Adam Smith, The Wealth of the Nations, 1776, 2:44:01

With many of my ancestors coming from the Isle of Mull in the Scottish Higlands, this got my attention: “No society can be surely be flourishing and happy of which the far greater of the members are poor and miserable…Poverty, though it no doubt discourages, does not always prevent marriage. It seems also to be favourable to generation (ie. having kids). A half-starved Highland woman frequently bears twenty children while a pampered fine lady is often incapable of bearing any, and is generally exhausted by two or three. Barrenness, so frequent among women of fashion, is very rare among those of inferior station. Luxury in the fair sex while it inflames perhaps the passion for enjoyment, seems to weaken and frequently destroy altogether the power of generation. But poverty, though it does not prevent the generation, is extremely unfavourable to the rearing of children. The tender plant is produced but in so cold a soil and so severe a climate, soon withers and dies. It is not uncommon, I have been frequently told, in the Highlands of Scotland for a mother who has borne twenty children not to have two alive. Several officers of great experience have assured me that so far from recruiting their regiment, they have never been able to supply it with drums and fifes from all the soldiers’ children that were born in it. A greater number of fine children however is seldom seen anywhere than about a barrack of soldiers. Very few of them, it seems, arrive at the age of 13 or 14. In some places, one half of the children die before they are four years of age, in many places before they are seven, and in almost all cases before they are 9 or 10. This great mortality however will be found everywhere chiefly among the people of the common people who cannot afford to tend them with the same care as those of better station. Though their marriages are generally more fruitful than those of people of fashion, a smaller proportion of their children arrive at maturity.”

Surprising Details Offered About Significant Though Faulty Firestarters

Reviewed in Canada on December 6, 2023

Rev. Dr. Ed (& Janice) Hird has offered a compilation of interesting and thrilling cameo presentations that focus on the life and leadership of twenty spiritual firestarters who lived between the 16th – 21st centuries. As an Anglican renewal leader and past president of Alpha Canada, Ed demonstrates well-researched depth and breadth in his understanding and appreciation of a variety of traditions and streams, such as key Puritan, Methodist, Baptist, Christian and Missionary Alliance, Pentecostal, and Vineyard leaders. I found a number of little-known and interesting details about the life and marriages of several of these amazing leaders. Though they had their own significant faults and struggles, God’s Firestarters were faith-filled, Spirit-led and empowered leaders who helped ignite revivals and renewal movements beyond their own limitations. If you want some fuel for your own spiritual fervor, read Ed’s treatments of such people as Susanna Wesley, William and Catherine Booth, Evan Roberts, Aimee Semple McPherson, Chuck Smith, John Wimber, J. I. Packer, and more. As you learn about these folk, perhaps you will also become one of God’s Firestarters in your own context!

Roger Helland, DMin. is the prayer ambassador of The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada and author of Pursuing God’s Presence, The Devout Life, and Missional Spirituality. He lives near Calgary with his wife Gail.