"Toward the close of the last century [written in the 1800s], before the days of the great Bible societies, there was for a season a woeful want of Bibles in America, caused partly by the prevalence of French infidelity and partly by the general religious apathy which followed the Revolutionary War. In that period a man went into a bookstore in Philadelphia and asked to buy a Bible. 'I have none,' said the bookseller. 'There is not a copy for sale in the city; and I can tell you further,' said he (for he was of the French way of thinking), 'in fifty years there will not be a Bible in the world.' The rough answer of the customer was, 'There will be plenty of Bibles in the world a thousand years after you are dead and gone to hell.'" - From The Christian Age, as quoted in Spurgeon's Sermon Notes
Further recommended reading & listening:
The Best of The Daily Spurgeon
The Forgotten Spurgeon, by Iain Murray
A Defense of Calvinism - by Charles Spurgeon
