In Wales Nonconformity, which for three hundred years was to play a dominating part in the religion, education, politics, and literature of the nation, began comparatively late; and it was not until after the Civil War that it acquired much strength. Indeed it has been estimated that, at the Restoration, there were in Wales only a score or so of Nonconformist chapels, each of them having a membership of from two to five hundred. Yet even in the days of small things the Nonconformists played a prominent part; and they included in their number the majority of the patriotic Welshmen of the age. In Wales, even more than in England, it may be said that it was not doctrinal distinctions that led to the rise of Nonconformity; neither was it the question of Church establishment. All the early Welsh Puritan leaders were strictly orthodox, according to the standard of the Prayer Book; and the majority of them were well content that there should be a State Church. It was upon the question of preaching that the first and greatest difficulties arose. The views held so emphatically by John Penry were taken up by his {167} successors; while Elizabeth's attitude of hostility was even stiffened by Laud. On the shoulders of that narrow and unamiable pedant must be laid the greater part of the blame for the irreparable schism which occurred in the English Church. Laud's lack of understanding of the temper and the needs of Wales is the less excusable inasmuch as he himself had been, from 1621 until 1626, Bishop of St. David's. During the greater part of the time he was non-resident; but he kept always a vigilant eye for recusants in his remote diocese. He also built a chapel in the Bishop's Palace at Abergwili, and actually came down for its consecration. Upon the Welsh Church, in other respects, his episcopate does not appear to have left a trace. The first Nonconformist Church in Wales was founded in 1639, at Llanfaches in Monmouthshire; and its first Minister was the saintly William Wroth who had been, for thirty-nine years, Rector of the parish. For some time prior to 1639 Laud had been uttering complaints about Wroth's irregular preaching. The utmost limit of his "irregularity" would seem to have consisted in the delivery of an occasional sermon in the open {168} air. When remonstrated with he offered a vigorous defence, saying: "There are thousands of immortal souls around me thronging to perdition, and should I not use all means likely to succeed to save them." Such zeal must have been highly offensive to the Archbishop; and one is not surprised to hear that Wroth was deprived of his living. This, however, was not going to deter the zealous Rector from preaching; and since he would no longer be allowed to do so in the Parish Church, he would do so elsewhere. Such was the parent Church of Welsh Nonconformity.