Welsh Journals

WELSH PIONEERS. Richard Price. By Roland Thomas, M.A. MID- WAY up the hillside on the left bank of the River Garw, a tributary of the Ogmore, in the parish of Llangeinor, and within a stone's throw of the village of that name, there stands a house of ancient appear- ance. It bears evidence of its having once been of considerable dimensions and consequence. No one going up the Garw Valley can fail to notice Tynton. Few, however, unfortunately, know enough about it to realise that it deserves to rank as one of the most famous of all the worthy homes of Wales. There, on February 23rd, 1723, was born Richard Price, a seer and a prophet, and one of Wales' greatest sons. Happy may the Garw Valley be to have been the home of such a man. Happy, too, may be even those rocks and sea at Southerndown, which, almost every summer during his lifetime, gave new health and strength to one of the most ardent defenders of liberty the world has known. It should be remembered that in Price's day it was difficult to champion the rights of man, and more difficult still to do so just when the assumption of those rights had ranged against their further extension, and even against their recognition at a'l, the whole strength of the powers of Govern- ment. Yet, the eighteenth century produced stal- warts in the cause of such rights, not less in Britain than in America and on the Continent. Judging from communications to the periodicals of the period, one would think that at least people were led to think on the matters of liberty and rights, and to examine their political and religious position. Price contributed as much as anyone, though not by means of communications to periodicals, to that result. Richard's father, Rees Price, was a religious man, and in his tehology an uncompromising Cal- vinist. But he was harsh and autocratic: his reign was in a particular sense that of law. The boy inherited the strength of his father without his domineering spirit, and while he became deeply religious, he soon made a pronounced departure from Calvinism. His mother, who before her mar- riage was Catherine Richards, possessed a beauti- ful person and a delightfully sweet disposition. Her reign was particularly that of love. She called forth from her boy unbounded love for her. The beginnings of that disinterested love of all sentient beings, and especially of mankind, which played such a controlling part in her boy's later life, must have received powerful stimulus from her. The family were in comfortable circumstances. Rees Price, while farming the land belonging to Tynton, also succeeded Samuel Jones both as tutor to the Academy and as pastor to the Dis- senters of the neighbourhood. His brother, Samuel, was also in the ministry in London. Nevertheless, Rees intended his son to take up a business career, and with that course in view the boy was given a good education. Before that education was finished, however, Richard had lost both his father and his mother, the former first, and the latter about a year later. Upon the death of the father, the mother and her two daughters were left in straightened circumstances, and Richard gave what little portion he had re- ceived, to them. Further studies at a Dissenting Academy in London, made possible largely through his uncle, Samuel, gave Richard as good an education as was possible anywhere in this country in those days. Richard's serious turn of mind was more suited to the work of the ministry than to business, and after his father's death he decided to follow his bent. Accordingly, at the close of his studies at the Academy he entered the ministry, without taking charge of a church, however. He became a private chaplain in London, an office which he retained until the death of his patron thirteen years later. These years enabled him to devote himself further to his favourite studies and to give form to his thoughts on questions which had been occupying the minds of thinking men for a century. He preached regularly on Sundays to congregations at the Old Jewry, where Dr. Chandler was pastor, and other places. But soon after his chaplaincy came to an end he entered fully upon his ministerial work by accept- ing the pastorate of the congregation worshipping on the Green of Newington. After some years he added to this pastoral charge that of Poor Jewry Lane, succeeding therein the famous Dr. Benson. Eventually, he gave up this latter charge in favour of that of the Gravel Pit, Hack- ney. He resigned Newington Green in his old age and busy years, but retained Hackney to the very end of his life. Two associated pastorates were very common in those days, even in London, but really under two pastors, neither of whom would be exclusively attached to one pastorate, but one would occupy the morning pulpit almost exclusively, and the other similarly the evening pulpit at both meeting houses. Price attended to his ministerial work with great conscientiousness. At one time in his life he grudged any time given to anything else. He prepared himself assiduously for the pulpit, and in the afternoons paid regular visits to his flock. His congregations were distinctly small during the early part of his ministry, but for many years in the late part they were the largest in London. Price's first publication was in connection with the philosophical controversies of the time. Moral philosophy had become popular through the numerous writings on some aspect or other of it. Many of these were quite ephemeral; but the best philosophical works of the century be- longed to those controversies and were polem- ical in purpose. We find in them therefore a