and a house has
been built and fitted up for the accommodation of three hundred
destitute orphans, each of whom has neither father nor mother. How
blessed therefore is it to trust in God, and in him alone, and not in
circumstances nor friends! There is, however, one thing which I must
record here, because it has taken place since I last wrote in my journal
on this subject, on January 2. It is this. During these twelve days I
have received for the various objects of the Scriptural Knowledge
Institution, in smaller donations, sixty-four pounds fifteen shillings
sixpence two farthings, also a donation of one hundred and fifty pounds,
and one of three thousand pounds. Is not this a plain proof that God is
both able and willing to help simply in answer to prayer? Is not human
reason confounded by such instances? When I first began to write these
exercises of my mind about another Orphan House, I knew not that on
January 4, I should receive a donation of three thousand pounds; yet I
was fully assured that God was able to support one thousand orphans as
easily as he did the thirty whom I first received in a rented house.
Does he not, however, tell me by all this, Go forward, my servant, and I
will help thee?

7. But, it might be said, suppose you were able by prayer to obtain this
large sum for building a house for seven hundred other orphans; and
suppose you were able to provide for them during your lifetime,--what
would become of this Institution after your death? Answer: I am quite
familiar with this objection. I have heard it many times as a reason
against the way of obtaining the means for the Scriptural Knowledge
Institution, simply by trusting in God, without any funded property, and
without looking to regular subscribers; but my reply is this. My
business is, with all my might to serve my own generation; in doing so I
shall best serve the next generation, should the Lord Jesus tarry. Soon
he may come again; but, if he tarry, and I have to fall asleep before
his return, I shall not have been altogether without profit to the
generation to come, were the Lord only to enable me to serve my own
generation. Suppose this objection were a sound one, I ought never to
have commenced the orphan work at all, for fear of what might become of
it after my death, and thus all the hundreds of destitute children
without father and mother, whom the Lord has allowed me to care for
during the last fifteen years, would not have been taken