BEFORE THE REVIVAL. — Rev. H. Elvet Lewis said that for some time his fellow-ministers had been greatly concerned and almost heart-broken because of the manifest lessening of the hold which religion had upon the young people of their congregations. So-called Ethical Societies were drawing them away from their sanctuaries, and the publications of a rationalistic press were taking the place of the Word of God. Groups of men and women were praying for their young men, and the answer had come, not in the way they might have expected, but in God’s own way.

REVIVAL EXCITEMENT. — Let it not be suspected that we are afraid of all stir and excitement. The greatest and best actions have ever been performed in stages of excited feeling and high personal exaltation. Nothing was ever achieved in the way of great and radical changes in men or communities without some degree of excitement; and if anyone expects to carry on the cause of salvation by a steady rolling on the same dead level, and fears continually lest the axles wax hot and kindle into a flame, he is too timorous to hold the reins in the Lord’s chariot. — Bushnell.

REVIVAL AWAKES THE CONSCIENCE — The Rev. J. J. Morgan, who was at tonight’s meeting, tells me that at a chapel where he had just been preaching, one of the deacons read aloud to the congregation a letter from a member, acknowledging that years ago he kept back the price of some tickets sold for the church. He now returned the money, and humbly begged for forgiveness. — Daily News.

REVIVAL REVIVES THE MEMORY. — A still more striking indirect effect of the revival was told me by a gentleman at Hafod tonight. Eight years ago, he said, a lady borrowed a sovereign from my wife. When asked for it after a few weeks, she denied the debt. Now she has sent the sovereign back acknowledging that her statement was a lie, and asking for forgiveness. This story would have a most sensational effect if I were permitted to reveal the lady’s name and the position of her husband. For eight years this trifling debt has been ranking in her conscience. — Daily News.

THE SUN, NOT THE STARS. — Deprecating the intrusion of General Booth and other eminent leaders upon the Welsh Revival, Invicta writes to the Daily News:

A revival without a famous orator? Can it be? Why, anyone almost can say as clever things as Evan Roberts if there were nothing but human cleverness in it. So there are thousands who quietly and trustfully are going to prayer on behalf of their own tiny churches and their own villages, that the Spirit which has come to Wales and found her ready by years of deep Scripture study and exercise of home religion, may baptise these also.

Let us plead, for the sake of the out-of-the-way workers that their rising hopes be not blighted by the fear lest after all it be of no use — that the work of God can only be done by the famous stars. Let the stars rest awhile, that the SUN Himself may shine.

AFTER FIFTY YEARS. — A few weeks ago the revival began at Hafod with an old collier of sixty-three years who had never been to a chapel service since he left Sunday-school fifty years ago. His wife attended one of the missions of Mr. Evan Roberts at the neighbouring town of Porth, and came home singing and praying. The next Sunday, while she was at the Silvan Chapel, of which she is a member, the old man came in and publicly gave himself up to Christ. His wife wept with joy, the congregation were moved to songs of passionate sympathy, the sermon had to be abandoned, and since then there have been no regular services, nothing but almost continuous revival. — Daily News

REVIVAL EXTRAVAGANCE. It is very often true, when a revival seems to have an extreme character, that the fact is due, not to the real state produced, but to the previous fall, the death and desolation, with which it is contrasted. The dishonour does not belong to the revival, but to the decay of principle in the disciple which needs reviving. There ought to be no declension of real principal, but, if there is, no dishonour attaches to God in recovering His disciple from it, but the more illustrious honour. Commonly, if the ridicule were thrown upon the worldliness — the dishonourable looseness of life and principle — that preceded it, it would not be misplaced. — Bushnell.

NOT ABUSIVE. — Not a single word of abuse against any person or any class of the community found a place in the address of the revivalist or in the prayers of the congregation; and this consistent absence of any fierce tirade, which is too often part and parcel of the stock-in-trade of zealous propagandists, is one of the significant and most wholesome features of the present movement. — Western Mail, Cardiff.

CHRISTMAS REVIVAL. — The Christ is asserting His claims in new and unexpected ways, and therein we do rejoice. Let materialistic men say what they will, the weeping and contrition of Welsh miners over sin, and its putting away by them, is more consonant with the true Christmas joy than all the empty songs and greetings of the multitudes who by their sin crucify afresh the Christ in the midst of their revelry. — Dr. Campbell Morgan.

BLESSED FRUITS. — Our young people desert the theatre, the football field, and the public-house by the thousand, and flock into every place of worship whose doors are open; and scores of them take part in every way they can to advance the movement. Old backsliders and hardened sinners follow the lead of the young, and come home rejoicing. Ministers of the gospel take heart and wait confidently. They all know the movement is of God, and are steadily preparing for the building up which is to follow. — A Wales Minister.