AN EXTRAODINARY INSTITUTION.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 900, 14 December 1871, Page 3

AN EXTRAODINARY INSTITUTION.

Most people have by this time heard ■of the institution at Bristol directed by Mr George Muller. But the facts recorded in Mr Mutter's last annual statement are so astonishing that they will bear reprinting. The Ashley<down Orphanage (whieh is the principal feature of Mr Muller's enterprise) does not possess a sixpence of 'endowment, it has not a single annual 'subscriber, boasts of no patron, vicepatron, officers, or committee, holds sio yearly or half-yearly meetings, •never appears on the Exeter Hall or any other platform, employs no collec-tors-or canvassers, whether clerical or lay, issues no annual report—excepting so far as the narrative of which we are now treating may be taken to be •One —and never appeals, either verb;ablly or through the press, for support. It is in the eyes of the founder and sole director a grand example of the power and efficacy of human faith. Many trials, Mr Muller lolls up, have had during the yea;' to be endured by him. Scarlet fever, he ■says, has prevailed among some of the little objects of his care, but he adds : " Very few comparatively have died in ■consequence, and great has been the ■mercy of God in removing sickness entirely from our midst." Trials of faith ho has had, too, in the sickness of some •of the helpers, in the death of one whom he names, in the scarcity of rain water, and in other ways ; " but in all these things," he writes," we found that we did not call upon God in % r ain, but were supported and helped." There is another feature peculiar to the Ashley-down Orphanage which •ought not to pass unnoticed. Not an •atom of work has been commenced until the money was in hand to pay for it. "As from the beginning so now : also," Mr Muller states on page four of his narrative, " we would under no •circumstances contract debt, but act according to God's mind by first obtaining the needed means." We gather from the report that Mr Muller has received from the beginning "above £500,000 as the result of prayer and faith." This colossal sum, •of course, has relation "t tie operations, small and large, of the 37 years •during which the Scriptural Knowledge Institution lias been working, •and has been applied not only to the erection and maintenance af the orphan houses, but to the support of missions and schools in various parts of Great Britain and the world, and the circulation of the Holy Scriptures and religious works based on them. As many as 150 missionaries are assisted from the funds. From the commencement 23,000 children or grown-up persons have been taught in the various schoo's eatirely supported by the institution (as Mr Muller is please to-designate it), besides tens of thousands benefited in other schools assisted by its funds. Added to this more than 64,000 Bibles, 85,000 Testaments, 100,000 smaller portions of the Holy Scriptures in various languages, ■and 29,000;G0O of religious tracts have been issued and distributed through its agency. Upon the support of the 'orphans, in procuring the admission of whom no favouritism whatever can possibly prevail, there has been expended from the commencement an almost fabulous suni. The -erection of the five orphan houses alone has cost £115,000. Tho expenses of the houses during the past year, quite exclusive from any assumed interest on the capital outlay, have been £21,660, but as the numbers are now very large they will be greater next year. Mr Muller says, indeed, on page 31 of his little, book " We shall not only require again £39,000, (for all departments), as during the past year, but considerably more still, perhaps £5,000, £6,000 £7,000 more. In glancing through the considerable portion of the pamphlet from which a knowledge is to be derived of the mode in which the funds are supplied to Mr Muller's hand, we find the help comos in almost every variety of amount from all parts of the world; it is given sometimes in cash and sometimes in kind; and it is to a very large extent anonymously. Among the heaviest sums received during the year, we note a legacy of £5,000 with £196 18s. 4d. added as interest, from the late J. A.; a legacy of £ t ,000 from W. R., who Mx Muller tells ua was so complete a stranger t<j him through life that he bad not even heard his name; a donation of .'Ji;OO from "A Christian Gentleman," one of £7OO

(£SOO of it for the Spanish Missioi;) from a donor not specified, £3OO from "A Christian Noble Lady," £4OO from an unnamed person living at a considerable distance, £SOO from a manufacturer, £350 from "near London," £SOO "from a considerable distance," the sum of £7OO in Turkish Bonds and 10 shares in the the Italian Irrigation Canal Company, by some one not specified. Anonymously from Somersetshire, 15 £2O Honduras Government Railway Bonds. There are several sums of £250 and £2OO, many of £IOO, and others ranging down to the offering of 2s. 6d. by "A Former Orphan," and a like sum by "A Very Poor Woman."