Welsh Journals

A Constructive Policy for Wales By T. P. Ellis. §24. IT was the Industrial Revolution that saved the soul of Wales. Not directly, but in- directly. What did it imply? Suddenly the face of the land was changed. New interests, new pursuits sprang up popula- tion increased by leaps and bounds, and found itself congested far too often in miserable enough surroundings new ideas, foolish and ill- balanced in many instances, like that of a newly interpreted law of nature,' were mooted, and being mooted, spread rapidly. On the one hand, there was an intensification of human misery on the other, the stirrings of a new hope. There was a terrible clash, as in all times of rapid change, between the old and the new, not only in the realms of religion, but in the realms of philosophy, of politics, and economics. In politics there was an outburst like the French Revolution in philosophy there was the growth of Benthamism and all the schools which sprang out of it, some of it good, like the new thought of humanitarianism, some of it evil, with its excessive admiration of the power of the human intellect. In economics there was a complete change in values, in time, in space, consequent on the introduction of machinery and the decay of the comparative importance of the agricultural industry. In religion, there was that remarkable movement, which is commonly called Methodism. Through them all, a common link runs-the insistence on the unrestrained freedom of the individual. The rapidity of these changes (and it is in rapidity, not in change, that difficulties arise) found the Church in England and in Wales quite unprepared to cope with them. The Church was organised on an agricultural, not an industrial basis, and it was far too static and incapable of meeting dynamic forces. The new centres of population were devoid of adequate provisions in the way of clergy and of churches and there was no one to make good the deficiencies. It must be admitted with sorrow that there were not many who realised the need and in Wales particularly the foreign bishops, non-resident in the land, gave no encouragement to those who did. Those, however, in the Church who saw their duty clearly pursued it unflinchingly. That was the origin of Methodism, both Wesleyan. and Calvinistic. There were acute differences between the Wesleyan and Calvinist conceptions, but there is no need to dwell upon them. They were alike in two things. They both originated in the Church they both had an intensely personal and direct appeal to make to people to whom no one else was appealing. Methodism found its home in Wales first of all in the new industrial areas of the south it found, for a long time, no echo in the country areas but, as time went on, the intense earnestness of the leaders of the movement and their special gift of passionate oratory in Welsh enabled them to spread into the country-side, and eventually to sweep it, too, along with them. In Methodism the people of Wales unquestionably found what they needed at the time, a means of giving expression to that characteristic to which reference has frequently been made, namely, the realisation of the actuality of religion. No other opportunity was being offered to them. It must not be forgotten that Methodism was essentially a movement within the Church itself but it had its reaction outside the Church. Non- conforming bodies, like the Independents and Baptists, bodies which laid special stress on a particular form of church government or ritual (the Baptists are the most rigidly ritualistic com- munity in Christendom), which had hitherto failed to make much impression in Wales, were likewise seized with a sense of the need of religious expression, and as Methodism grew, so likewise did these movements, extraneous to the Church, grow. In this passionate outburst there was an unfor- tunate side as well as a good one, but down at any rate to 1840, the good side was in the ascendancy. I would only note here one unfor- tunate element, for it is of importance in under- standing what followed. There was an indubitable lack of discipline in the Methodist movement. It was partly that which induced, not the Church, but the foreign hierarchy within the Church, to frown on Methodism. Partly that, and still more the un- comfortable feeling that Methodism indicated the passing away of a period, in which the Welsh Church and the Welsh people had been subor- dinated to outside considerations. The story of how so many of the Church Methodists were discouraged and penalised by the hierarchy is too well-known to need repetition. No one who is both Welsh and a Churchman can have the slightest sympathy with the attitude adopted towards some of the fine spirits of the Methodist movement. The short-sightedness, the lack of understanding, sympathy and tact of the foreign heirarchy contributed to a new tragedy in Wales. The ultimate causes of disruption were, how- ever, never quite realised until they suddenly became crucial. The Methodists found them- selves confronted with two facts, one that their movement was in danger from the extravagances of some of the itinerant preachers, the other that they were obtaining no recruits from the ordained clergy qualified to administer the sacraments. The movement had also attracted to itself a number of Nonconformists who were hostile to the Church's conception of church government, and their voice swayed the movement itself.