Mr. Moody’s religious work extended beyond America. He appreciated other speakers and workers. He had heard much of English methods, and also had a great anxiety to see Charles H. Spurgeon and George Muller. With the twofold purpose of benefiting Mrs. Moody’s health and making the acquaintance of these two great leaders and learning of their methods, in 1867 he visited England. He was unknown in England except to a few who had visited America. Upon his arrival in England, accompanied by F. J. Hartley, secretary of the London Sunday School Union, he attended an anniversary meeting in Exeter Hall, where he was invited to speak. It was customary on such an occasion to be connected with a resolution, as its mover or seconder, in order to give a speaker the right to the floor. Mr. Moody was therefore assigned to move a vote of thanks to the chairman of the evening, who was on the occasion the well-known Earl of Shaftesbury. At the proper time the vice chairman announced they were glad to welcome their “American cousin, the Rev. Mr. Moody, of Chicago, who would now move a vote of thanks to the noble Earl who had presided on this occasion.”
Mr. Moody burst upon the audience with this bold announcement: “The Chairman’ has made two mistakes. To begin with, I’m not the ‘Reverend’ Mr. Moody at all. I’m plain Dwight L. Moody, a Sabbath-school worker. And then I’m not your ‘American cousin!’ By the grace of God I’m your brother, who is interested with you in our Father’s work for his children. And now about this vote of thanks to ‘the noble Earl’ for being our chairman this evening. I don’t see why we should thank him anymore than he should thank us. When at one time they offered to thank our Mr. Lincoln for presiding over a meeting in Illinois, he stopped it. He said he’d tried to do his duty, and they’d tried to do theirs. He thought it was an even thing all round.” That opening fairly took the breath away from Mr. Moody’s hearers. Such talk could not be gauged by any standard. Its novelty was delightful, and Mr. Moody carried his English hearers from that time on. He visited Mr. Muller and his work at Bristol where Muller had 1,150 children in his orphanages, supported without any guarantees of fund and without solicitation. Mr. Moody said of Muller, “He calls on God, and God sends money to him. It is wonderful to see what God can do with a man of prayer.” He also met Mr. Spurgeon, and paid him a short visit. He visited and addressed the Y. M. C. A.’s, and besides helping them, gained much information which he put to good use on his return to America. The appreciation of Mr. and Mrs. Moody by the English people is shown by the farewell supper given them when they were leaving for America. One of the speakers said: “Few men who have visited a foreign shore have endeared themselves to so many hearts in so short a time, or with an unknown name and without letters of commendation won their way so deeply into the affections of a
multitude of Christian brethren as had Mr. Moody. Few had ever heard of him before, but having talked with him or heard him speak of Jesus, asked for no other warrant to yield him a large measure of their love.” In later years Mr. Moody referred to this visit and his efforts as being in a measure an exhibition of “zeal without knowledge;” but, as he would also add, “There is much more hope for a man in such a condition than for that man who had knowledge without zeal.” During this first visit to England, Moody also visited Dublin, Ireland, where he met Henry Moorehouse, “the boy preacher.” Moorehouse afterward visited America and preached in Mr. Moody’s church in Chicago. Mr. Moody again visited England and Ireland for a short time in 1872. In 1873 he went abroad to spend a longer time, carrying on an extensive work in many sections of England and visiting Scotland and Ireland. At his own personal expense he took Mr. Sankey with him. On their arrival they extended their operations, Mr. Moody preaching and Mr. Sankey singing in many cities and towns of England, Ireland, and Scotland. There was much prejudice largely because they were not in any way connected with the Established Church. Mr. Moody was really undenominational. But despite the prejudice they quickly won their way into tens of thousands of hearts, and many were converted under their combined labors. One of his friendly critics wrote of his preaching at that time as follows:
Exhibition Hall, Dublin, Ireland
“Mr. Moody preaches, but the conventional use of the word ‘preaching’ does not convey any notion of Mr. Moody’s talk. He is a business man and he means business; every word he speaks is meant to lead to a definite business; if it does not do that, he regards it as thrown away. Most people believe that there is a life beyond the grave and that there is some way of salvation and some way of being lost forever; and this is rather important business after all. Mr. Moody goes into the heart of this matter at once and he puts it in a business way. He says he himself has salvation, in fact is saved forever by the Son of God, and that every soul that wants it may have it too, at once, and know it, and go home with it, and be as happy as he likes.” It was during this visit to England that Moody and Sankey first began publishing their songs in book form. These books were used in all their meetings, and hundreds of thousands of copies were sold. There arose some unjust criticism of Mr. Moody’s motive in publishing the songbooks, some asserting that he was doing it for the profit there was in it for himself and Mr. Sankey. Whereupon he instructed the publishers to turn over all royalties and profits from the books to a committee of prominent business men of Great Britain, who should administer the funds as they thought proper. More than one million dollars has been thus distributed through English and American committees, many religious and educational institutions profiting therefrom. Mr. Moody personally received nothing. This was a wonderful demonstration of Mr. Moody’s bigheartedness and unselfishness. Mr. Moody was very sensitive to criticism, and even if it was unjust and unfounded he usually found some way to turn the criticism into a boomerang that fell on the heads of his critics and proved his purity of motive.