Would it not be well to try what draining the land would do? Are the
most influential men cold and unresponsive to the call of the Spirit?
What sort of people take the lead in the prayer meetings? Are they left
to the zealous poor? Does every man of wealth and culture hurry home and
leave the preacher to shift for himself? Who are the stewards? Are they
men who will do their utmost to welcome strangers, or does their example
tell on others so much that a visitor never has a word of welcome or a
grip of the hand? What is the singing like? Is it of the colourless,
tame style, whose only sign of life is the rapid gallop which kills
devotion in so many places?
How is the Bible read by the preacher? Does he confine himself to the
narrow round which he has read so often in the ears of the people that it
has lost its charm--or does he seek out that which will be sure to
interest; and does he read as if he believed it?
We think our readers know some congregations in which there can be no
revival until the drainer has been at work, and that which starves the
seed removed. What we want is to have the question asked at the next
leader's or quarterly meeting.