Many a rescued lad was he able to restore to his home and to society, and to the world. For many of these lads he was able to secure situations on board ship. To show his interest in them when away he had a large map on his study wall, in this map were pins in very many places. These, he told a visitor, showed the position of the ships on which his lads were located; and he moved the pins as the ships moved and prayed for each boy from day to day. The workhouse and the infirmary were places he used to visit, and his visits were remembered by the inmates, as all the fruits and flowers he could grow were given to these places and to the sick and poor whom he visited. Very often the dying sent for him in preference to a clergyman, and he was, if at home, always ready;
no matter what the weather or what the distance. His works were essentially works of charity, and these were not done to be seen of men. He was one of the humblest men I ever met. He would not occupy the chair at a meeting or even go on to the platform. Once I remember he addressed a gathering after tea of those who had been rescued and who were likely to be useful to others, but he would not be lionised or praised. He would say, “No; I am but the instrument: the praise belongs to God.” His spirit was the fruitful cause of all the work he did.
“Give me that lowest place,
Not that I dare ask for that lowest place.
But Thou hast died that I might share
Thy glory by Thy side.
Give me that lowest place, or if for me
That lowest place too high
Make one more low, where I may sit
And see my God; and love Thee so.”
He recognised “that pure religion and undefiled before God the Father is this, to visit the fatherless, and the widows in their affliction, and to keep unspotted from the world.” This
kindled his enthusiasm, influenced his chivalrous character, and we think had largely to do with his success. To know him was to know a Christian, a Christlike man—God’s man.
With Job (ch. 29, verses 11, 12, etc.) he could say truly—
“When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me. Because I delivered the poor that cried and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy. I was eyes to the blind and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor, and the cause which I knew not I searched out.”
He could truly say
“I live for those that love me:
For those that know me true;
For the heaven that smiles above me
And waits my coming too.
For the cause that needs assistance,
For the wrong that needs resistance.
For the future in the distance,
And for the good that I can do.”
Upon his removal from Gravesend in 1873 a local newspaper writing of his removal, and