320 



Welsh Revival of 1904-5 brought into the churches an immense number of recruits 

 whose stability has been in inverse ratio to their enthusiasm, and many of them have 

 fallen away. This accounts for the greater part of the decrease, but there are other 

 causes. Emigration has something to do with it, and also the movement from the rural 

 to the urban districts. People change their residence more often than they did and are 

 not always careful to transfer their church membership. Often there is not a church 

 of their own order in the new locality, and where there is they hesitate to incur the 

 responsibilities attaching to membership. The increase of Sunday pleasure and the 

 general " spirit of the age " have also to be taken into account. In the Wesleyan 

 Methodist Church possibly the regxdations concerning attendance at class-meeting may 

 have alienated a number of adherents. The exact definition of what should constitute 

 membership in the Wesleyan Church has been a matter of repeated discussion in district 

 synods and in Conference for some years past, and proposals to make the class meeting 

 a more elastic exercise that shall be adaptable to different sections of the members have 

 found much favour. 



The Table of Free Church membership in England and Wales may be found of 

 interest, though it must be remembered that such statistics can only be approximate. 

 The meaning of the term " members " varies in the different denominations, and it has 

 also been impossible to include in it any figures for the many unattached missions and 

 evangelistic agencies. 



Statistics of the Evangelical Free Churches of England and Wales. 

 (From the Free Church Year Book, 1912.) 



a This is inclusive of members on probation. 

 b 304 churches have not sent any returns. 

 c Includes teachers. 



The Salvation Army has some 9,000 halls with.seating accommodation for about 500,000, 

 and employs 16,000 officers. But they give no returns as to adherents. The Unitarians 

 have some 375 churches (seating 100,000) and about the same number of ministers, with a 

 membership of say 45,000 and about 40,000 Sunday scholars. 



The following figures give some idea of relative strength in Scotland: 



There are also minor Presbyterian churches, e.g. original "Speeders, and Reformed Pres- 

 byterians, and the Baptist, Wesleyan and Primitive Methodist churches are represented 

 especially in the larger cities. 



In Ireland the (disestablished) Episcopal Church claims about 600,000 of the population, 



