These venerable teachers and patterns of Truth and Virtue, do all, with one voice, express their deep sensibility of the evils and miseries of their present state of existence, and their ardent aspirations after another and a better state. They all, with one voice, acknowledge the vanity and insufficiency of every sublunary enjoyment, and the indispensable necessity of "setting the affections on things above, not on things on the earth." They all, with one voice, pronounce their state in this world to be that of strangers and exiles; and consider their temporary pilgrimage here, as only intended to purify and prepare them for a state of eternal peace and happiness hereafter. In a word, they all, with one voice, declare, that there is no other method, by which they can be redeemed from the evils of their present life, and qualified for the blessings of a future, but by a perpetual communion with the great FATHER OF THEIR SPIRITS, kept up on his part by kind and liberal effusions of his own essential goodness; and on theirs, by an affectionate and ardent inclination of their wills and desires towards him, and a grateful reception, and faithful improvement of his loving communications. Under the Old Testament, this blessed intercourse was understood and felt by patriarchs and prophets, through the outward means of sacrifices, types, and various ceremonies and ordinances; all predictive and expressive of a certain Redeeming Process, which, "in the fulness of time," was to be accomplished for human nature, in the person of a suffering and triumphant MESSIAH. Under the New Testament, it broke forth, with meridian lustre, in the incarnation and nativity, life and conversation, sufferings, death, resurrection and ascension of the BLESSED JESUS; in whose sacred person the divine and human natures were most happily united, to the end, that as the SON OF MAN and the SON OF GOD, he might communicate to every Son of Man, that should receive his testimony, and believe in his Name, the power of becoming a SON OF GOD, John i. 12. His life and conversation upon earth must, therefore, be the true and only standard, by which ours is to be regulated. As he lived, so should we live also; and consider this world in the same point of view, and treat it in the same manner, that he did. So far, indeed, as the worthies of the Old Testament have lived or spoken according to the spirit of his Gospel, so far, without doubt, we are bound to follow their example: and a very little acquaintance with Scripture will be sufficient to inform us, that "they did all eat of the same spiritual meat, and did all drink of the same spiritual drink," and had all entered upon the same Redeeming Process, with those, who have since lived under the Light of the Gospel, and have known and found this meat and drink to be no other than those spiritual emanations of Truth and Love, which we all receive, or may receive, from CHRIST OUR COMMON SAVIOUR.