three years before he commenced his more settled labours in Wales, that Robert Raikes had originated the Sunday-school idea in Gloucester. Thomas Charles was the first to seize upon the idea, and introduce it into his own country. Charles had an organizing, and administrative, mind; he fixed upon innumerable places, where he settled schoolmasters, for periods of from six to nine, and twelve months, to teach the people to read, giving them the initial elements, and rudiments, of education, and then removing these masters to another locality.
So he filled the country with schools—Sabbath, and night-schools. He visited the schools himself, periodically, catechizing the children publicly; and in the course of his lifetime, he had the satisfaction of seeing the aspect of things entirely changed. He used no figure of speech, when, towards the close of his life, he said, “The desert blossoms as the rose, and the dry land has become streams of water.” To these purposes of his heart he was able to devote whatever money he received from the work of the ministry; he testifies affectionately that “the wants of my own family were provided for by the industry of my dear wife;” and he received some help by donations from England. He found, everywhere, a dearth of Bibles, and it is curious to read that, although the Church of England would not receive him as one of her ministers, when his work became established, the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge madehim, after considerable reluctance, a grant of no less than ten thousand Welsh Bibles. After this, he went to London, for the purpose of establishing a Society to supply Wales with the Holy Scriptures. It was at a meeting of the Religious Tract Society, which was called together for that purpose, that it was resolved to establish the British and Foreign Bible Society; and before that society had been established ten years, it had supplied Wales with a hundred thousand copies of the Word of God.
Other men were great preachers, but Thomas Charles was, in the truest sense of the word, a bishop, an overseer,—travelling far, and wide, preaching, catechizing, administrating, placing and removing labourers. All his works, and words, his inward, and his outward life, show the active, high-toned saintliness, and enthusiastic holiness, of the man. There is, perhaps, no other to whom Wales is so largely indebted for the giving direction, organization, and usefulness to all religious labour, as to him. His modesty transcended his gifts, and his activity. John Campbell, of Kingsland, himself noted in all the great, and good works of that time, relates that at a meeting, at Lady Anne Erskine’s, at which Mr. Charles was requested to state the circumstances which had made little Bala a kind of spiritual metropolis of the Principality of Wales, “he spoke for about an hour, and never once mentioned himself, although he was the chief instrument, and actor, in the whole movements which had made the place so eminent.”
This good man, John Campbell, afterwards wrote to Mr. Charles’s biographer: “I never was at Balabut once, which was not long after his removal to the regions of immortality; and such was my veneration for his character, and labours, that, in approaching it, I felt as if I was about coming in sight of Sinai, or Jerusalem, or treading on classical ground. The events of his life, I believe, are viewed with more interest by the glorified than the battles of Actium, or Waterloo.”
But, as a preacher, he was unlike those men, whose words moved upon the wheels of thunder, and who seemed to deal with the lightnings of imagination, and eloquence. As we read his words, they seem to flow with refreshing sweetness. He was waited for, and followed everywhere, but his utterances had nothing of the startling powers we have seen; we should think he preached, rather, to those who knew, by experience, what it is to grow in grace. There is a glowing light of holiness about his words—a deep, sweet, experimental reality. Of course, being a Welshman, his thoughts were pithily expressed. They were a sort of spiritual proverbs, in which he turned over, again and again, some idea, until it became like the triads of his country’s literature; and dilating upon an idea, the various aspects of it became like distinct facets, setting forth some pleasant ray.
Such was Thomas Charles. Wales lost him at the age of sixty—a short life, if we number it by years; a long life, if we consider all he accomplished in it; and, to this day, his name is one of the most revered throughout the Principality.
It is impossible to do the justice even of mentioning the names of many of those men, who “servedtheir generation” so well, “according to the will of God, and then fell asleep.” And it is as necessary, as it is interesting, to notice how the various men, moved by the Spirit of God, found Him leading, and guiding them in the path of labour, their instincts chose.
In the history of preaching, we believe there is no more curious chapter than this, of these strange preachers in Wales. They have an idiosyncrasy as entirely, and peculiarly, their own, as is that of the country in which they carried on their ministrations. The preaching friars of the times we call the dark, or middle ages, are very remarkable, from the occasional glimpses we are able to obtain of them. Very remarkable the band of men, evoked by the rise of Methodism in England,—those who spread out all over the land, treading the paths indicated by the voice, and finger of Whitfield, or Wesley. Very entertaining are the stories of the preachers of the backwoods of America, the sappers, and miners, who cleared a way for the planting of the Word among the wild forests of the Far West.
These Welsh preachers were unlike any of them,—they had a character altogether their own. A great many of them were men of eminent genius, glowing with feeling, and fancy; never having known college training, or culture, they were very often men who had, somehow, attained a singular variety of knowledge, lore, and learning, which, perhaps, would be despised as unscientific, and unclassified, by the schools, but which was not the less curious, and, to the Celtic mind, enchanting.
They all lived, and fared hard; all their thoughts,and fancies were high. If they marched before us now, the nineteenth century would, very likely, regard them as a set of very rough tykes. Perhaps the nineteenth century would regard Elijah, Amos, and Nahum, and sundry other equally respectable persons, in much the same manner. Rude, and rough in gait, and attire, the rudeness, and the roughness would, perhaps, be forgotten by us, if we could interpret the torrent, and the wail of their speech, and be, for a short time, beneath the power of the visions, of which they were the rapt seers, and unveilers. We wonder that no enthusiastic Welshman has used an English pen to pourtray the lives, and portraits of a number of these Welsh worthies; to us, several of them—notably, John Elias, and Christmas Evans—seem to realize the idea of the Ancient Mariner,—
“I pass like night from land to land,I have strange power of speech;The moment that his face I see,I know the man that must hear me—To him my tale I teach.”
“I pass like night from land to land,I have strange power of speech;The moment that his face I see,I know the man that must hear me—To him my tale I teach.”
For instance, how many people in England ever heard the name ofThomas Rhys Davies, an extraordinary man? And he left an extraordinary diary behind him, for he seems to have been a very methodical man; and his diary shows that he preached during his lifetime at least 13,145 times, and this diary contains a distinct record of the time, place, and text; and it is said that there is scarcely a river, brook, or tarn, from Conway to Llansanan, from Llanrwst to Newbridge, from the sea at Llandudno, to the waters of the Berwyn mountains, in whose waves he had not baptized.
In fact, he was, perhaps, in his own particular, and peculiar line, second to none of the great Welsh preachers; only, it is said that his power was inexplicable, and yet that it stood the severest tests of popularity. His sermons are said to have been exceedingly simple, and very rememberable; they sprang out of a rare personal charm; he was himself; but, perhaps, if he resembled one of his great brethren, it would be Williams of Wern. His style was sharp, pointed, axiomatic, but antithetic, never prodigal of words, his sermons were short; but he was able to avail himself of any passing circumstance in the congregation, and to turn it to good account. Once, when a congregation seemed to be even more than usually disposed to cough, he said, “Cough away, my friends, it will not disturb me in the least; it will rather help me than not, for if you are coughing, I shall be sure that you are awake.”
He had that rare gift in the preacher, perfect self-possession, the grand preliminary to mastery over a congregation, an entire mastery over himself. All great Welsh preachers, however they may sometimes dilate, and expand truths into great paintings, and prolonged descriptions, excel in the pithy, and proverb-uttering power; but Thomas Rhys Davies was remarkable in this. Here are a few illustrations:—
“Ignorance is the devil’s college.”“There are only three passages in the Bible which declare what God is, although there are thousands which speak about Him. God is a Spirit, God is Light, and God is Love.”“Pharaoh fought ten great battles with God, and did not gain one.”“The way through the Red Sea was safe enough for Israel, but not for Pharaoh; he had no business to go that way, it was a private road, that God had opened up for His own family.”“Let the oldest believer remember that Satan is older.”“Christ is the Bishop, not of titles, but of souls.”“Moses was learned, but slow of speech; it was well that he was so, or, perhaps, he would not have found time to write the law. Aaron had the gift of speech, and it does not appear that he had any other gift.”“If you have no pleasure in your religion, make haste to change it.”“Judas is much blamed for betraying Christ for three pounds; many, in our day, betray Him a hundred times for three pence.”“Pharaoh commanded that Moses should be drowned; in after days, Pharaoh was paid back in his own coin.”“Many have a brother’s face, but Christ has a brother’s heart.”
“Ignorance is the devil’s college.”
“There are only three passages in the Bible which declare what God is, although there are thousands which speak about Him. God is a Spirit, God is Light, and God is Love.”
“Pharaoh fought ten great battles with God, and did not gain one.”
“The way through the Red Sea was safe enough for Israel, but not for Pharaoh; he had no business to go that way, it was a private road, that God had opened up for His own family.”
“Let the oldest believer remember that Satan is older.”
“Christ is the Bishop, not of titles, but of souls.”
“Moses was learned, but slow of speech; it was well that he was so, or, perhaps, he would not have found time to write the law. Aaron had the gift of speech, and it does not appear that he had any other gift.”
“If you have no pleasure in your religion, make haste to change it.”
“Judas is much blamed for betraying Christ for three pounds; many, in our day, betray Him a hundred times for three pence.”
“Pharaoh commanded that Moses should be drowned; in after days, Pharaoh was paid back in his own coin.”
“Many have a brother’s face, but Christ has a brother’s heart.”
Such was Thomas Rhys Davies; like Christmas Evans, journeying from North through South Wales, he was taken ill in the same house in which Christmas Evans died. Conscious of his approaching death, he begged that he might die in the same bed; this was not possible, but he was buried in the same grave.
Then there wasEvan Jones; he had been aprotégéof Christmas Evans; Christmas Evans appears to have brought him forward, giving his verdict on his suitability as to the ministry. ChristmasEvans was able to appreciate the young man, for he seems to have possessed really brilliant powers; in his country, and in his land’s language, he attained to the distinction of a bard; and it is said that his poetry rose to an elevation of wild, and daring grandeur. As a preacher, he does not appear to have studied to be popular, or to seek to adapt his sermons to the multitude; he probably moved through cloudy grandeurs, from whence, however, he sometimes descended, with an odd quaintness, which, if always surprising, was sometimes reprehensible. Once, he was expatiating, glowingly, on the felicities of the heavenly state, in that tone, and strain which most preachers love, occasionally, to indulge, and which most hearers certainly, occasionally, enjoy; he was giving many descriptive delineations of heavenly blessedness, and incidentally said, “There they neither marry, nor are given in marriage.” There was sitting beneath him a fervent brother, who, probably, not knowing what he said, sounded forth a hearty “Amen!” Evan heard it, looked the man full in the face, and said, “Ah, you’ve had enough of it, have you?”
This man was, perhaps, in his later years, the most intimate friend of Christmas Evans. Christmas poured his brilliant imagination, couched in his grand, although informal, rhetoric over the multitudes; Evan Jones frequently soared into fields whither, only here and there, an eye could follow his flight; but when the two friends were alone, their spirits could mingle pleasantly, for their minds were cast very much in the same mould; and when Christmas Evans died, it was this friend who published inWelsh one of the most graceful tributes to his memory.
In the history of the preaching, and preachers of a hundred years since, we meet, of course, with many instances of men, who possessed considerable power, but allied with much illiterate roughness; still, the power made itself very manifest—a power of illustrating truth, and making it clearly apprehended. Such a preacher mustShenkin of Penhyddhave been, rough, and rude farmer as he was, blending, as was not at all uncommon then, and even in our own far more recent knowledge, the occupations of a farmer, and the ordained minister. Shenkin has left a very living reputation behind him; indeed, from some of the accounts we have read of him, we should regard him as quite a type of the rude, yet very effective, Welsh orator.
Whatever the Welsh preacher had to say, however abstract, it had to be committed to an illustration, to make it palpable, and plain. In those early times, a very large room, or barn, in which were several hundreds of people, would, perhaps, have only one solitary candle, feebly glimmering over the gloom. It was in such circumstances, or such a scene, that Shenkin was once preaching on Christ as the Light of the world. In the course of his sermon, he came to show that the world was not its own light, and announced to his hearers what, perhaps, might startle some of them, that “light was not in the eye.” It seemed as if he had no sooner said this, than he felt it to be a matter that required illustration. As he warmed with his subject, going round, and round to make his meaning plain, but all the time seeming tofear that he was not doing much towards it with his rustic congregation, he suddenly turned to the solitary candle, and blew it out, leaving his congregation in utter darkness. “There,” he exclaimed, triumphantly, to his invisible congregation, “what do you say to that? Is the light in the eye?” This, of course, settled the matter in the minds of the most obtuse; but it was still a serious matter to have to relight, in a lonely little chapel, an extinguished candle.
He was a singular creature, this Shenkin. Not many Welsh preachers have a greater variety of odd stories told than he, of his doings, and sayings. He had a very downright, and straightforward method of speech. Thus, he would say, “There are many who complain that they can scarcely remember anything they hear. Have done with your lying!” he exclaimed. “I’ll be bound to say you remember well what you sold your old white horse for at Llandaff fair three years ago. Six or seven pounds, was it? Certainly that has not escaped your memory. You can remember anything but the Gospel.” And many of his images were much more of the rough-and-ready, than of the classical, order. “Humility,” he once said, “is as beautiful an ornament as a cow’s tail; but it grows, like the cow’s tail, downwards.”
Wales was covered with men like this. Every district possessed them, and many of them have found their memorial in some little volume, although, in most instances, they only survive in the breath of popular remembrance, and tradition.
One of the mightiest of these sons of thunder, who has left behind him a name, and fame, scarcelyinferior to the great ones on whom we have more lengthily dwelt, wasEbenezer Morris. He was a fine, free, cheerful spirit; his character sparkled with every Christian virtue,—a man of rare gifts, and grace. With a severe sense of what was just in the relations of life, and what constituted the principles of a strong theology, keeping his unblemished course beneath the dominion of a peaceful conscience, he enjoyed, more than many, the social fireside chat, with congenial friends. Although a pastor, and a preacher of wide fame, he was also a farmer; for he was one of an order of men, of whom it has been said, that good people were so impressed with the privilege conferred by preaching the gospel, that their hearers were careful not to deprive them of the full enjoyment of it, by remunerating their labours too abundantly.
Ebenezer Morris held a farm, and the farmer seems to have been worthy of the preacher. A story is told of him that, wanting to buy a cow, and going down to the fair, he found one for sale which he thought would suit him, and he bought it at the price named by its owner. Some days after, Mr. Morris found that the price of cattle had gone up considerably, and meeting the previous owner of the cow, he said, “Look here, I find you gave me too great a bargain the other day; the cow is worth more than I purchased her for,—here is another guinea; now I think we shall be about right.”
There are several stories told, in the life of this good, and great man, showing that he could not take an unfair advantage, that he was above everything mean, unfair, and selfish, and that guineas, and farmsweighed nothing with him in the balance against righteousness, and truth. His influence over his whole country was immense; so much so, that a magistrate addressed him once in public, saying, “We are under great obligations to you, Mr. Morris, for keeping the country in order, and preserving peace among the people; you are worth more than any dozen of us.” On one occasion he was subpœnaed, to attend before a court of justice, to give evidence in a disputed case. As the book was handed to him, that he might take the oath, the presiding magistrate said, “No! no! take it away; there is no necessity that Mr. Morris should swear at all; his word is enough.”
His appearance in preaching, his entire presence, is described as most majestic, and commanding: his voice was very loud, and it is said, a word from his mouth would roll over the people like a mighty wave. “Look at that window,” said an aged deacon, in North Wales, to a minister, who had come to preach at the chapel to which the former belonged, “look at that window! It was there that Ebenezer Morris stood, when he preached his great sermon from the words, ‘The way of life is above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath,’ and when we all turned pale while we were listening to him.” “Ah!” said the minister, “do you remember any portion of that sermon?” “Remember!” said the old deacon; “remember, my good man? I should think I do, and shall remember for ever. Why, there was no flesh here that could stand before it!” “What did he say?” said the minister. “Say! my good man,” replied the deacon; “say?Why, he was saying, ‘Beneath, beneath, beneath! Oh, my people, hell is beneath, beneath,beneath!’ until it seemed as if the end of the world had come upon us all in the chapel, and outside!”
When Theophilus Jones was selected as Rowland Hill’s co-pastor at Wooton-under-Edge, Ebenezer Morris came to preach on his induction. In that place, the audience was not likely to be a very sleepy one, but this preacher roused them beyond their usual mark, and strange stories are told of the sermon, while old Rowland sat behind the preacher, ejaculating the whole of the time; and many times after, when Mr. Hill found the people heavy, and inattentive, he was in the habit of saying, “We must have the fat minister from Wales here, to rouse you up again!” We know his likeness very well, and can almost realize his grand, solemn manner, in his black velvet cap, which made him look like a bishop, and gave much more impressiveness to his aspect, than any mitre could have done.
This Ebenezer Morris was the son of a man eminent in his own day, David Morris, of whom it was said, that he scarcely ever preached a sermon which was not the means of the conversion of men, and in his evangelistic tours he usually preached two, or three times a day. There is a sermon, still spoken of, preached at Rippont Bridge, Anglesea. The idea came to him whilst he was preaching, that many of the people before him might surely be lost, and he burst forth into a loud dolorous wail, every line of his countenance in sympathy with his agonizing cry, in Welsh, which no translation canrender, “O bobl y golled fawr! y golled fawr!” The English is, “O ye people of the great loss! the great loss!” It seems slight enough to us, but it is said that the people not only moved before his words, like reeds in a storm, but to this day they speak in Anglesea of David Morris’s sermon of “The Great Loss.”
The great authority for the most interesting stories of the religious life in Wales, is the “History of Welsh Methodism,” by the late Rev. John Hughes, of Liverpool; unfortunately, we believe it only exists in Welsh, in three volumes, amounting to nearly two thousand pages; but “Welsh Calvinistic Methodism; a Historical Sketch,” by the Rev. William Williams, appears to be principally a very entertaining digest, and condensation, of many of the most noticeable particulars from the larger work. There have certainly appeared, from time to time, many most interesting, and faithful men in the ministry of the Gospel in Wales, quite beyond the possibility of distinct mention; some of them were very poor, and lowly in life, and circumstances. Such wasThomas Hughes. He is described as a man of small talent, and slender knowledge, but of great holiness, and with an intense faith that many of his neighbours were in a very bad condition, and that it was his duty to try to speak words to them, whereby they might be saved. He used to stand under the old walls of Conway, and numbers gathered around him to listen; until at last he excited the anger of the vicar, who caused him to be arrested, and brought into his presence, when the following conversation took place:—
Vicar. “You ought to be a learned man, to go about, and to be able to answer deep questions.”
Hughes. “What questions, sir?”
Vicar. “Here they are—those which were asked me by the Lord Bishop. Let’s see whether you will be able to answer them. Where was St. Paul born?”
Hughes. “In Tarsus.”
Vicar. “Hem! I see that you know something about it. Well, can you tell me who took charge of the Virgin Mary after our blessed Redeemer was crucified?”
Hughes. “John.”
Vicar. “Well, once again. Who wrote the Book of Revelation? Answer that if you can.”
Hughes. “John the Apostle.”
Vicar. “Ho! you seem to know a good deal, after all.”
Hughes. “Perhaps, sir, you will allow me to ask you one or two questions?”
Vicar. “Oh yes; only they must be religious questions.”
Hughes. “What is holiness? and how can a sinner be justified before God?”
Vicar. “Ho! we have no business to bother ourselves with such things, and you have no business to put such questions to a man in my position; go out of my sight, this minute.” And to the men who had brought him, “Take care that you do not bring such people into my presence any more.”
Hughes was a simple, earnest, believing man, with a good deal of Welsh cuteness. After this interview with the vicar, he was permitted to pursue his exhortationsat Conway in peace. But there is a place between Conway, and Llandudno, called Towyn Ferry; it was a very ignorant little nook, and the people were steeped in unbelief, and sin; thither Hughes determined to go, but his person was not known there. The news, however, was circulated abroad, that there was to be a sermon, and religious service. When he arrived, he found things did not appear very pleasant; there were heaps of stones prepared for the preacher’s reception, when he should make his appearance, or commence his work. Hughes had nothing clerical in his manner, or garb, any more than any one in the crowd, and no one suspected him to be the man, as he threw himself down on the grass, and entered familiarly into conversation with the people about him. After a time, when their patience began to fail, he stood up, and said, “Well, lads, there is no sign of any one coming; perhaps the man has heard that you are going to stone him; let one of us get up, and stand on that heap of stones, and talk, and the rest sing. Won’t that be first-rate?”
“Capital,” said a bully, who seemed to be the recognised leader of the crowd. “You go on the heap, and preach to us.”
“Very well,” said Hughes, “I’m willing to try; but mind you, I shall make some blunders, so you must be civil, and not laugh at me.”
“I’ll make ’em civil,” said the bully. “Look here, lads, whoever laughs, I’ll put one of these stones into his head!”
“Stop you!” said Hughes; “the first thing we have to do, is to pray, isn’t it?”
“Ay, ay!” said the bully, “and I’ll be clerk. I’ll stand before you, and you shall use my shoulder for the pulpit.”
So prayer was offered, short, and simple, but in real earnest; and at its close, a good many favourable words were uttered. Some volunteered the remark that, “It was every bit as good as a parson.” Hughes proceeded to give out a text, but the bully shouted,—
“Hold on, you fool! we’ve got to sing first.”
“Ay, ay!” said Hughes, “I forgot that.”
So they sang a Welsh hymn, after a fashion, and then came the text, and the sermon, which was short, and simple too, listened to very attentively; and the singular part of the story is, that the bully, and clerk, left the ground with the preacher, quieted, and changed, and subsequently he became a converted man. The regeneration of Wales, through its villages, and lone remote districts, is full of anecdotes like this,—stories of persecution, and the faithful earnestness of simple men, who felt in them a strong desire to do good, and fulfilled their desire, becoming humble, but real blessings to their neighbourhoods.
Only in a history of the Welsh pulpit—and that would be a volume of no slight dimensions—would it be possible to recapitulate the names of the men who exercised, in their day, considerable influence over the scattered thousands of the Principality. They constitute a very varied race, and were characterized by freshness, and reality, taking, of course, the peculiar mental complexion of the preacher: some calm, and still, but waving about their words like quiet lightnings; some vehement, overwhelming,passionate; some remarkable for their daring excursions of imagination; some abounding in wit, and humour. One of the most remarkable of these last, one who ought not to go unmentioned in such an enumeration, wasSamuel Breeze. This was the man who first introduced “The Churchyard World” to Dr. Raffles,—of whom it was said, that if you heard one of his sermons, you heard three preachers, so various were not only the methods of his sermons, but even the tone of his voice. He is said to have produced extraordinary effects. Christmas Evans said of him, that “his eyes were like a flame of fire, and his voice like a martial strain, calling men to arms.”
The writer of this volume, in a work on the “Vocation of the Preacher,” mentions a curious instance, which he gives from the unpublished reminiscences of a dear departed friend—the Rev. John Pyer, late of Devonport—who was present when the incident happened, in Bristol, perhaps nearly eighty years since. Sammy Breeze, as he was familiarly called by the multitudes who delighted in his ministry, came, periodically, from the mountains of Cardiganshire, or the neighbourhood of Aberystwith, to Bristol, where he spoke with more than tolerable efficiency in English. Mr. Pyer, then a youth, was in the chapel, when, as was not unusual, two ministers, Sammy Breeze and another, were to preach. The other took the first place, a young man with some tints of academical training, and some of the livid lights of a then only incipient rationalism in his mind. He took for his text, “He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believethnot shall be damned;” but he condoned the heavy condemnation, and, in an affected manner, shaded off the darkness of the doom of unbelief, very much in the style of the preacher in Cowper’s satire, who never mentioned hell to ears polite. The young man, also, grew sentimental, and “begged pardon” of an audience, rather more polite than usual, for the sad statement made in the text. “But, indeed,” said he, “he that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not—indeed, I regret to say, I beg your pardon for uttering the terrible truth, but, indeed, he shall be sentenced to a place which here I dare not mention.”
Then rose Sammy Breeze. He began: “I shall take the same text, to-night, which you have just heard. Our young friend has been fery fine to-night, he has told you some fery polite things. I am not fery fine, and I am not polite, but I will preach a little bit of truth to you, which is this: ‘He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned,’and I begs no pardons.” He continued, “I do look round on this chapel, and I do see people all fery learned and in-tel-lect-u-al. You do read books, and you do study studies, and fery likely you do think that you can mend God’s Book, and are fery sure you can mend me. You have great—what you call thoughts, and poetries; but I will tell you one little word, and you must not try to mend that; but if you do, it will be all the same; it is this, look you: ‘He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned,and I begs no pardons. And then I do look round your chapel, and I do see you are a foine people,well-dressed people, well-to-do people. I do see that you are fery rich, and you have got your moneys, and are getting fery proud; but I tell you, it does not matter at all; for I must tell you the truth, and the truth is, ‘He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned,’and I begs no pardons. And now,” continued the preacher, “you will say to me, ‘What do you mean by talking to us in this way? Who are you, sir?’ And now I will tell you. I am Sammy Preeze. I have come from the mountains of Cardiganshire, on my Master’s business, and His message I must deliver. If you will never hear me again, I shall not matter much, but while you shall hear me, you shall hear me, and this is His word in me, and in me to you: ‘He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned,’and I begs no pardons.”