Welsh Journals

July 22, 1892, THE WELSH WEEKLY Thess. i, 8.) Such was the character of the early Church. This character, and efforts expressive thereof and corresponding therewith, are implied in the very nature of Christianity. Christianity, while a religion for the salvation of those who accept it, is also the religion of love for the bodies and souls of men. It builds hospitals and organizes charities for the relief of their bodily wants ; and it creates institutions and establishes associations to meet their spiritual necessities. It takes in the whole world, and with " the sword of the Spirit" pro¬ poses to conquer the whole for Jesus Christ. The progress of the Gospel in the world, from country to country, and from age to age, is no matter of mere accident or arbitrary decree, but the result, with the blessing of God, of that causative moral force which the Church has wielded in the history of human affairs. The Church is in the aggregate God's steward, and in the aggregate God's apostle to evangelize the nations of the earth. Moreover, what is true of the Church as a whole, is true of each member in particular. While all the members cannot be preachers in the technical sense, and all cannot be missionaries in this sense, all can have and should have the preaching spirit and the missionary spirit. All can say : "Thy kingdom come." All can speak for Christ by precept and example. As a general rule, all can, to some extent, give of their worldly substance to promote the cause of Christ. It takes money to support Christian missions; and those who give money for this purpose from Christian motives, and in proportion as the Lord hath prospered them, are as really doing the work of God as those who formally preach the Gospel. And in respect to this matter of giving to religious causes, we recommend all our readers carefully to read the eighth and ninth chapters of Paul's Second Epistle to the Corinthians. There have been written, first and last, a great many tracts, and, indeed, treatises on the subject of giving ; yet we have never seen anything equal to these two chapters in reference to this particular branch of Christian duty. We commend them to preachers as a storehouse for texts, and to all Christians as an inspired guide to practice. PRESBYTERIAN NOTES. The opening of the East Moors Hall in connection with the Cardiff Evangelistic Movement, is the event of the week among Welsh Presbyterians. The open¬ ing of a hall at the cost of £2,000 marks the firm establishment of an undertaking which has for its object the evangelisation of the numbers of the men and women in Cardiff, who are spiritually lost. As the result a year's work the modest tent has been re¬ placed by spacious and suitable hall, with enthusiastic congregation composed mainly of persons converted under the ministry of the missionaries. The lessons to the churches from the experiment at East Moors are many. Ample proofs are afforded of the power of the simple Gospel of Christ in saving men from degradation and sin. We have also to learn that the latent power in our existing organization, when rightly applied, is very great. There is apparently no need of a new denomination or church, spiritual or "civic"; but if the members of our churches would lift up the cross of holding open-air services, cottage meet¬ ings, and house-to-house visitations, they are far more likely to succeed in winning souls to Christ than even the members of the Salvation Army. The sight of a band of respectable neighbours holding forth on the corner of a street on Sundays and week-nignts has an irresistible effect on the people ; all the more so on account of the absence of professionalism in the services. Also the work at East Moors and other parts of Cardiff affords an illustration of the truth of Carey's words : '' Expect great things from God ; attempt great things for God. We are glad to find that Mr. R. J. Rees, B.A., of London, who has been a Mansfield student for three years, has succeeded in obtaining first class honours in the School of Theology at Oxford. Before entering Mansfield, Mr. Rees studied at Aberystwyth, and became a graduate of the London University. He commenced preaching at New Jewin, London (of which church he was a member) a little over three years ago. In order to fit himself for the great work of his life he went to Mansfield for Divinity, and it is most gratifying to think his labours have been crowned with such brilliant success. We understand Mr. Rees is about to settle down as bhe pastor of the English Calvinistic Methodist Church at Pwllheli, and we heartily wish him God's speed in his new shpere of work. CONGREGATIONAL NOTES. In the death of Dr. Thomas, which took place at four o'clock on Thursday morning, the 14th inst., at Colwyn Bay, the Church of Christ in Wales has lost one of its most faithful watchmen. There is now a gap on the wall most difficult to fill. There are several men, good and true, who are in every respect qualified to be leaders of the Congregational body in Wales, but we have not another Dr. Thomas. The influential position which he occupied in his own denomination was mainly his own creation, the result of fifty years of almost unexampled activity in the Master's work. Though he laboured almost exclusively in the interests of his own denomination, yet his influence was felt and his word carried weight throughout the whole body of Welsh Nonconformists, and he fully deserved the title of the "Grand Old Man" of Welsh Noncon¬ formity. In our next number we intend publishing a character sketch and portrait of the late divine. By this time the Mansfield Summer School of Theology is in full swing. We have met several ministers wending their way to Oxford, fired with the irrepressible enthusiasm of their College days. Their weary, worn, and sad looks had disappeared, and the joyousness of youth shone in their faces. Truly this is a right royal way of spending a holiday, and the churches that have made arrangements for their pastors to partake of the feast of fat things provided at Mansfield will be undoubtedly much benefited. BAPTIST NOTES. The paper of the Rev. T. Roberts Mold, on the "Evils of Sectarianism," and read by him at the Welsh Congregational Union meeting recently, was a most timely utterance on a matter of incalculable importance. And the fulness of the report of it in the Welsh papers will give it the wide circulation it veritably deserves. Welsh religious life is very much disfigured and marred by its rampant Sectarianism. Mr. Roberts is very frank and honest in his distribu¬ tion of the evil. He exempts no religious body from participation in this belittling spirit, and here our own observation and experience go to confirm the verdict of the reader of the paper. We have in our time wit¬ nessed deplorable instances of it among all denomina¬ tions alike. By Sectarianism we do not understand firm and strict adherence to its distinctive principles by a denomination, or a member of a denomination. For it is a denomination's glory to be true and loyal to the very principles which give it its denominational existence. By Sectarianism we understand all attempts at monopolizing on the part of one denomination all honour and power and office to the exclusion of the rights and claims of others in relation to the same things. Another form of Sectarianism is that exclu- siveness in religious life and activity which refuses all co-operation with other religious bodies, in things common to all alike. Thus Sectarianism does not assume the same exact form in all. In one it is arrogant and monopolizing, in another exclusive and narrow. Whichever be the form it is ugly and disgusting in the extreme. It is to be hoped that a careful perusal of Mr. Roberts' paper by the various denominations will help them to see the evil of the spirit which he so honestly and eloquently denounces. Each denomination should honestly ask itself "Am I an offender in this matter ?" As Baptists, we think we may venture to say that the form of Sectarianism to which our denomina¬ tion is subject is not the monopolizing form, it is not the form which shows itself in lust of power and high office, and their worldly advantages. The charge generally brought against the Baptists is one of exclusiveness and bigotry. And this charge other denominations base upon our attitude upon the Communion question. The strict Communion prac¬ tices of the Baptists are regarded by outsiders as of the very essence of Sectarianism. But in this they do us a great wrong. The strict Communion practices of the denomination is but strict loyalty to principle, and loyalty to principle is not Sectarianism in the bad sense. At the same time frankness demands that we should admit the existence in the body of a con¬ siderable amount of that sectarian narrowness which consists more especially in an unreasoning suspicion of the motives of the other denominations, and which leads to the persistent refusal to unite with them on lines that are common to all. In confirmation of this we need only mention the, to us, silly refusal of the majority of the associations this year to join the Non¬ conformist Union now being promoted, on the ground lest contact with other denominations should prove injurious to our distinctive principles. All denomina¬ tions, however, have much to learn in respect of magnanimity in spirit and trustfulness of each other, and a general perusal of Mr. Roberts' paper would help greatly in that direction. WESLEYAN METHODIST NOTES. The Rev. John Griffiths, the energetic and sagacious Secretary of the South Wales District, has made a proposal which every Welsh Methodist will heartily commend. He has submitted to some of the leading officials in the connexion the question whether at the Cardiff Conference in 1893 a Welsh Ordination Service might not be a very desirable thing. His proposal is to hold it in the splendid Welsh chapel at Merthyr, on Mabon's day in August, 1893, the ordination charge to be delivered by one of our leading Welsh ministers. He thinks it would prove an impressive and attractive ceremony to the Welsh public, and be a concession which our Welsh members would greatly appreciate. We heartily sympathize with the proposal and trust he will leave no stone unturned to give it effect. Already he has secured the sympathetic acquiescence of several of our leading men with the idea, and is full of hope that the coming Conference will cordially endorse it, and that it will be duly included in the Place of Services for 1893. The following Methodist candidates have been successful at the recent election, viz. :—Messrs. W. Allen, Newcastle-under-Lyme; J. Arch, N. West Norfolk; W. A. M'Arthur, Cornwall (Helston); J. Bennett, Lines. (Gainsborough); J. M. Cheetham, Oldham; W. O. Clough, Portsmouth; H. H. Eowler, Wolverhampton ; M. Fowler, Durham City; A. Holden, Yorks (Buckrose); J. Holden, Yorks (Keighley); W. H. Holland, North Salford; T. Owen, Cornwall Launceston; B. Pickard, Yorks (Normanton); R. W. Perks, Lines (Louth); Clarence Smith, East Hull; S. D. Waddy, Lines (Brigg). Amongst the unsuccess¬ ful candidates was Mr. Percy Bunting, the Editor of the Contemporary Mevieiv. Mr. T. Owen, M.P., is a native of Machynlleth, and head of the wellknown firm of Evans and Owen, Bath. A young girl has just won the Howard University prize for the best translation of Horace. No thought is beautiful which is not just ; and no thought can be just which is not founded in truth.— Addisson. He is a wise man who does not grieve for tho things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has. —Epictevs. Work is the grand cure for all maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind. As we must account for every idle word, so we must for every idle silence.—Benjamin Franklin. Justice Gainsford Bruce took his seat on the Bench for the first time on Monday last. He, with Mr. Justice Collins, forming a Divisional Court.