Algernon O. Swinburne.

The religious awakening, which is now convulsing Wales, has come with all the force of a dramatic surprise. A few months ago not many persons in the Principality, and nobody outside its limits, would have believed that the revival which finds in Mr. Evan Roberts, if not its leader, at least its figurehead, was close at hand. Educated men were of course aware that alike to the Franciscan friar and to the Methodist itinerant, the Welsh people had lent a willing ear. It was, at least in the Principality itself, a matter of common knowledge that between the middle of the eighteenth and the middle of the nineteenth century revival after revival had swept over Wales, creating a religious enthusiasm in the mass of the people which the brutality and stupidity of a Whig and latitudinarian episcopate forced almost in spite of itself into the nonconformist chapel. After 1859 however the voice of the revivalist was heard no more on the

hillside. The talk of the old folks, who had in the golden days of Methodism trod many a weary league to hear John Elias preach on the green at Bala, has kept alive in the countryside the tradition of the fathers of Welsh nonconformity. Still, for the last forty years the mind of nonconformist Wales has been turned from the other-worldliness of the revival days to such mundane matters as politics and education, chapel building and sectarian organization. During this period the chapel has been the greatest political power in the Principality, and a system of higher education has been organized on a secular basis. With the political triumph of Welsh dissent however its enthusiasm, if not its spirituality, departed from it. Meanwhile although the Established Church in Wales has made considerable progress in recent years, it has failed to shake off entirely the numbing Erastian tradition of the eighteenth

century. Its higher dignitaries are still rather Establishment than Church defenders. A religious revolution seemed therefore until yesterday impossible in Wales. The most reasonable forecast of its religious future was that the philosophic rationalism of the B.A. preacher of the Welsh University would convert many of the richer Welsh dissenters to theological beliefs closely resembling those which serve in place of a faith to the modern French Protestant, that the large mass of Welsh nonconformists would either sink into religious indifference, or gradually drift back into the Established Church.

"O cæcas hominum mentes!" To-day Wales is once more in the throes of a religious convulsion. Again mysterious visions are seen, again mysterious lights brood over the homes of believers, or the chapels where the fire of the awakening is blazing: again the grand hymns of the old revival days are sung by enthusiastic congregations; again simple and uneducated men and women are awakening the land to the old evangelical faith. Night after night the whole population of many a village crowds into one of its little chapels to sing and to pray (so they would put it) as the Holy Spirit may lead them. The movement is strongest in South Wales and has produced in Mr. Evan Roberts a remarkable personality; but in the wilds of Merioneth and Carnarvonshire the same force is at work, though the English press has not yet heard the names of its seers and teachers. Meanwhile political turmoil is dead. No one-a few wirepullers excepted-mentions Mr. LloydGeorge's agitation against the Education Act, except perhaps to regret it. Sectarian proselytism is at an end. The prayer of the revivalist is not that persons shall become Methodists or Baptists or Independents, but that the "churches free and established alike"

shall awaken from their frozen apathy. and teach again the fundamental principles of Christianity. Some features of a more doubtful nature are accompanying the upheaval. It is not quite pleasant to read that Eisteddfods and literary meetings are falling flat; and it is even more regrettable to hear that many of the converted in South Wales are ceasing to play football. It is deplorable that the reason of certain weak-minded persons should be deranged by the excitement necessarily attendant on these revivalist gatherings. In the main, however, the testimony, even of the callous London journalist, goes to show that the movement may claim already to have effected a great, if only a temporary, reformation in the morality of large districts.

To speculate as to the causes of the marvellous outburst would at the present time be dangerous. Perhaps popular disappointment at the results of fifty years of political agitation may have turned the minds of many Welshmen to spiritual hopes and fears. Possibly the country folks have wearied of the bitter feuds of rival denominations, and of the vaporings of the young preacher from the University College who has been striving to Hegelianize Calvinistic Methodism. It will be however more profitable to compare the present awakening with the great upheavals of the olden days. In some ways this revival presents the old familiar features. There is the old orthodoxy, the old fervor and something also, alas, of the old narrow and Puritan conception of the religious life. On the other hand certain superficial differences present themselves, due mainly to the spirit of the age. There is comparatively little said of eternal wrath; there are few of those uncouth manifestations of popular excitement, which unquestionably prejudiced educated opinion against the older Method

ism; there is less powerful preaching, and more lay initiation. Over and above all this, however, it is clear that a religious conception directs the present movement to which the men of the earlier revivals were strangers. Their minds were fixed on the idea of individual conversion. They rushed to the chapels and field-preaching to hang on the lips of a great orator, who proclaimed salvation. In the movement of to-day the underlying ideas seem to be the public confession of sin, and the salvation not so much of the individual as of the community. In a word this remarkable revival is a protest against an individualistic and sectarian conception of religion, and a struggle to return to a corporate and positive Christianity. For this reason Churchmen may view the Welsh movement with satisfaction. There is nothing essentially Protestant in the idea of revivalism. Coldness and decorum in religion savor in truth of Erastian Protestantism; the greatest revivalist of whom Church history tells was that most purely medieval of religious characters, S. Francis of Assisi. Το prophesy the future effects of this Welsh revival would be as idle as to speculate upon the causes that have called it forth. One thing however seems certain. Welsh religion can never again become as individualistic or sectarian as it has been in the past; and the Catholic conception of Christianity which the revival has reintroduced into Wales may in time have The Saturday Review.

ecclesiastical and politic consequences of lasting importance.

Meanwhile it is satisfactory to note that Welsh Churchmen have to some extent learned the lesson of the eighteenth century. Two Welsh Bishops have pronounced on the work of the revivalists a qualified benediction. There is not the slightest fear to-day that a curate who says a kindly word of these enthusiasts will have his license quashed, far less are we likely to see (as in the olden time) a diocesan chancellor, or high ecclesiastical dignitary supplying liquor to a mob engaged in stoning Mr. Evan Roberts. Were it not for the Acts of Uniformity, it would be quite possible for the Church to take a prominent part in guiding and modifying in a wise direction this remarkable manifestation. So far, however, as lies in their power, the majority of Welsh Churchmen are sympathetic, and this sympathy will not be lost on a religious and emotional people and will do more than a thousand Church defence meetings to shake the unreasoning prejudice, which up to the present time has made the average Welsh dissenter regard the Church as an Erastian and worldly institution.

To conclude, though a few materialists, a solitary English Radical, and the baser sort of journalist may jeer, a new chapter seems to have been opened in Welsh history which, ere it is ended, may record events of deep religious interest to other lands besides Wales.

Andred D. White's "reminiscences" which have been printed in The Century Magazine are to be published in book form next month by The Century Company. A new volume by Dr. S. Weir Mitchell,-a story of expe

riences of Northerners in the South during the reconstruction period, is to appear at the same time.

The announcement that some Indian ladies have started a ladies' monthly

magazine attests the progress which the education of women has made in India. The magazine was to make its first appearance last month at Cochin under the title of the Sarad, and it will be edited by three Nair ladies who have been educated in English schools. The magazine is written and printed in the vernacular.

It was announced without authority that the "Correspondence of Queen Victoria," which is being arranged by Mr. Arthur C. Benson and Lord Esher, would be published in December by Mr. John Murray. This was an error. These important volumes will not be published for some months. The mass of the documents which have to pass under the examination of the editors is very great, and is far from being exhausted.

Five volumes were disposed of last month in London at private sale for about $100,000. The volumes were originally part of the collection of manuscripts and early printed works formed by Guglielmo Libri, and their value is due chiefly to their elaborate early metal bindings. They were sold at auction at Sotheby's about forty years ago for just over £630, and have been in the family of the purchaser ever since. The most important of the five volumes is an Evangelarium, a sixth century manuscript written in beautiful uncial letters, with a silvergilt binding of the tenth or eleventh century.

M. Charles Causse, better known as Pierre Maël, who died recently, was one of the most prolific of contemporary French novelists, although he was but forty-two years old, and his early career was in the navy. His first great success was "Le Torpilleur 29." A mere list of his seventy odd books would fill a column. Most of these

ran into several editions. His death has been followed by the interesting literary revelation that he had a collaborator, M. Charles Vincent, who, in accordance with an agreement arranged between the two, will "carry on," in commercial parlance, the business under the old name.

Reverend John Mackenzie Bacon, whose name is pleasantly familiar to readers of The Living Age as the author of scientific articles and narratives of experiences as an aeronaut, died recently. On the theme with which he had popularly identified himself he published two books within recent years"By Land and Sky" (1900) and "The Dominion of the Air: the Story of Aerial Navigation" (1902). Earlier books which are credited to him are: "A Short Analysis of Paley's Evidences of Christianity" (1870), "Hints on Elementary Statics" (1870), "Short Notes on the Acts of the Apostles" (1870), "On the Gospel of St. Matthew" (1883) and "On the Gospel of St. Luke" (1885).

A volume which has its obvious uses, though it makes no strong appeal as literature, is that entitled "Thoughts for the Occasion, Fraternal and Benevolent." It is compiled by Franklin Noble, D.D., and adds to historical and other information regarding the various fraternal and benevolent organizations, large and small, amiable suggestions to those who are called upon to be orators upon occasions interesting to the orders, and a surprisingly large collection of speeches and addresses made by the leaders of these organizations upon similar occasions in the past. With this volume within reach no one need be at a loss as to what is suitable to say when called upon for "the good of the order." E. B. Treat & Co.