Page:A history of booksellers, the old and the new.djvu/498

456 PROVINCIAL BOOKSELLERS, the Lectures on " Revivals," and on " Professing Christians," by Mr. Finney, of which he sold 150,000 copies. As an auctioneer, he was a lesser, or Liver- pool edition, of Tegg, and his rooms under the Liver theatre were crowded nightly. On one occa- sion Johnson is said to have purchased the entire contents of Baldwin's Bible room, and he was well known to have been the largest consumer of Bibles out of London ; and when Arnold left the Bagsters, and commenced Bible printing on his own account, Johnson was his favourite customer. Arnold's puffing hand-bills vie with the choicest pill-mongering pro- ductions. After a violent tirade against Puseyism he continues thus, re his " Domestic Bible," and " Bible Commentary :" " He has provided you the seed ; He will help you to sow it, He will help you to reap it. Sow it then, sow freely sow largely sow bountifully sow per- severingly. It may be bought cheaply may be had in any quantity has never been known to fail in its effects. There are agents for its sale in every town in Great Britain, you may obtain it from any bookseller in penny and threepenny packages. Sow it, men of Britain sow it in schools in families in every town in every village in every hamlet of England, Wales, and Scotland. Sow it beyond the sea for it will grow on foreign shores. Send it to Ireland, to the Colonies, to India, to China, and sow it there. Send it to the continent and to Africa and sow it there." And so on ad nauseam. The seed, however, proved very unprofitable to Arnold ; and shortly after his failure Johnson was also obliged to give up business, having signed some unfortunate bills. He afterwards rejoined his father in Manchester.