No man, however dissevered from the party politics of the day, can see and live amongst the Irish of the North, without having forced on his soul the conviction that the Protestant faith and life, with its grit and backbone and self-dependence, has made them what they are. Romanism, on the other hand, with its blind faith and its peculiar type of life, has been at least _one_, if not the main, degrading influence amongst the Irish of the South and West, who are naturally a warm-hearted and generous and gifted people. And let Christian Churches, and our Statesmen who love Christ, remember—that no mere outward changes of Government or Order, however good and defensible in themselves, can ever heal the miseries of the people, without a change of Religion. Ireland needs the pure and true Gospel, proclaimed, taught, and received, in the South as it now is in the North; and no other gift, that Britain ever can bestow, will make up for the lack of Christ’s Evangel. Jesus holds the Key to all problems, in this as in every land.
Returning to Scotland, I settled down at my headquarters, the house of my brother James in Glasgow; and thence began to open up the main line of my operations, as the Lord day by day guided me. Having the aid of no Committee, I cast myself on Minister after Minister and Church after Church, calling here, writing there, and arranging for three meetings every Sabbath, and one, if possible, every week-day, and drawing-room meetings wherever practicable in the afternoons. My correspondence grew to oppressive proportions, and kept me toiling at it every spare moment from early morn till bedtime. Indeed, I never could have overtaken it, had not my brother devoted many days and hours of precious time, answering letters regarding arrangements, issuing the “Share” receipts for all moneys the moment they arrived, managing all my transactions through the bank, and generally tackling and reducing the heap of communications and preventing me falling into hopeless arrears.
I represented a Church in which all Presbyterians are happily united; and so, wherever possible, I occupied on the same Sabbath day, an Established Church pulpit in the morning, a Free Church in the afternoon, and a United Presbyterian Church in the evening, or in any order in which the thing could be arranged to suit the exigences of every town or village that was visited. In all my addresses, for I nowhere attempted ordinary sermonizing, I strove to combine the Evangelist with the Missionary, applying every incident in my story to the conscience of the hearer, and seeking to win the sinner to Christ, and the believer to a more consecrated life. For I knew that if I succeeded in these higher aims, their money would be freely laid upon the altar too.
I printed, and circulated by post and otherwise, ten thousand copies of a booklet, “Statement and Appeal,”—containing, besides my Victorian Commission and my Glasgow address, a condensed epitome of the results of the New Hebrides Mission and of the reasons for asking a new Steam Auxiliary Ship. To this chiefly is due the fact (as well as to my refusing to call for subscriptions), that the far greater portion of all the money came to me by letter. On one day, though no doubt a little exceptional, as many as seventy communications reached me by post; and every one of these contained something for our fund,—ranging from “a few stamps” and “the widow’s mite,” through every variety of figure up to the wealthy man’s fifty or hundred pounds. I was particularly struck with the number of times that I received £1, with such a note as, “From a servant-girl that loves the Lord Jesus”; or “From a servant-girl that prays for the conversion of the Heathen.” Again and again I received sums of five and ten shillings, with notes such as,—“From a working-man who loves his Bible”; or “From a working-man who prays for God’s blessing on you and work like yours, every day in Family Worship.” I sometimes regret that the graphic, varied, and intensely interesting notes and letters were not preserved; for by the close of my tour they would have formed a wonderful volume of leaves from the human heart.