When the second sermon was finished, Mr. Evans arose, and by the time he had spoken about fifteen minutes, describing mercy welcoming the prodigal home, some scores of people who sat on the burial ground, got up on their feet, some weeping, others praising, and this heavenly rapture continued in the fields and on the roads the whole of the night, and the next morning returned ere the heavenly ecstasy subsided. This, we may remark in passing, shows the uncommon effect which attended his preaching, though he was then comparatively a young minister. Upon this he pleasantly remarked to a friend, referring to a minister of Socinian sentiments, who was present-" Job David, the Socinian, was highly displeased with this American gale." But it was too strong for the sophistry of the Socinian to frustrate its happy influence.

Mr. Evans continued his attendance on the South Wales Associations annually for many years, and each year people flocked in crowds from all parts to hear him. The Associational meeting was enlivened whenever the presence of Christmas Evans was recognized, and especially when his voice was heard on the platform, and persons of other denominations often referred in terms of commendation to the 'man of one eye.' Such was the great popularity he had by this time acquired.

The Baptist cause was also now in a prosperous and flourishing condition around him; indeed it con

tinued to blossom beneath the genial showers of divine grace, like the garden of the Lord, and the sweet notes of the birds of paradise echoed cheerfully in all the plantations of King Jesus. "But oh!" said Mr. E.," a black cloud arose on the churches of the North, and a destructive storm burst from it."

CHAPTER III.

Introduction of Sandemanianism into North Wales.-The evils which attended it.-Its influence upon Mr. Evans, and upon the Baptist denomination.—The meeting at Ramoth, and the separation of Mr. Jones.-Description of Mr. Jones.-Sandemanianism counteracting Sabellianism. The character of the ministry previous to the Sandemanian system. The prejudicial tendency of Sandemanian principles.-Mr. Evans striving with God on its account, and his happy deliverance from it.

AT the close of the preceding chapter, we beheld Mr. Evans and the cause in which he was engaged progressing with rapid strides over the hills and dales of Anglesea; but ah! how soon the black cloud to which he there refers burst forth in a frightful torrent, threatening the utter destruction of the beautiful garden, which, by the blessing of God, he had been instrumental in planting. And for a season, too, it greatly checked his own progress and usefulness. Mr. Evans having written an account of this unhappy affair somewhat in detail, we offer no apology for presenting it to the reader, for the most part as recorded by himself.

The manner of the introduction of Sandemanianism among the Baptists of North Wales, he describes thus: "The works of Sandeman and Glass, and some books of McLean's, a Baptist minister in Edinburgh, fell in some way into the hands of Mr. John Jones, of Ramoth, a talented preacher amongst us, who immediately drank deep into the spirit of the system they were intended to propagate, and he infused it, by every means in his power, into the minds of his brethren, both ministers and others, and was, unhappily, too successful in his administration of the poisonous draft." The subject of this narrative was for a time considerably tinctured with the venom of this potion, and very narrowly escaped drinking deeply and wholly the dregs of the cup that was wrung out for him. He says, "The Sandemanian system affected me so far as to quench the spirit of prayer for the conversion of sinners, and it induced in my mind a greater regard for the smaller things of the kingdom of heaven than for the greater. I lost the strength which clothed my mind with zeal, confidence, and earnestness in the pulpit for the conversion of souls to Christ. My heart retrograded, in a manner, and I could not realize the testimony of a good conscience. Sabbath nights, after having been in the day exposing and vilifying with all bitterness the errors that prevailed, my conscience felt as if displeased, and reproached me that I had lost nearness to, and walking with, God. It would intimate

that something exceedingly precious was now wanting in me; I would reply, that I was acting in obedience to the word; but it continued to accuse me of the want of some precious article. I had been robbed, to a great degree, of the spirit of prayer and of the spirit of preaching."

The effect produced by this system upon the Baptists as a religious body in the North, was exceedingly disastrous. Mr. E. proceeds: "The Sandemanian spirit began to manifest itself in the counties of Merioneth, Caernarvon, Anglesea, and Denbigh, and the first visible effect was the subversion of the hearers, for which the system was peculiarly adapted; intimating, as it did, that to Babylon the crowd of hearers always belonged. We lost, in Anglesea, nearly all those who were accustomed to attend with us; some of them joined other congregations; and, in this way, it pulled down nearly all that had been built up in twelve or fifteen years, and made us appear once again a mean and despicable party in the view of the country. The same effects followed it in a greater or lesser degree in the other counties noticed; but its principal station appears to have been in Merionethshire; this county seems to have been particularly prepared for its reception, and here it achieved by some means a sort of supremacy."

When matters had run far in this way, the majority of the Baptists of Merioneth, under the guidance of their talented leader, Mr. Jones, of Ra