Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 15.djvu/383

 NEW ENGLAND REVIVALS 369

From this table it is apparent that the average annual addi- tions to the denominations as a whole for the five years follow- ing the revivals, except in the revival of 1877, to which reference will be made later, are from one-fourth to one-fifth the number of those in the revival year. It is also apparent that the average annual additions following the revival year are, in the majority of instances, decidedly less than those in the preceding years.

But the exhibit thus far is based on the figures of all the churches, whether they shared in the revivals of the year or not. Accordingly another investigation has been made. With slight exceptions all churches of the Baptists and Congregationalists adding 50 or more in the revival year and those of the Metho- dists readily available have been taken. The exception is that only those Baptist churches adding 106 or more, 1 1 in all, in the famous revival of "Elder Knapp" in Boston in 1842 are used from that revival, and 13 in Vermont in 1826 and 1830. These churches, 337 in all, report 25,935 additions in the revival years ranging from 1826 to 1877 in 24 groups of from 3 to 30 churches each, widely scattered and in proportionate distribution between city and country towns. The total additions for the revival year and for each following year, together with the total additions for the following five years and the percentage which these to- gether make of those of the revival year are given. The total members of these churches at the close of the revival years are given in four instances.

We are now prepared to point out some of the conclusions which these data seem to justify from the position of the stu- dent of social science, some of which seem to be clearly estab- lished and others to be more or less probable. Let the general reader again be cautioned against the assumption that this paper is a discussion of revivals in all their phases. It is only an introductory chapter to such wider treatment. It is an attempt to bring a reasonable amount of data together by the statistical method so that they can be the better observed by all and to treat them from the point of view of the social scientist alone, leaving the other parts of the field to the psychologist, the soci- ologist, the student of ethics and religious pedagogy, all of whom