Wales

by William Watkin Davies

The indirect effects of Nonconformity were, in their own way, as important as the direct. The Welshman, hitherto so careless and docile in his politics, became thoughtful and independent, having accustomed himself to government by discussion and voting in his chapel. He had learned to read in the Sunday School; and it was not long before he added to his Bible and his commentary a newspaper and a literary and political magazine. Every chapel would have its Literary Society; and by that means new ideas in poetry and music, in science and in philosophy would slowly be disseminated among the people. A modern scholar probably did not go too far when he declared that "Nonconformity found Wales derelict; it has reared up a new nation. It found Wales pagan; it has made her one of the most religious countries in the world. It found Wales ignorant; it has so stimulated her energies that by to-day Welshmen, largely by their own self-sacrifice, have provided for themselves the most complete educational system in Europe."

CHAPTER XIII
THE DAWN

The new spirit which began to manifest itself in Wales in the eighteenth century took various forms. Of these, by far the most important was religion, and with that we have already dealt. The other forms were education, industrialism, politics, and literature; and among these, education claims the first place. It is impossible to make any clear distinction between religion and education; for the chapel, by its Sunday School, its Literary Society, its Bible Class, and its preaching was, for many years, a far more important agent of education than any school or college. Again it is not easy to determine whether that peculiarly Welsh institution, the Eisteddfod, belongs more properly to the domain of education, or to that of literature and art.

Ever since the first coming of Christianity into the country Wales had had its schools. In an earlier chapter we dwelt upon differences between the Celtic Church and that of Rome; and one of the most conspicuous of these differences was its greater insistence upon the value of culture and knowledge. There were Grammar Schools in Wales in the sixth century, just a hundred years before the establishment by Augustine of the first English school at Canterbury. In the turbulent times of the Middle Ages these schools deteriorated sadly; still the lamp of learning was never wholly extinguished. Such as they were, the mediæval schools were connected with the monasteries, and with the dissolution of those foundations they too ceased to exist. A few Welshmen were always to be found at Oxford, and we have seen how they flocked back to their native land to participate in the rising of Glyndwr. The Tudor union of the two nations made intercourse much more easy; and, during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the number of Welsh students at the old Universities greatly increased. They were further encouraged by the establishment of Jesus College, Oxford, a wholly Welsh foundation. But it is needless to say that it was only the sons of the gentry, and young men about to enter upon an ecclesiastical career, who were able to avail themselves of these advantages. The great bulk of the middle class, and the whole of the lower classes, remained without any sort of direct education.

The Reformation period witnessed the founding of many new Grammar Schools, both in England and Wales. The new Established Church prided itself upon the possession of "sound learning"; and the schools were under its auspices. But these schools were all in the towns; and the instruction given in them was entirely in English, and by teachers who knew not a word of Welsh. The country districts remained untaught, as too did the vast majority of the people who, knowing no English, were unable to profit by the new schools.

Good people in London seemed to have felt an occasional qualm at the thought of the ignorance which prevailed across the Welsh border. For example, we hear of Oliver Cromwell and Richard Baxter playing with the idea of a Welsh University. In the last years of the seventeenth century an effort was made to provide Welsh children with instruction in the English language, and to circulate the Bible, the Prayer Book, and certain other books in Welsh. Archbishop Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Thomas Gouge, and James Owen founded a society for that purpose; and it was so far successful that about a thousand poor Welsh children were taught every year. In 1701 the work of the society was taken over by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge. Lending libraries were formed, charity schools established, and much good work done. All these efforts, however, were eclipsed by the famous "Circulating Schools" of the Rev. Griffith Jones.

This remarkable man, the "morning star of the Revival" as he has been called, was born in 1684, at Cilrhedyn, and educated at the Carmarthen Grammar School. After holding the living of Llandeloi for five years, he became Vicar of Llanddowror. He was fully impressed with the desirability of providing education for the poorer Welsh children, and especially for those whose homes lay in the country districts. As it was clearly not feasible to provide a sufficient number of stationary schools, he hit upon the happy device of having circulating ones. Much help was given to him, and much encouragement in his enterprise by Sir John Phillips, the pioneer of the Charity Schools movement; by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge, and by Madame Bevan of Llacharn. The success of the undertaking was startling, and well-nigh instantaneous. Within ten years a hundred schools had been established; while within thirty years the number had swollen to between three and four thousand. The total number of scholars amounted to a hundred-and-sixty thousand. For the instruction of the teachers a seminary was established. Apart from subscriptions given by benefactors, the whole cost was borne by a collection made in church during the Communion Service. It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of this enterprise. It helped to preserve Welsh as a literary language. It taught a considerable part of the population to read the Bible. It prepared the way for the Revival which was at the door, and gave to the Revivalists a solid foundation upon which to build. Griffith Jones died in 1761; but the schools went on. In 1780 they were suspended, owing to a lawsuit; but in 1809 the scheme again came into operation.

The next momentous step forward in Welsh education was the starting of Sunday Schools, by Charles of Bala. This was one of the direct results of the Revival. From that day to the present the influence of these schools has been incalculably great. Children had their place in them; but their primary function was the education of adults. The term "school" when applied to them is somewhat misleading; they were rather small study-circles, presided over by a democratically chosen leader, and, with the Bible as text-book, discussing almost every question pertaining to this world and the next. Sunday Schools were quickly adopted by all the Nonconformist bodies, and by the Episcopal Church as well; and among the former at least church membership implied membership of the school. Owing to this the minds of the people of Wales became saturated with the Scriptures. The geography of Palestine was more familiar to them than that of England. Bible stories, Bible arguments, and Bible metaphors were become interwoven with the very texture of their thought. Huxley once pointed out that no man who possessed a good knowledge of the Bible could be considered uncultured; and Ruskin maintained that to know by heart some of its greatest passages was to make the writing of an undistinguished style impossible. To these admirable results must be added, in the case of Wales, the training in reasoning, in dialectic, and in controversial fair-play which the Schools supplied.