Kitabı oku: «A Book of North Wales», sayfa 14

Whilst Tyssilio was in Brittany, news reached him that his sister-in-law was dead, and his monks wished him to return to Meifod. However, he was content to remain where he was, and he declined the invitation. The name by which he is known in Brittany is Suliau, or Suliac. His statue is over the high altar of his church on the Rance, and represents him as a monk in a white habit, a bald head, and holding his staff. It is a popular belief that as the staff is turned so is changed the direction of the wind. The old woman who cleans the church informed me that her husband, a fisherman, was returning, but could not enter the harbour owing to contrary winds. She turned the crozier in the hand of the saint, and at once the wind shifted, and the boat arrived with full sails in the harbour. Tyssilio’s ring is preserved in the church.

About three miles up the valley above the junction of the Banw and Vyrnwy, but on the former, are the mounds that mark the site of Mathrafal, the former palace of the kings of Powys after they were driven from Shrewsbury. They form a quadrangle with a tump at one angle immediately above the river, and there are indications of more extended earthworks cut through by the road and mostly levelled.

Meifod Church stands in an extensive yard, planted with avenues of fine trees. It has been much altered by rebuilding, but on the south side are round-headed arches, very rude, of early Norman work. The east window of the south aisle is Decorated, but that of the chancel is Perpendicular. Within the church is a richly carved late Celtic pillar with figures on it. The screen has been removed; it was late in character, and is now stuck as a decoration against the wall of the chancel, and portions are worked into a partition shutting off the vestry from the church. This vestry occupies the site of the original church of S. Tyssilio.

Here is buried Madog, eldest son of Meredydd ab Bleddyn, prince of Powys, from whom is named one of the two divisions of Powys – Powys Fadog. He is not a man for whom one can feel any respect. He sided with Henry II. against his own countrymen, and took the command of the English fleet in the invasion of Anglesey, and was defeated with great loss. His second wife was Matilda Verdun, an Englishwoman; she had a temper, and he was of an amorous complexion, and they led a cat-and-dog life. At last he deserted her. She appealed to the English king, who ordered each party to appear at Winchester before him, and it was stipulated that each should have as retinue no more than twenty-four horses. Madog arrived with his horses and one man on each, but the lady with twenty-four horses and two men riding on each horse. The result was that she overbore him, and he was ordered to entail the lordships of Oswestry upon her and her heirs male, by whomsoever begotten; and he was thrown into prison, where he was murdered at her instigation. Thereupon she married John Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel, and carried the lordship of Oswestry to the English house. Madog died in 1161. His body was transported to Meifod.

Meifod is the parish whence came Charles Lloyd, the founder of Lloyd’s Bank. He was born in 1637, and was a member of a very ancient family that was estated at Meifod, and his father was a county magistrate. Whilst a student at Oxford he took up with the new notions promulgated by George Fox, and became a Quaker. In 1662 he was arrested and required to take the oath of allegiance. As he refused, the oppressive laws against sectaries were enforced against him with the utmost rigour. For ten years he was detained in prison at Welshpool, his possessions were placed under præmunire, his cattle sold, and the family mansion of Dolobran allowed to go to wreck and ruin. He was confined in “a little smoky room, and did lie upon a little straw himself for a considerable time.” His wife, who had been tenderly nurtured, “was made willing to lie upon straw with her dear and tender husband.”

When released he made over the family property to his son, and removed to Birmingham, where he became an ironmaster, realised much money, and founded Lloyd’s Bank.

William Penn is thought to have visited him at Dolobran, and portions of the panels of oak have been removed as relics and carried to America.

A contemporary thus describes Charles Lloyd: —

“He was a comely man in person, of an amiable countenance, quick of understanding, of a sound mind, and would not be moved about on any account to act contrary to his conscience, very merciful and tender, apt to forgive and forget injuries (even to such as were his enemies), and did good for evil, hated nothing but Satan, Sin, and Self.”

He died in 1698.

His brother Thomas accompanied William Penn to Pennsylvania; another brother, John, was the ancestor of that very staunch Churchman, Bishop Lloyd, of Oxford, who is regarded as the initiator of the Oxford or Tractarian Movement.

Dolobran is still in the possession of the Lloyd family.

At Llangynyw, in the church, is a screen in position; there is no loft. The old oak porch is fine.

The adjoining parish is Llanfair Caereinion, the scene of the burning of Iorwerth by his nephew Madog.

The upper waters of the Vyrnwy have been dammed and converted into a lake to supply Liverpool with water. Now it fell out that when the dam was in course of construction there was a stone in the river called Carreg yr Ysbryd, or the Ghost Rock, and it had to be removed. This was supposed to cover an evil spirit that had been laid and banned beneath it. The Welsh labourers engaged on the works would have nothing to do with shifting the block; but the English navvies had no scruples, and they blasted the rock, and with crowbars heaved out of place the fragments that remained.

Then was revealed a cavity with water in it; and, lo! the surface was agitated, and something rose out of it. The Taffies took to their heels. Then an old toad emerged, hopped on to a stone, yawned, and passed its paws over its eyes, as though rousing itself after a long sleep.

“It’s nobbut a frog,” said the Yorkshire navvies. “It’s Cynon himself,” retorted the Welshmen. “Look how he gapes and rubs his face. You may see by that he has been in prison.”

After that, whenever a Taffy was observed to yawn, “Ah, ha!” said his mates; “clearly you have but recently come out of prison.”

Lake Vyrnwy is nearly four miles long, and is fed not only by the river that gives its name to the reservoir, but also by many torrents that dance down the mountain-sides, forming pretty waterfalls. The work of impounding this sheet of water was commenced in 1881, and the water was stopped by closing the valves on November 28th, 1888. It has all the appearance of a natural lake, except from the lower end, where shows the magnificent dam, 161 feet high, but with 60 feet below of foundation.

Llanfyllin is the nearest station to Lake Vyrnwy. Near this is Llanfihangel yn Nghwnfa, where was born and lived one of the sweetest hymn-composers of Wales, Anne Griffiths. She first saw light at Dolwar Fechan, a farmhouse in this parish, in 1776, and was the youngest daughter of Mr. John Thomas, a farmer. She received such education as was to be obtained in a country school at that period, and acquired a smattering of English, some arithmetic, and a knowledge of reading and writing Welsh. She grew up to be a fresh-faced, comely, dark-eyed, and dark-haired young woman, and was fond of dancing and other innocent pleasures.

When aged about twenty she joined the Calvinistic Methodist sect, and thenceforth her life was distinguished for its devotional character and deep piety. In October, 1804, she married a Thomas Griffiths, of Cefn-du, Guilsfield, who came to live with her at Dolwar. In July, 1808, she gave birth to a child, that lived but a fortnight, and she survived it but another fortnight, dying at the age of thirty.

“Thus living and dying in the seclusion and obscurity of a lonely mountain farmhouse, Anne Griffiths composed some of the sweetest and most precious hymns in the Welsh language, if not, indeed, in any language. They are not numerous – all that have been preserved being only about seventy-five verses – and they are too often marred by faults of composition and the transgression of the simplest rules of prosody, yet many of them are so rich in poetic fancy, sublime imagery, holy sentiment, and seraphic fervour, that they can never be forgotten so long as hymns are sung in the Welsh language. Mothers teach their babes to lisp them, and many a pious Christian has been heard faintly to whisper them in the hour of death.”⁶

None of them were published during her life, and, indeed, it did not occur to her that they would ever appear in print, or would be esteemed beyond the circle of her own most intimate friends. She committed very few of them to writing, but she recited them to Ruth Hughes, a farm-servant with her, who treasured them in her memory; and they were taken down from Ruth’s repetition some time after the death of Anne Griffiths. They were first published at Bala in 1806. They have recently been translated into English, but they do not bear rendering out of the Welsh in which they were composed.

In the churchyard of Welshpool is a stone – the Maen Llog. It is shapeless, and is said formerly to have stood in the abbey of Strata Marcella, and on it the abbots were installed. After the Dissolution it was brought to S. Mary’s Church, and those who had to do penance were required to stand on it in a white sheet with a candle in one hand. During the Commonwealth the Puritan Vavasour Powell turned it out of the church, as an object of superstition; but in the graveyard it continued to be regarded with some respect, and was in request as a Wishing Stone. Those very ardently desiring something mounted it, and turning thrice sunways framed their wish; and so, before quitting Welshpool, I took care to mount it, turned the right way about, and wished prosperity to this cheerful little town and to its Powysland Club.

CHAPTER XV
NEWTOWN

Manufacture of cloth and flannel – Fine screen and ugly modern church – Sir John Pryce – Aberhafesp Church – S. Mark’s Eve – Bed of an ancient lake – Caersws – Legend of Swsan – Obligations of a chieftain – How a tribe would increase – How to reduce the difficulty of providing land – Llanwnog – S. Gwynnog – Consequences to his family of the publication of the letter of Gildas – View from Llanwnog – Llanidloes Church – Richard Gwynn – Chartist riots – Poetical description of them – Robert Owen – Henry Williams – Richard Davies

NEWTOWN is new in every particular except in its manufacture, and that of cloth and flannel was old enough in Wales, if we may judge by the spindle-whorls and shuttles found in camp and cairn; but the business once spread over the Principality is now concentrated at Newtown.

The ugly white brick church has taken the place of one that was old, and contained a magnificent screen. This has not been destroyed, but is preserved in a barn at the rectory. There is some talk of placing it once more in the church, where it would be like the proverbial jewel of gold in a swine’s snout.

Sir John Pryce, fifth baronet, of Newtown Hall, was born in 1698, and succeeded to the title and estates on the death of his father in 1720. He married first his first cousin Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Thomas Powell. She died in 1731.

One day Sir John was overtaken by a storm of rain whilst out shooting, and took refuge under a tree, and to the same shelter ran a girl, Mary, daughter of a small farmer of Berriew, named John Morris. As the rain continued to fall, Sir John Pryce was given plenty of time to make the girl’s acquaintance, to fall in love with her, and to propose. This led to a second marriage.

But the humble origin of Lady Pryce led to much spiteful comment, and some people would assert that she had not been married to Sir John. This was absolutely untrue, but falsehood is believed if venomous. Whether it were this, or that she could not accommodate herself to her new situation, or the fact that the first Lady Pryce was kept, embalmed, by the bedside, or perhaps all together combined to weigh on her spirits, and she died of despondency after two years of married life. This was in 1739.

In July, 1741, the Rev. W. Felton, curate of Newtown, was dying, when, two days before his death, he received a long letter from Sir John Pryce, from which a few passages may be extracted: —

“Dear Mr. Felton, – I waited an opportunity yesterday of conferring with you in private; but, not finding the room in which you sat clear a minute, I am forced to communicate this way my thoughts. I have abundant reason to believe that you will immediately enter upon a happier state when you make an exchange, and I desire that you will do me the favour to acquaint my two Dear Wives, that I retain the same tender Affections and the same Honour and Esteem for their Memories which I ever did for their persons, and to tell the latter, that I earnestly desire, if she can obtain the Divine permission, that she will appear to me, to discover the persons who have wronged her, and put me into a proper method of vindicating those wrongs which robbed her of her life and me of all my happiness in this world.

“I heartily wish you the Divine protection and assistance, and am

“Your Friend and Humble Servant,

“Jon Pryce.

“P.S. – I have sent you a Bottle of Mint Water, which, if you find too strong, you may dilute with Spring Water to what size you please.”

Sir John wrote an elegy of a thousand lines on his second wife, in which he affirmed that with his latest breath he would “lisp Maria’s name.”

Ere long, however, he fell in love again, and this time with a widow, Eleanor Jones, and married her.

But when the lady found the bodies of his two preceding wives embalmed, one on each side of the matrimonial bed, she absolutely refused to enter it, and ordered their burial “before she would supply their vocation.”

She also died, in 1748. Immediately Sir John wrote off to one Bridget Bostock, “the Cheshire Pythoness,” who pretended to heal the sick by the faith-cure and with her “fasting spittle,” which she supplied in corked and sealed bottles: —

“Madam, – Being very well informed by very creditable people that you have done several wonderful cures, even when Physicians have failed … why may not God enable you to raise the Dead as well as to heal the Sick, give sight to the Blind and hearing to the Deaf? Now I have lost a wife whom I most dearly loved, and I entreat you for God Almighty’s sake that you would be so good as to come here, if your actual presence is absolutely requisite, to raise up my dear wife, Dame Eleanor Pryce, from the Dead… Pray let me know by return of the Post, that I may send you a Coach and Six and Servants to attend you here, with orders to defray your expenses in a manner most suitable to your desires.

“Your unfortunate afflicted petitioner & hble servt.

“John Pryce.”

In compliance with this invitation Mrs. Bostock visited Buckland, in Brecknockshire, where Sir John then was, and exerted all her miracle-working powers, but without effect.

Sir John remained inconsolable – for a while. But from his will, dated 20th June, 1760, it appears that he was then meditating a fourth marriage. He, however, died before it took place. In his will he speaks of “that dearest object of my lawful and best and purest Worldly affections, my most dear and most entirely beloved intended wife, Margaret Harries, of the parish of S. Martin, Haverfordwest, spinster.”

He died on October 28th, 1761, and was buried at Haverfordwest.

His son, Sir John Powell Pryce, sixth baronet, was an unfortunate man. Having by some accident injured his eyes, his wife applied to them a strong acid by mistake for a lotion, which entirely blinded him. But this was not all. Want of management, and wasteful living, obliged him to part with one estate after another, and at last he was thrown as a debtor into King’s Bench, where his faithful wife joined him, and spent many years with him in the prison, till he died in 1776. With his son Edward Manley the title expired.

Three miles up the Severn above Newtown are two churches without villages attached – Penstrowed and Aberhafesp – on opposite sides of the Severn.

A story is told of the latter, a modern church with very bad glass in it. Two men, hearing that he who remains in the church porch on S. Mark’s Eve will see or hear something concerning those who are to die in the course of the year, resolved to keep watch there over midnight. One of them, wearied with the day’s work, fell asleep. Presently, in the dead of night, the one who was awake heard a voice from within the church calling his fellow by name. He roused him, and said, “Let us go – it is of no use waiting longer here.”

In the course of a few weeks, there was a funeral from the opposite parish of Penstrowed, and the departed was to be buried in Aberhafesp churchyard. There is no bridge nearer than that which spans the river at Caersws, and to take the body that way would mean a journey of over five miles. It was determined, therefore, to ford the river opposite Aberhafesp Church. The person who had fallen asleep in the porch volunteered to carry the coffin across the river, and it was placed on the saddle in front of him, and, to prevent it from falling, he was obliged to grasp it with both arms.

The deceased had died of an infectious fever, and the coffin-bearer was stricken, and within a fortnight was a dead man, and was the first parishioner who died in the parish of Aberhafesp that year.

The hills fall back above the two churches and allow of a broad level basin, once the bed of a fine lake, before it was silted up at the end of the Glacial Period. Here the Afon Garno, Paranon, and Ceryst, meet the Severn at Caersws, which was an important Roman station, at the junction of several roads, and where now the Mid-Wales line falls into the Cambrian Railway.

Caersws derives its name from a traditional Queen Swsan, that carried on a war with a prince who reigned over a tribe on the south of the Severn. One day, seeing the enemy mustered on the Llandinam Hills, she crossed the river with her forces to give battle to the foe. The prince, occupying higher ground, was able to repel the attack; and the queen, seeing that her men were routed and in full flight, rode up to the prince and demanded to be put to death, that she might be buried in a great cairn beside her braves who had fallen. The prince replied that she was too gallant to be thus slain, and that he pardoned her; and further committed himself to her hands. Thenceforth their quarrels were fought out in private.

The Roman castrum may still be traced – it covers about seven acres. Excavations made here have given up coins of Vespasian, Domitian, and of later emperors, also Samian ware. Roman soldiers must have been very regardless as to the condition of their pockets, for wherever they went they dropped their money.

The plain would seem to have been a debatable ground from hoar antiquity, for every height about it is entrenched.

It was one of the first obligations of a chief of a Celtic tribe to provide every married man who was subject to him with a farm, with seven acres of arable land, seven of pasture, seven of woodland, and a share in commons. Now as the tribe grew and multiplied he was put to great straits, and the only way out of his difficulties, where all the available land was appropriated, was for him to oust a neighbour from his territories. This obligation weighed on a chief to the eighth generation. Now suppose that a man started to found a tribe, and had three sons, and each of these sons had three, and all married, and in each generation had the same number. In the eighth, the tribe would consist of 2,673 marriageable men clamouring to be provided with farms of seven acres of arable, land, seven of forest, and seven of pasture. What could the chief do to satisfy them but lead them against a neighbour?

One way out of the difficulty was the establishment of monasteries. This explains the development of monachism on the steppes of Tartary, as well as in Wales and Ireland. On that high and sterile plateau in Central Asia, only a limited population can be maintained, and it is to keep down the growth of the population, as a practical expedient, that so large a portion of the males is consigned to celibacy. And it was this practical necessity that provoked the ascetic and celibate societies of the Druids first, and the Christian monks afterwards. When no new lands were available for colonisation, when the three-field system was the sole method of agriculture known, then the land which would now maintain three families at least, would support but one. To keep the equipoise there were migration, war, and compulsory celibacy as alternatives. That this really was a difficulty confronting the old Celtic communities we can see by a story of what occurred in Ireland in 657. The population had so increased that the arable land proved insufficient for the needs of the country. Accordingly an assembly of clergy and laity was summoned by Dermot and Blaithmac, kings of Ireland, to take the matter into consideration. It was decided that the amount of land held by any one householder should be restricted; and further the elders of the assembly directed that prayers should be offered to the Almighty to send a pestilence “to reduce the number of the lower class, that the rest might live in comfort.”

S. Fechin of Fore, on being consulted, approved of this extraordinary proposal. And the prayer was answered from heaven by a second visitation of the terrible Yellow Plague; but the vengeance of God caused the force of the pestilence to fall on the nobles and clergy, of whom multitudes, including the kings and Fechin of Fore himself, were carried off.

To this day, in Tyrol, where the farms cannot be subdivided, owing to the mountainous nature of the land, on the death of the father the sons draw lots who shall marry and take the farm. The rest work under their more fortunate brother, and remain single.

Llanwnog lies under the rounded, heathy mountain of Ddifed, in rear of which are some tarns lying high. The church has in it a very fine and well-preserved screen and rood-loft, and an old stained-glass representation of the patron saint and founder of the church.

His name was Gwynnog, and he was a son of Gildas the historian.

At an early age Gildas committed his son to S. Finnian to be educated. Leaving his master when his education was complete, Gwynnog settled in this spot above the plain of Caersws, but the scurrilous pamphlet issued by his father from his safe retreat in Brittany seems to have fallen like a bombshell among those of his family who were in Wales and Cornwall, and obliged them to leave the territories of the princes against whom Gildas had hurled invectives. Cuneglas (or Cynlas) was prince of Powys at the time. Gildas called him “a bear, wallowing in filth, a tawny butcher.”

Cuneglas after this was not likely to deal tenderly with a son of the pamphleteer, and Gwynnog fled for his life to Brittany, to his father. It seems not improbable that he was elected Bishop of Vannes, where there had been sorry doings and ecclesiastical scandals, and the Church was looking out for a respectable ruler.

The Frank historian Gregory of Tours calls him Eunius, and says that he was over-fond of the bottle. Weroc II. was Count of Vannes at the time, and he was engaged in hostilities with Chilperic, king of the Franks, whom he defeated with great slaughter in 578. Chilperic made terms with the Breton chief, who undertook to pay tribute, but afterwards made difficulties about fulfilling his engagement, and sent Bishop Gwynnog, or Eunius, to Chilperic with a list of complaints. Chilperic was furious at this breach of engagements, and resented it against the unoffending prelate, whom he sent into exile. Gwynnog died at Angers in 580, just ten years after his father.

The view from Llanwnog across the basin of the Severn at the mountains up the valleys of the Severn and the streams that pour into it is very beautiful.

A branch line from Moat Lane leads to Llanidloes at the junction of the Clywedog and Afon Tylwch with the Severn. Although the mountains here do not rise to a great height, they are broken and fine, and many beautiful walks may be taken up the glens of the tributaries of the Severn and over the heathy moors. The Afon Brochan may be ascended to a tarn from which the stream flows, or to the pretty lake Llyn Ebyr, three miles to the north.

Llanidloes possesses one of the finest churches in North Wales, with a richly carved oak roof, the hammer beams supported by angels bearing shields.

Richard Gwynn was a native of Llanidloes. He was educated at S. John’s College, Cambridge, and must have been of poor parentage, for he was a sizar there. He could not reconcile himself to the religious changes in the reign of Edward VI., nor to the violence with which fanatics wrecked the churches; nor would he accept the claim of Queen Elizabeth to be “Supreme Governor” over the Church in England, the objectionable title “Supreme Head” having been put aside.

He lived quietly with his wife and children, keeping a school, at one time at Overton Madog, then at Wrexham, Gresford, and again at Overton; and had many scholars, as he led an exemplary life, and was well known for his learning and scholarship. He does not seem to have been mixed up with any seditious movements, or to have been associated with the Jesuits. Nevertheless he was arrested in 1580 and cast into prison, and kept there for four years; he was treated with great harshness, and frequently tortured to force him to accept the Queen’s supremacy. After several trials he was finally brought up at Wrexham Assizes in 1584 and condemned to death for high treason. The sentence was as follows: —

“Richard White (i. e. Gwynn) shall be brought to prison from whence he came, and thence drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution, where he shall hang half dead, and so be cut down alive, his members cast into the fire, his belly ripped into the breast, his bowels, liver, lungs, heart, etc., thrown likewise into the fire, his head cut off, his body be parted into four quarters.”

“What is all this?” said Gwynn. “Is it any more than one death?”

The sentence was carried out on October 15th, 1584.

Llanidloes was the scene of a Chartist outbreak in 1839. The weavers armed and requisitioned contributions from the neighbourhood. Lord John Russell, who was Home Secretary, sent down three police officers to cope with hundreds of rioters well armed with fowling-pieces, pistols, and hand grenades. The magistrates then, unsupported properly, took the matter into their own hands and swore in special constables. The crisis came on April 30th. A man blowing a horn summoned the Chartists to assemble on the Bridge, and three men were captured on their way to the assembly, and were conveyed to the “Trewythen Arms.” The crowd now rushed to attempt a rescue, but was held at bay by fifty special constables. However, by weight and numbers, the rioters drove them away after a struggle, entered the inn, and wrecked it; they liberated the three men who had been taken, and caught the ex-mayor, who appealed to the mob to spare his life, as he was a doctor who had brought many of them into the world. They let him go, and he left the town to give the alarm. For five days Llanidloes was ruled by mob law, but the Chartist leaders saw that no gross outrages were committed.

Matters had now become too serious to be dealt with in the mild manner Lord John Russell had thought might suffice. Military aid was sent. An old lady has recorded her reminiscences of the time.

“The town,” she says, “was in an uproar. The Chartists had been drilling in the Dingle. The news came that a regiment of soldiers was coming to put down the riots, and I can remember watching their arrival. I was standing in a crowd on the Bank, and the soldiers in red coats and brass helmets came up the Pool road, the band playing before them. I shall never forget the scene. The women and children were crying like wild things, they thought everybody was going to be slaughtered. The soldiers proceeded to Newtown Hall, followed by a great and excited crowd. Here they were met by George Arthur Evors, the chief magistrate, who gave instructions to fire. But the officer in charge refused. ‘What,’ he said, ‘fire upon a lot of women and children? Certainly not.’ The soldiers, after all, did no harm, but in the course of a row one man was killed with clubs. After that we did not hear much about the Chartists. Many of them left the country, and never returned. Some were arrested and put into gaol, others managed to hide till things had quieted down, and then came back. But poor Frost, Jones, and Williams were transported.”

A schoolmaster of Newtown named George Thomas wrote a Hudibrastic poem on the riots, containing allusions and sly hits at local characters that were much relished at the time.

According to him —

 
“The rebels had a bullet mould,
A pistol rusty, crack’d and old,
Some bellows, pipes, and lucifers,
Tweezers, card-plates, and goose-oil cans,
With dust and other nameless pans,
Hot water, soapsuds, toasting prongs,
With cat-calls, horns, and women’s tongues.”
 

All ended with much noise and little harm done.

 
“When eggs were spent, tongues peace desir’d,
The spoils of war had brought no crust,
The rebels fled, the troops retir’d,
Covered with glory, sweat and dust.”
 

In the old churchyard of Newtown may be seen the plain slab that covers the body of Robert Owen, the Socialist. He was born in the place, but his father was from Welshpool, and had set up business as saddler, ironmonger, and postmaster. Robert was born in 1771, and was sent to London to a situation in a haberdasher’s shop. Thence he removed to Manchester, where he started cotton-spinning. His life is too well known to be given in full here, but a few points may be mentioned. He had imbibed very strong anti-religious ideas, and he was persuaded that the whole social world was topsy-turvy, and required reorganising on the new principles that he had excogitated.