“‘When I look back to the period when we began to publish the news of a coming Saviour, I think it the happiest time of my life. How were our hearts refreshed by the readiness of the dear brethren in Christ to hear, believe, and obey, the simple gospel of the kingdom! With what delight have I, in company with many of the dear, anxious children of God, read and re-read the Scriptures, searched diligently and compared the prophets, Jesus Christ, and his apostles, to see if these things were so! What glorious light I have often seen in that holy book while thus engaged! And with what joy have I taken sweet communion with kindred hearts in the house of God, where our faith was more and more established by the word of his grace; where our prayers were mingled at the same altar, and arose together, as incense, to the mercy-seat of our Redeemer, for a preparation to meet the coming glories, which we then expected shortly to realize; where our hearts burned with love and gratitude to God for the good news of the near approach of the King of kings; where our songs of praise and hallelujahs to the Lamb cheered our drooping spirits, and prepared us more vigorously to pursue our weary pilgrimage to the land of promise, which, from evidence to us conclusive, and which I am not ashamed of, we soon expect to reach! “‘Then, heart beat in unison with heart, soul mingled with soul, and love, holy, heavenly, divine, united us in that oneness of gospel truth, and prejudice and party were dissipated from our thoughts like midnight darkness, or the morning mists by the rising sun. This was a time of love, a time of faith, working by love and purifying the heart. It was this hope, “the blessed hope,” that made us purify ourselves from our sectarian prejudices and bigotry.