iled me: then I should
not have liked to look at the difficulties, or at least I should have
sought to have them removed by my own efforts. But as it was, I did
nothing but pray. Prayer and faith, the universal remedies against
every want and every difficulty; and the nourishment of prayer and
faith, God's holy word, helped me over all the difficulties.--I never
remember, in all my Christian course, a period now (in October 1881)
of fifty-five years and eleven months, that I ever SINCERELY and
PATIENTLY sought to know the will of God by the teaching of the Holy
Ghost, through the instrumentality of the word of God, but I have
been ALWAYS directed rightly. But if honesty of heart and uprightness
before God were lacking, or if I did not patiently wait upon God for
instruction, or if I preferred the counsel of my fellow men to the
declarations of the word of the living God, I made great mistakes.--5.
A fifth difficulty in the way was, to find a sister, as matron, for
the new Orphan-House, who, as far as I could see, would be suitable;
for there were reasons why the sister, of whom I had first thought,
could not be engaged for this work. This was no small difficulty in
the way, not only as a point important in itself, but also because I
could not proceed with the fitting up of the house, &c., till such a
sister had been found.

In the beginning of June, I began therefore to give myself to prayer,
along with my wife and her sister who lived with us, making it a
point, every morning after family prayer, to retire together for the
express purpose of asking the Lord to remove these five difficulties,
if it were indeed, as I judged, His holy will, that I should labour
for a season on the Continent. In addition to this we day by day
asked His blessing upon the brethren at Stuttgart among whom I was
looking forward to labour, and upon unconverted persons with whom I
might come in contact on the Continent in the ministry of the Gospel
publicly or privately. We asked Him also especially to prepare the
hearts of the brethren in Germany for my service, to help me in
writing the book, to bless it, &c. We asked Him further, to be with
the Church in Bristol, during my absence, to use my absence as a
means of making the gifts, which He had bestowed among us, more
abundantly manifest, to help the labourers in the Orphan-Houses and
Day-Schools during my absence, &c. Thus we were, morning by morning,
waiting upon the Lord, and enlarging our