Page 91 - Living Epistles

I almost wish I had a hundred bodies. They should all be devoted to my
Savior in the missionary cause. But this is foolishness. I have almost more
than I can do to manage one, it is so self-willed, earthly-minded, fleshly.
Constantly I am grieving my dear Savior who shed for me His precious
blood, forgetting Him who never has relaxed His watchful care and
protection over me from the earliest moment of my existence. I am
astonished at the littleness of my gratitude and love to Him, and confounded
by His long-suffering mercy. Pray for me that I may live more and more to
His praise, be more devoted to Him, incessant in labors in His cause, fitted
for China, ripened for glory.

The following correspondence to his mother revealed how much Hudson
Taylor was choosing to get by on a very meager diet, along with his very
humble dwelling place. He could have chosen to eat much better, but it was his
delight to save as much of his money as possible to share with the poor people
he visited throughout the week.

"I am sorry you make yourself anxious about me," he wrote in January. I
think it is because I have begun to wear a larger coat that everybody says,
`How poorly and thin you look !' However, as you want to know everything,
I have had a heavy cold... that lasted a week. But since then I have been as
well as ever in my life. I eat like a horse, sleep like a top and have the spirits
of a lark. I do not know that I have any anxiety save to be more holy and
useful...

As to my health, I think I never was so well and hearty in my life. The winds
here are extremely searching, but as I always wrap up well I am pretty
secure... The cold weather gives me a good appetite, and it would be dear
economy to stint myself. So I take as much plain, substantial food as I need,
but waste nothing on luxuries...

I have found some brown biscuits which are really as cheap as bread,
eighteen pence a stone, and much nicer. For breakfast I have biscuit and
herring, which is cheaper than butter (three for a penny, and half a one is
enough) with coffee. For dinner I have at present a prune-and-apple pie.
Prunes are two or three pence a pound and apples tenpence a peck. I use no
sugar, but loaf which I powder, and at fourpence halfpenny a pound I find
it is cheaper than the coarser kind. Sometimes I have roast potatoes and
tongue, which is as inexpensive as any other meat. For tea I have biscuit and
apples. I take no supper, or occasionally a little biscuit and apple... I pickled