(1) First let us remember that these graces of the Cambrian or Celtic
character, which our Heavenly Father has thus vouchsafed to us, are also
by His good providence blended in the English race with exactly those
qualities which furnish their counterpoise—with that self-control, that
moral discipline, that solid steadiness of purpose, without which poetic
sentiment, religious fervour, mental vivacity are often useless, or worse
than useless.
The old hermit in his solitude, the preacher in his fervid appeal, was
good; but the honest, manly Christian, doing his duty faithfully and
truthfully in his own station of life, is better. The sailor who
remembers on the broad sea that God’s eye is always upon him; the workman
or tradesman who endeavours to render to his Maker the best of all
services, the offering of honest labour, the offering of unadulterated
food, the offering of an upright conscientious traffic; the railway
official or partner who cheers and encourages friendless travellers by a
kindly word or by a helping hand, not for reward, but for love of his
fellow creatures,—these are the modes by which, far more than by sudden
conversion or enthusiastic hymns, we can fulfil God’s goodwill towards
us.
(2) Another remark, still more obvious, but one of which we sometimes
lose sight in speaking of the good influences of race and nationality, is
that the power of religion, of the Christian religion, though coloured by
these several influences, is yet above and beyond and independent of them
all. I spoke before of the old story which tells how he who stands on
the turf from St. David’s churchyard and looks out on the western sea was
believed to see in the distance the green island of the fairies. But
there is a still better thing that can be done by each one of us, Saxon
or Celt, Englishman or Briton, old and young, rich and poor. Take your
stand on any good religious lesson, learnt from whatever quarter—any
piece of fresh fragment of knowledge, cut out of your inner experience—a
good text from your Bible, a good prayer from your prayer-book, a good
hymn from your hymn-book, a good counsel, or example of friend or teacher
anywhere, which has enabled you better to know yourself, and better to
know what God is,—stand fast upon it, and look out over the wide sea of
your future years, and the still wider ocean of eternity beyond, and from
that green turf of duty or of knowledge you will see in the distance the
islands, not of the fairies, but something far better—the islands of the
blessed, of the eternal shores across the stormy waves of this
troublesome world.
Such an example, such a memory, such a life {39} you have had in the
recollection of her who devoted her life to the welfare of the people of
Holyhead, who loved the Welsh nation with a constant love, who spoke
their tongue as her own, who cherished all their traditions, who longed
for the restoration of this venerable church, whose heart’s desire has
been on this day fulfilled by its reproduction in all its antique
simplicity, in all its gracious adaptation to our living needs. She was
a Welshwoman to the heart’s core; but she was also a generous, loving,
wise, Christian spirit; and when we stand round her grave, and in this
church which is the monument of her goodness, we stand as it were on the
fragment of St. David’s turf, and we look out beyond a wider than any
earthly sea to those islands of the better land where she and the great
family of God’s servants have gone before; the islands of eternal
rest—the islands where truth and holiness have “room and verge enough” to
flourish undisturbed by earthly tempests, unwarped by the winds of
earthly cares—in the haven where they and we would all be, through the
grace of God and the power of His Spirit in our Lord Jesus Christ.
On a granite cross standing upon rocky ground near Llanfawr, is engraven
the following inscription by Dean Stanley.
To the dear memory of Ellin, forty-four years the beloved and loving
wife of the Honble. William Owen Stanley of Penrhos, Lord Lieutenant
of Anglesey. The constant friend of the poor and afflicted of her
native Wales, with which, from youth to age, she was one in heart and
speech, in word and deed. Born Nov. 9th, 1809. Died Nov. 24th,
1876. This was erected by her sorrowing husband.