Christmas Evans Part 14

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 believeth not shall be d.a.m.ned;" 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 h.e.l.l 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 d.a.m.ned,' _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 G.o.d'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 d.a.m.ned, _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 d.a.m.ned,' _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 d.a.m.ned,' _and I begs no pardons_."

It was a strange scene; but as he went on, in quaint, but terribly earnest strain, anger pa.s.sed into awe, and mute astonishment into rapt attention. No one, who heard the words, could ever again hear them unheeded, nor think lightly of the doom of the unbelieving. The anecdote is worth being laid to heart, in these days, when there is too often a reserve in declaring the whole counsel of G.o.d.

After service, in the vestry, the deacons were in great anger with the blunt preacher; and one, a well-known religious man in Bristol, exclaimed, "Mr. Breeze, you have strangely forgotten yourself to-night, sir. We did not expect that you would have behaved in this way. We have always been very glad to see you in our pulpit, but your sermon to-night, sir, has been most insolent, shameful!" He wound up a pretty sharp condemnation by saying, "In short, I don't understand you!"

"Ho! ho!" exclaimed Sammy. "You say you do not understand me? Eh! look you then, I will tell you; I do understand you! Up in our mountains, we have one man there, we do call him exciseman; he comes along to our shops and stores, and says, 'What have you here? Anything contraband here?'

And if it is all right, the good man says, 'Step in, Mr. Exciseman, come in, look you.' He is all fair, open, and above-board. But if he has anything secreted there, he does draw back surprised, and he makes a fine face, and says, 'Sir, I do not understand you.' Now, you do tell me that you don't understand me, but I do understand you, gentlemen, I do; and I do fear you have something contraband here; and I will say good-night to you; but I must tell you one little word; that is: 'He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be d.a.m.ned,' _and I begs no pardons_."

But, with these simple ill.u.s.trations, we have not exhausted the number of noticeable names. In connection with every name as it occurs, some interesting anecdote meets the memory. There was Robert Lloyd, the shoemaker, and Thomas the turner, and Robert Roberts, of whom, from the stories before us, we do not find it difficult to believe, that he had the power to describe things in such a vivid, and graphic manner, as to make his hearers feel as if the scenes were pa.s.sing before their eyes.

Then there were David Evans of Aberayron, and Ebenezer Richard of Tregaron, and William Morris of St. David's, whose every sermon was said to be a string of sparkling gems; John Jones of Talysarn, and his brother, David Jones; John Hughes; the seraphic Henry Rees, and Thomas Philips, and many another name, concerning whom an ill.u.s.tration might be furnished, of their powers of wit, wisdom, or eloquence. England, itself, has been indebted, in many a circle, to eminent Welsh preachers, who have stimulated thought, created the sphere of holy usefulness, moved over the minds of cultivated members with the freshness of a mountain wind, or a mountain stream. It would be invidious to mention their names-many are yet living; and some, who have not long quitted the Church on earth, have still left behind them the fragrance of loved, and honoured names, and exalted, and earnest labours.

Few of our readers, we may suppose, can be unacquainted with the name, and memory of "The Man of Ross," so famous through the verses of Pope.

Ross is a well-known little town in Monmouthshire, on the banks of the Wye, on the borders of Wales. There, in the parish church, in the pew in which John Kyrle, the Man of Ross, sat, more than a hundred years since, a curious sight may be seen: two elm-trees rise, and spread out their arms, and flourish within the church; especially during the spring, and summer months, they form a singular adornment to the sacred edifice. The tradition is, that they are suckers from a tree planted by the "Man of Ross," outside the church; but it was cut down by a certain rector, because it excluded the light; the consequence was that they forced their way inside, where they had continued to grow, and flourish. As we have looked upon the singular sight of those trees, in the Man of Ross's pew, we have often thought of those who, in Wales, planted in the house of the Lord, flourish in sacred, and sainted memories, in the courts of our G.o.d.

Although all that was mortal of them has pa.s.sed away, they still bring forth fruit, and flourish in the grateful recollections of the country, they were permitted to bless, and adorn.

Yes, it is very singular to think of many of these men of Wild Wales.

Even those who were counted heretical, were more than extraordinary men; they were, perhaps, men who, in our day, would seem rather remarkable for their orthodoxy of sentiment. Rhys Stephen, in an extended note in his Memoirs of Christmas Evans, refers to the influence of discussions, in the Princ.i.p.ality, raised by the Rev. WILLIAM RICHARDS, LL.D. A large portion of the ministerial life of this distinguished man, was pa.s.sed in England; he was educated for the ministry at the Baptist Academy in Bristol, for some time co-pastor with Dr. Ash, author of the Dictionary, and then became the minister of the Baptist Church at Lynn, in Norfolk, where he remained for twenty years. He always continued, however, in every sense of the word, a Welshman, and, notwithstanding his English pastorates, his residences in Wales were frequent and long.

He was born at Pen-hydd, in Pembrokeshire, in 1749. He published a Welsh-English dictionary, and his services to Welsh literature were eminent. But he was regarded as a heretic; his temperament, singular as it seems in a Welshman, was almost purely philosophic, and neither imaginative, nor emotional; he disliked the great annual religious gatherings of his countrymen, and called them fairs, and the preachers, upon these occasions, he sometimes described in epithets, which were not complimentary. Naturally, his brethren paid him back; they called him a heretic,-which is also an exceedingly convenient, and not unusual method of revenge. Dr. Richards's influence, however, in Wales, at the beginning of this century, appears to have been very great; the charges against him, he does not appear to have been very mindful to disprove, and it is exceedingly likely that a different, or more guarded mode of expression, was the height of his offending. Who can fathom, or delineate, all the fine shades and divergencies of the Arian controversy?-men whose perfect soundness, in evangelical doctrine, was utterly undisputed, talked with Dr. Richards, and said, that they could not discover that he held opinions different from their own. In a letter, dated December 7th, 1804, when grave charges had been urged against him, and all the religious mischiefs throughout the Princ.i.p.ality ascribed to him, he writes as follows, to a friend:-

"I think I may safely say, that no great change, of any kind, has taken place in my sentiments since I knew you. You must know, surely, that I did not use to be an _Athanasian_, or even a _Waterlandian_. Such views of the Deity always appeared to me too _Tritheistical_. I have been used to think, and do so still, that there is a particular meaning in such words as these of the Apostle's, 'To us there is but one G.o.d, the Father;' but I never could say, or think, with the Socinians, that Jesus Christ is no more than _a man_, like ourselves. I believe, indeed, that He is a Man; but I, also, believe that He is 'Emmanuel, G.o.d with us'-that he is 'the form of G.o.d'-'the image of the invisible G.o.d'-an object of Divine worship, so that we should 'honour the Son as we honour the Father'-'that all the fulness of the G.o.dhead dwells in Him bodily,'

or substantially. In short, I believe everything of the dignity, and glory of Christ's character, that does not _divide_ the Deity, or land in _Tritheism_."

Again, to another correspondent: "I believe, also, in the doctrine of the atonement, or sacrifice, of Christ, in the virtue of His blood, and in the prevalence of His mediation."

Something of the same order of man, so far as sentiment, and knowledge are indications, but possessed of more wit, imagination, and emotion, was DAVIES, of CASTELL HYWEL, the first pastor of Christmas Evans, and of Daniel Davies, of Swansea. He was, in his day, a man of many-sided reputation, but of suspicious doctrinal relations. He was so eminent a cla.s.sical scholar, and so many of the Welsh clergy had received their education from him, that when Dr. Horsley was appointed Bishop of St.

David's, he expressed, in his usual pa.s.sionate manner, his irritation that the most distinguished tutor in South Wales was a Nonconformist, and gave out that he would not ordain any of Mr. Davies' pupils. Davies was a great bard; and Welshmen who know both languages, say that his translation of Gray's "Elegy" is, in force, and pathos, superior to the original. This will scarcely seem strange, if the deep pathos of the Welsh language be taken into account. His epitaph on Dr.

Priestley-satirizing, of course, the materialism of Priestley-ill.u.s.trates, at once, his humour, and versification:

"Here lies at rest, in oaken chest, Together packed most nicely, The bones, and brains, flesh, blood, and veins, And _soul_ of Dr. Priestley!"

As an ill.u.s.tration of his readiness of wit, a story is told, how one of the most noted of the Welsh bards one day met him, while the rain was streaming down upon him. Umbrellas, probably, were scarce. He was covered with layers of straw, fastened round with ropes of the same material; in fact, thatched all over. To him his brother bard exclaimed:

"Oh, bard and teacher, famed afar, Such sight I never saw!

It ill becomes a house like yours To have a roof of straw."

To which Davies instantly replied:

"The rain is falling fast, my friend; You know not what you say, A roof of straw, methinks, doth well Beseem a wall of clay."

Such was Christmas Evans's first "guide, philosopher, and friend."

And if we refer to certain characteristics of the Welsh language, which make it eminently fine furniture for preaching-power, to these may be added, what we have not so particularly dwelt on, but which does follow, as a part of the same remark-the singular proverbial power of the Welsh language. In reading great Welsh sermons, and listening to Welsh preachers, we have often felt how much the spirit of their own triads, and the manner of old Catwg the Wise, and other such sententious bards, falls into their modern method. Welsh proverbs are the delightful recreations of the archaeologists of the old Welsh language. Here, while we write these lines, we have piles of these proverbial utterances before us; short, compact sayings, wherever they come from, but which have been repeated on, from generation to generation. The Bardic triads, for instance, relating to language, selected by Mr. Owen Pugh,-how admirable they are for any preacher! They may stand as the characteristics of their most eminent men.

"The three indispensables of language-purity, copiousness, and aptness; the three supports of language-order, strength, and harmony; the three uses of language-to relate, to describe, to excite; the correct qualities of language,-correct construction, correct etymology, and correct p.r.o.nunciation; three marks of the purity of language-the intelligible, the pleasurable, the credible; three things that const.i.tute just description-just selection of words, just construction of language, and just comparison; three things appertaining to just selection-the best language, the best order, and the best object." It must be admitted, we think, that, in these old triads, there is much of the compact wisdom of a primeval people, with whom books were few, and thoughts were fresh, and constant. There seemed to be a singular propensity, in the old mind of Wales, to throw everything into the form of a trinity of expression, or to bind up words, as far as possible, in short, sententious utterances.

Catwg's "Essay on Metaphysics" is a very brief, and concise one, but it ill.u.s.trates that rapid running-up-the-ladder kind of style, which has always been the delight of the Welsh poet or teacher.

"In every person there is a soul. In every soul there is intelligence. In every intelligence there is thought. In every thought there is either good, or evil. In every evil there is death; in every good there is life. In every life there is G.o.d; and there is no G.o.d but He than whom there can be none better. There is nothing that cannot have its better, save the best of all. There is no best of all except love. There is no love but G.o.d. G.o.d is love!"

Ill.u.s.trations of this kind fill volumes. It is not for us here to say how much of the admirable, or the imitable there may be in the method.

It was the method of the old Welsh mind; it was the method into which many of the best preachers fell, not because they, perhaps, knew so much of the words of the bards, as because it represented the mind of the race. Take a few of the Welsh proverbs.

"He that is intent upon going, will do no good before he departs."

"Every one has his neighbour for a mirror."

"The water is shallowest where it bubbles."

"A lie is the quickest traveller."

"Fame outlives riches."

"He that is unlucky at sea, will be unlucky on land."

"There is always time for meat, and for prayer."

"He mows the meadow with shears."

"Calumny comes from envy."

"Every bird loves its own voice."

"The life of a man is not at the disposal of his enemy."

"He that loves the young, must love their sports."

"Prudence is unmarried without patience."

"He that is the head, should become the bridge."

"Three things come unawares upon a man: sleep, sin, and old age."

But it is not only that this sententious characteristic of the Welsh language makes it a vehicle for the transparent expression of sentiment; even our translations cannot altogether disguise the pathetic tones of the language, and bursts of feeling. The following verse of an old Welsh prayer, which, a _Quarterly Reviewer_ tells us, used to form, with the Creed and Ten Commandments, part of the peasant's daily devotion, ill.u.s.trates this:-

"Mother, O mother! tell me, art thou weeping?"

The infant Saviour asked, on Mary's breast.

"Child of th' Eternal, nay; I am but sleeping, Though vexed by many a thought of dark unrest."

"Say, at what vision is thy courage failing?"

"I see a crown of thorns, and bitter pain; And thee, dread Child, upon the cross of wailing, All heaven aghast, at rude mankind's disdain."

It is singular that Mr. Borrow found, on an old tombstone, an epitaph, which most of our readers will remember, as very like that famous one Sir Walter Scott gives us, from an old tomb, in a note to "The Lay of the Last Minstrel." The following is a translation:-

"Thou earth, from earth, reflect, with anxious mind, That earth to earth must quickly be consigned; And earth in earth must lie entranced, enthralled, Till earth from earth to judgment shall be called."

The following lines also struck Mr. Borrow as remarkably beautiful, of which he gives us this translation. They are an inscription in a garden:-