Does not the reader call up a very beautiful picture of these two, in that old and obscure Welsh hamlet, nearly a hundred and fifty years since?—the conversation of such an one as Paul, the aged, with his young son, Timothy; and if anything were needed to increase our sense of admiration of the young clergyman, it would be that he did not disdain to receive lessons from old age, and an old age covered with the indignities attaching to an outlawed Nonconformist. In Wales, there were very many men like Philip Pugh; we may incidentally mention the names of several in the course of these pages—names well worthy of the commendation in Johnson’s perfect lines:
“Their virtues walked their narrow round, Nor made a pause, nor left a void; And sure the Eternal Master found Their single talent well employed.
“And still they fill affection’s eye, Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind; And let not arrogance deny Its praise to merit unrefined.”
Then there opened a great career before Rowlands, and Llangeitho became as a shrine in evangelical Wales. He received invitations to preach in every neighbourhood of the Principality; many churches were opened to him, and where they were not, he took freely, and cheerfully, to the chapels, or the fields. His words, and accents were of that marvellous kind we have identified with Welsh preaching. Later on, and in other times, people said, he found his successor in Davies of Swansea; and the highest honour they could give to Swansea, in Davies’ day, was that “it was another Llangeitho.”
Rowlands had the power of the thunder, and the dew; he pressed an extraordinary vitality into words, which had often been heard before, so that once, while reading the Church Service, in his own church, he gave such a dreadful tenderness to the words, “By thine agony, and bloody sweat!” that the service was almost stopped, and the people broke forth into a passion of feeling. Christmas Evans says: “While Rowlands was preaching, the fashion of his countenance became altered; his voice became as if inspired; the worldly, dead, and careless spirit was cast out by his presence. The people, as it were, drew near to the cloud, towards Christ, and Moses, and Elijah. Eternity, with its realities, rushed upon their vision. These mighty influences were felt, more or less, for fifty years. Thousands gathered at Llangeitho for communion every month, and they came there from every county in Wales.”