feel assured that all that is yet required will be forthcoming in its season. The bazaar which is so soon to be held will, we hope, secure the amount needed to bring the enterprise up to the next stage, and then we may lay our plan for the final outlay on the chapel of the Orphanage, and a few other necessaries. All that has been done has been accomplished without personal solicitation, or the allotment of votes, or the dissemination of heart-rending appeals: it has sufficed to lay the case before the Lord in prayer, and then to mention it to His people in plain and earnest terms, and the funds have come in with marvellous regularity, the larger amounts having been timed to meet the hour of need as exactly as if the whole went by clock work. The hand of the Lord is in this thing, and to Him be glory. That this institution has brought honor to God is plain enough, for many a time those who would have abused our ministry have admitted that a good work has been wrought, and have had no heart to revile. There is something about orphan work which wins the sympathy of the most careless, and none can tell till the last great day how many have been by this means led to think well of the gospel, and next to hear it and experience its power."

"The Colportage Association has held on its most useful course. It has been sustained with difficulty, for somehow it does not chime in with the tastes and views of large donors, but its influence for good is second to no existing agency. Where there are

not enough dissenters to support a minister, or where ministers are unable to cover large and scattered districts, the colporteur makes his way with his pack, and speaks a word for Jesus at every door, either by personal conversation or by leaving a tract. Besides this, he preaches by the roadside or in village chapels, gets up temperance meetings, visits the sick, and above all sells good books. This society, and several other useful works, report themselves in these pages, and enlist good friends thereby."

"Mrs. Spurgeon's Book Fund quietly pursues its beneficent course. It is putting sound theology just now upon the shelves of many a poor curate and ill-paid minister, and this it does so largely that it would be a miracle of a strange sort if it did not greatly affect the ministry of the day. That the sermons distributed and the "Treasury of David" furnish material for preachers is saying very little: that they have evangelized the tone of many has been confessed in numerous instances, and is true of far more.

"Brethren and sisters, you have aided me so far in a benevolent enterprise of no small dimensions, and I hope I have in no degree lost your loving confidence. Continue, then, to bear me up in your prayers, and to sustain me by your contributions. More can be done, and more should be done. Every living work is capable of growth; every work which has God's blessing upon it is under necessity

to advance. Our watchword still is forward. Possibly we cry forward more often than pleases those who lag behind. Some time ago I asked for men and means to send evangelists to India; one man only offered, and that one man was sent. Up till now I have had sufficient money, and I believe that when more men offer I shall have larger funds; but here is room for prayerful uplooking to the Lord. Brethren, pray for us. I would fain live to the utmost of my own life, and I would draw out from all my brethren more and more for God's glory by the propagation of the gospel, the alleviation of suffering, and the arousing of the Church. Thanks to all helpers, and a thousand blessings."

CHAPTER XVII.

IN COMBAT.

It may be important as a matter of history although it is less agreeable to the general reader, to give some account of the controversies into which Mr. Spurgeon at times was drawn. We have before stated that he had strong friends and bitter enemies. No man could have been more deeply and sincerely loved by promiscuous congregations of people than was Mr. Spurgeon. Some of them even asserted that their affection for him was stronger than their affection for their own families. He was a tower of defence to his friends and no persecuted person went to him for protection who did not at once secure all that his genius and generosity could give.. The admiration of his acquaintances which amounted almost to worship naturally awoke in the jealous bosoms of ordinary human beings a counterpart spirit of envy and criticism.

The people well knew that it would please Mr. Spurgeon far more than any personal gift if they would remember the poor, the sick, the lame, the blind and the aged, as an indication of their re

spect for him. It is a magnificent thing to contemplate in the life of any person when the love of his friends for him manifests itself in deeds of Christian charity and the promotion of salvation.

A very excellent idea of the esteem in which he was held by those who had been acquainted with him through his ministry is shown in an address which was presented to him beautifully embossed on the occasion of his fiftieth birthday.

The twenty-five thousand dollars which was presented to him on that Fiftieth Anniversary with the assurance that he could do with it as he chose. He refused to accept it for himself and appropriated it to the various charities of the church. The accumlated power of ten thousand deeds of kindness necessarily exalted him in the minds of his friends. and lifted him to such an eminence that he was a most prominent mark for the arrows of the infidel, the atheist and the unsuccessful. Even that Fiftieth Anniversary, while it multiplied his friends, also brought upon him severe contests with the enimies of the good and the true. The address which was presented to him on that occasion we give in full that it may be preserved as an important matter of history.

'TO THE REV. C. H. SPURGEON, Pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle:

"With an united voice of thanksgiving to our ever-blessed God on your behalf; with a cordial acknowledgment of the good services you have rend