and it was consequently a very serious question to
my mind, not whether _He_ was faithful, but whether I had strong enough
faith to warrant my embarking in the enterprise set before me.

I thought to myself, "When I get out to China, I shall have no claim on
any one for anything; my only claim will be on GOD. How important,
therefore, to learn before leaving England to move man, through GOD, by
prayer alone."

At Hull my kind employer, always busily occupied, wished me to remind
him whenever my salary became due. This I determined not to do directly,
but to ask that GOD would bring the fact to his recollection, and thus
encourage me by answering prayer. At one time, as the day drew near for
the payment of a quarter's salary, I was as usual much in prayer about
it. The time arrived, but my kind friend made no allusion to the matter.
I continued praying, and days passed on, but he did not remember, until
at length, on settling up my weekly accounts one Saturday night, I found
myself possessed of only a single coin--one half-crown piece. Still I
had hitherto had no lack, and I continued in prayer.

That Sunday was a very happy one. As usual my heart was full and
brimming over with blessing. After attending Divine service in the
morning, my afternoons and evenings were filled with Gospel work, in the
various lodging-houses I was accustomed to visit in the lowest part of
the town. At such times it almost seemed to me as if heaven were begun
below, and that all that could be looked for was an enlargement of one's
capacity for joy, not a truer filling than I possessed. After concluding
my last service about ten o'clock that night, a poor man asked me to go
and pray with his wife, saying that she was dying. I readily agreed, and
on the way to his house asked him why he had not sent for the priest, as
his accent told me he was an Irishman. He had done so, he said, but the
priest refused to come without a payment of eighteenpence, which the man
did not possess, as the family was starving. Immediately it occurred to
my mind that all the money I had in the world was the solitary
half-crown, and that it was in one coin; moreover, that while the basin
of water gruel I usually took for supper was awaiting me, and there was
sufficient in the house for breakfast in the morning, I certainly had
nothing for dinner on the coming day.

Somehow or other there was at once a stoppage in the flow of joy in my
heart; but instead of reproving