entirely providential. It was already a custom in Halle
for the poor to convene every week at a stated time, and receive the
alms which had been contributed for their support. Francke saw their
weekly gatherings, and resolved to improve the occasion by religious
teaching. But their children were also ignorant, and there was no hope
that the parents would be able to educate them. So he resolved to do
something also in this direction, and secured some money for this
purpose. But yet the parents did not thus apply it; whereupon he placed
a box in his own dwelling, that all who visited him might contribute. He
knew that then he would have the personal distribution of such funds.
During three months one person deposited four thalers and sixteen
groschen; when Francke exclaimed, "That is a noble thing--something good
must be established--with this money I will found a school." Two thalers
were spent for twenty-seven books; but the children brought back only
four out of the whole number that they had taken home. New books were
bought, and henceforth it was required that they be left in the room. At
first Francke's own study was the book depository and school-room; but
in a short time his pupils so greatly increased that he hired adjacent
accommodations. Voluntary contributions came in freely; new buildings
were erected, and teachers provided; and before the death of the
founder, the enterprise had grown into a mammoth institution, celebrated
throughout Europe, and scattering the seeds of truth into all lands.[26]
It became a living proof that Pietism was not only able to combat the
religious errors of the times but also to grapple with the grave wants
of common life. Is not that a good and safe theology, which, in addition
to teaching truth, can also clothe the naked and feed the hungry?
Francke's prayer, so often offered in some secluded corner of the field
or the woods, was answered even before his departure from labor to
reward; "Lord, give me children as plenteous as the dew of the morning;
as the sand upon the sea-shore; as the stars in the heavens; so numerous
that I cannot number them!"

The theological instruction of Francke and his coadjutors in the
University of Halle was very influential. During the first thirty years
of its history six thousand and thirty-four theologians were trained
within its walls, not to speak of the multitudes who received a thorough
academic and religious instruction in the Orphan House. The