There is a singular circumstance mentioned of some horse-races, a great disturbance to the best interests of the neighbourhood; on the day of the great race, Elias’s spirit was very much moved, and he prayed most passionately and earnestly that the Lord would do something to put a stop to them. His prayer was so remarkable, that someone said, “Ahab must prepare his chariot, and get away.” The sky became so dark shortly after, that the gas was lighted in some of the shops of the town. At eleven o’clock the rain began to pour in torrents, and continued until five o’clock in the afternoon of the next day. The multitudes on the race-ground dispersed in half-an-hour, and did not reassemble that year; and what seemed more remarkable was, that the rainfall was confined to that vicinity. It is our duty to mention these things. An adequate impression could not be conveyed of the place this man held in popular estimation without them. And his eminence as a preacher was astonishing; wherever he went, whatever day of the week, or whatever hour of the day, no matter what the time or the season, business was laid aside, shops were closed, and the crowds gathered to hear him. Sometimes, when it was arranged for him to preach in a chapel, and more convenient that he should do so, a window was taken out, and there he stood, preaching to the crowded place within, and, at the same time, to the multitudes gathered outside. Mr. Morgan, late vicar of Christ Church, in Bradford, gives an account of one of these sermons. There was a great panorama exhibiting at the same time. Elias took the idea of moving succession—the panorama of all the miracles wrought by Christ. It is easy to see how, from such lips, a succession of wonderful pictures would pass before the eye, of living miracles of Divine working,—a panorama of wonderful cures. Mr. Morgan says, “I was very ill at the time, but that striking sermon animated me, and I have often stirred the cold English with the account of it.”
We have said that no sermons are preserved; Elias himself regretted, in his advanced life, that some, which had been of a peculiar interest to him, had gone from him. Fragments there are, but they are from the lips of hearers. Many of these fragments still present, in a very impressive manner, his rousing, and piercing, and singularly original style; his peculiar mode of dealing at will, for his purposes of illustration, with the things of earth, heaven, and hell.
Take one illustration, from the text, “Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive be delivered?” “Satan!” he exclaimed, “what do you say? Shall the prey be taken from the mighty? ‘No, never. I will increase the darkness of their minds; I will harden more the hardness of their hearts; I will make more powerful the lusts in their souls; I will increase the strength of their chains; I will bind them hand and foot, and make my chains stronger; the captives shall never be delivered. Ministers! I despise ministers! Puny efforts theirs!’ ‘Gabriel!’ exclaimed the preacher, ‘messenger of the Most High God: shall the prey be taken from the mighty?’ ‘Ah! I do not know. I have been hovering over this assembly. They have been hearing the Word of God. I did expect to see some chains broken, some prisoners set free; but the opportunity is nearly over; the multitudes are just upon the point of separating; there are no signs of any being converted. I go back from this to the heavenly world, but I have no messages to carry to make joy in the presence of the angels.’” There were crowds of preachers present. Elias turned to them. “‘What think you? You are ministers of the living God. Shall the prey be taken from the mighty?’ ‘Ah! who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? We have laboured in vain, and spent our strength for nought; and it seems the Lord’s arm is not stretched out. Oh, there seems very little hope of the captives being delivered!’ ‘Zion! Church of Christ! answer me, Shall the prey be taken from the mighty? What do you say?’ And Zion said, ‘My God hath forgotten me; I am left alone, and am childless. And my enemies say, This is Zion, whom no man seeketh after.’ Oh, I am afraid the prey will not be taken from the mighty—the captive will not be delivered. Praying Christians, what do you think? ‘O Lord, Thou knowest. High is Thy hand, and strong is Thy right hand. Oh that Thou wouldst rend the heavens, and come down! Let the sighing of the prisoner come before Thee. According to the greatness of Thy power, preserve Thou them that are appointed to die. I am nearly wearying in praying, and yet I have a hope that the year of jubilee is at hand.’” Then, at this point, Elias assumed another, higher, and his most serious manner, as if about to speak to the Almighty; and, in quite another tone, he said, “What is the mind of the Lord respecting these captives? Shall the prey be taken from the mighty?” Then he exclaimed, “‘Thus saith the Lord, Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered.’ Ah!” he exclaimed, “there is no doubt about the mind and will of the Lord—no room for doubt, and hesitation. ‘The ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads.’”
This is the fragment of a sermon preached when Elias was about thirty years of age. Of course it can give but a very slender idea, but perhaps it shows something of the manner of the master. His imagination was very brilliant, but more chastened, and subdued, than that of many. His eloquence, like all of the highest order, was simple, and he trusted rather to a fitting word, than to a large furniture of speech. It is said that, to his friends, every sermon appeared to be a complete masterpiece of elocution, a nicely-compacted, and well-fitted oration.
Among the great Welsh preachers, David Davies, and Williams of Wern were, like Rowlands of Llangeitho, comparatively fixtures. Of course, they appeared on great Association occasions. But John Elias, and Christmas Evans itinerated far, and wide. Unlike as they were in the build of their minds, and the character of their eloquence, they had a great, and mutual, regard, and affection for each other; and it is told how, when either preached, the other was seen with anxious interest drinking in, with the crowd, the words of his famous brother. Theirs are, no doubt, the two darling names most known to the religious national heart of Wales. To John Elias it is impossible to render such a mede of justice, or to give of his powers even so comprehensive a picture, as is attempted, even in this volume, of Christmas Evans.
Something like an illustration of the man may be gathered from an anecdote of the formation of one of the first Bible Societies in North Wales. It was a very great occasion. A noble Earl, the Lord Lieutenant of the county, was to take the chair; but when he heard that John Elias was expected to be the principal speaker, he very earnestly implored that he might be kept back, as “a ranter, a Methodist, and a Dissenter, who could do no good to the meeting.” The position of Elias was such that, upon such an occasion, no one could have dared to do that; so the noble Lord introduced him, but with certain hints that “brevity, and seriousness would be desirable.” The idea of recommending seriousness to John Elias, certainly, seems a very needless commendation; but when Elias spoke,—partly in English, and partly in Welsh,—especially when, in stirring Welsh, he referred to the constitution of England, and the repose of the country, as illustrating the value of the Bible to society, and some other such remarks,—of course with all the orator’s piercing grandeur of expression,—the chairman, seeing the inflamed state of the people, and himself not well knowing what was said, would have the words translated to him. He was so carried away by the dignified bearing of the great orator, that he would have a special introduction to him at the close of the meeting. A day or two after, a special messenger came to invite him to visit, and spend some time at the house of the Earl. This, however, was respectfully declined, for reasons, no doubt, satisfactory to Elias, and which would satisfy the peer also, that the preacher had no desire to use his great popularity for his own personal influence, and aggrandisement.
After a life of eminent usefulness, he died, in 1841, at the age of sixty-eight. His funeral was a mighty procession, of about ten thousand persons. They had to travel, a distance of some miles, to the beautiful little churchyard of Llanfaes, a secluded, and peaceful spot,—a scene of natural romance, and beauty, the site of an old Franciscan monastery, about fourteen miles from Llangefni, the village where Elias died. The day of the funeral was, throughout the whole district, as still as a Sabbath. As it passed by Beaumaris, the procession saw the flags of the vessels in the port lowered half-mast high; and as they passed through Beaumaris town, and Bangor city, all the shops were closed, and all the blinds drawn before the windows. Every kind of denomination, including the Church of England, joined in marks of respect, and justified, more distinctly than could always be done, the propriety of the text of the funeral oration: “Know ye not that a prince and a great man has fallen?” Of him it might truly be said, “Behold I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument, having teeth: thou shalt thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills like chaff.”
CHAPTER VII.
CONTEMPORARIES—DAVIES OF SWANSEA.
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.
We shall, 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 be asked, 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.”