A Trip Abroad | Page 7

the manager of the
institution, a son-in-law of Mr. Muller, who died in 1898, at the
advanced age of ninety-three years. We saw one of the dormitories,
which was plainly furnished, but everything was neat and clean. We
were also shown two dining-rooms, and the library-room in which Mr.
Muller conducted a prayer-meeting only a night or two before his death.
In this room we saw a fine, large picture of the deceased, and were told
by the "helper" who was showing us around that Mr. Muller was
accustomed to saying: "Oh, I am such a happy man!" The expression
on his face in this picture is quite in harmony with his words just
quoted. One of his sayings was: "When anxiety begins, faith ends;
when faith begins, anxiety ends."
Mr. Muller spent seventy years of his life in England and became so
thoroughly Anglicized that he wished his name pronounced "Miller."
He was the founder of the "Scriptural Knowledge Institution for Home
and Abroad" and was a man of much more than ordinary faith. His
work began about 1834, with the distribution of literature, and the
orphan work, if I mistake not, was begun two years later. "As the result
of prayer to God" more than five millions of dollars have been applied
for the benefit of the orphans. He never asked help of man, but made
his wants known to God, and those who are now carrying on the work
pursue the same course, but the collection-boxes put up where visitors
can see them might be considered by some as an invitation to give. The
following quotation from the founder of the orphanages will give some
idea of the kind of man he was. "In carrying on this work simply
through the instrumentality of prayer and faith, without applying to any
human being for help, my great desire was, that it might be seen that,
now, in the nineteenth century, _God is still the Living God, and now,

as well as thousands of years ago, he listens to the prayers of his
children and helps those who trust in him._ In all the forty-two
countries through which I traveled during the twenty-one years of my
missionary service, numberless instances came before me of the benefit
which this orphan institution has been, in this respect, not only in
making men of the world see the reality of the things of God, and by
converting them, but especially by leading the children of God more
abundantly to give themselves to prayer, and by strengthening their
faith. Far beyond what I at first expected to accomplish, the Lord has
been pleased to give me. But what I have seen as the fruit of my labor
in this way may not be the thousandth part of what I shall see when the
Lord Jesus comes again; as day by day, for sixty-one years, I have
earnestly labored, in believing prayer, that God would be pleased, most
abundantly, to bless this service in the way I have stated."
The objects of the Scriptural Knowledge Institution are set forth as
follows: "To assist day schools and Sunday-schools in which
instruction is given upon scriptural principles," etc. By day schools
conducted on scriptural principles, they mean "those in which the
teachers are believers; where the way of salvation is pointed out, and in
which no instruction is given opposed to the principles of the Gospel."
In these schools the Scriptures are read daily by the children. In the
Sunday-schools the "teachers are believers, and the Holy Scriptures
alone are the foundation of instruction." The second object of the
Institution is "to circulate the Holy Scriptures." In one year four
thousand three hundred and fifty Bibles were sold, and five hundred
and twenty-five were given away; seven thousand eight hundred and
eighty-one New Testament were sold, and one thousand five hundred
and seventy-four were given away; fifty-five copies of the Psalms were
sold, and thirty-eight were given away; two thousand one hundred and
sixty-three portions of the Holy Scriptures were sold, and one hundred
and sixty-two were given away; and three thousand one hundred
illustrated portions of the Scriptures were given away. There have been
circulated through this medium, since March, 1834, three hundred and
eleven thousand two hundred and seventy-eight Bibles, and one million
five hundred and seven thousand eight hundred and one copies of the
New Testament. They keep in stock almost four hundred sorts of Bibles,

ranging in price from twelve cents each to more than six dollars a copy.
Another object of the Institution is to aid in missionary efforts. "During
the past year one hundred and eighty laborers in the Word and doctrine
in various parts of the world have been assisted." The fourth object is to
circulate such publications as may be