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“ These are Thy servants who have gathered in this meeting, have turned unto Thy kingdom and are in need of Thy bestowal and blessing. O Thou God! Manifest and make evident the signs of Thy oneness which have been deposited in all the realities of life. Reveal and unfold the virtues which Thou hast made latent and concealed in these human realities.
O God! We are as plants, and Thy bounty is as the rain; refresh and cause these plants to grow through Thy bestowal. We are Thy servants; free us from the fetters of material existence. We are ignorant; make us wise. ”

“ With our bodies, with our minds, with our souls, with all our powers and faculties, with all our intuitions and endeavours, with the science of the sages, with the history of the ages, with the minstrels' chants and the artists' "witcheries," with all these we glorify Thee as the Eternal Reality. In Thee as the all-embracing Unity, we feel unified. ”

“ The quality, hope and destiny of our land is expressed in the phrase of our Fathers, 'E Pluribus Unum'—of many, one—of many States, one Nation—of many races, one people—of many creeds, one faith—of many bended knees, one family of God. ”

“ That is our faith, that is our purpose, that is our cry. Let us try the nation. This it is which has called together these countless numbers of the people to demand a change; and from these gatherings, sublime in their vastness and their resolution, I think I see, as it were, above the hilltops of time, the glimmerings of the dawn of a better and a nobler day for the country and the people that I love so well. ”

“ Let us look at the life of those who live in and for it,—so I say with regard to the religious organisations. Look at the life imaged in such a newspaper as the Nonconformist,—a life of jealousy of the Establishment, disputes, tea-meetings, openings of chapels, sermons; and then think of it as an ideal of a human life completing itself on all sides, and aspiring with all its organs after sweetness, light, and perfection! ”

“ I am he, O my God, who testifieth to Thy unity, who acknowledgeth Thy oneness, who boweth humbly before the revelations of Thy majesty, and who recognizeth with downcast countenance the splendors of the light of Thy transcendent glory. I have believed in Thee after Thou didst enable me to know Thy Self, Whom Thou hast revealed to men’s eyes through the power of Thy sovereignty and might. ”

“ Society was composed then, as now, of every grade and shade of opinion,—from the outspoken tenets of Calvinism to the milder and more poetic sway of that unconscious religious fervor, which captivates and moulds by the consistency of its own life rather than by the profession of creeds. ”

“ Actuated by a single motive, and that motive and that object the building up of the Church and kingdom of God, have this people gathered from among the nations and from the islands of the sea. Should it not rejoice our hearts to meet such characters? Should it not be a matter of pleasure to be associated with such a community, and to have a part and lot in the establishment of truth and righteousness upon the earth. ”

“ I have given these speeches, at length, as an illustration of the spirit and aspirations prevailing in this community, at this time, and as a part of the history of the day. That these aspirations will ever be fully realized may well be doubted; but surely every right thinking friend of humanity will pray that they may be. ”

“ Always in our own Society.—All that is akin to me in nature and history speaks to me, praises me, urges me forward and comforts me—: other things are unheard by me, or immediately forgotten. We are only in our own society always. ”

“ Strive earnestly and zealously for intellectual advancement and moral freedom, in union with your fellow-men,—lend a ready ear to the cries of the needy, enter heartily into the wishes of your fellow-citizens,—and you shall find the Holy Spirit, who shall declare Himself to you—you shall hear Him in the voice, in the call of your people, of your native country! ”

“ I experienced recently, a marked perception of your state, as one in which God took delight, and upon which he had infinite designs, regarding himself and his glory. I saw clearly the state to which God desired to bring you—the means to be used, and the obstacles in the way—the mutual sympathy and confidence he required between us—and the openness and freedom of communication necessary for our mutual benefit, and that we should not hesitate to speak freely of each other's faults. ”

“ This land of ours, consecrated before God to freedom of body, mind and soul, has been to these lowly men the beacon light of a new day in their lives and destinies. Here they came, breathed in the spirit of the free. Some have returned and brought back new strength and new visions. ”

“ Therefore, in the name of humanity, and virtue, and religion,—in the name of the great God, our common Creator and our common judge, we appeal to the nations of Christendom, and earnestly and respectfully ask of them that they will regard us with the sympathy and friendly consideration to which the peculiarities of our condition entitle us, and to extend to us that comity which marks the friendly intercourse of civilized and independent communities. ”

“ How many men are there that can take their families, and gather round the family altar, and all of them bow before the Lord without a jar of feeling, with one perfect unity, every one willing to submit with the most perfect submission to the will of the Lord, as clay in the hands of the potter? ”

“ The wise answer is, that this institution of Religion, like Society, Friendship, and Marriage, comes out of a principle deep and permanent in the constitution of man; that as humble, and transient, and partial institutions come out of humble, transient, and partial wants, and are to be traced to the senses and the phenomena of life; so this sublime, permanent, and universal institution came out from sublime, permanent, and universal wants, and must be referred to the Soul, the religious Faculty, and so belongs among the unchanging realities of life. ”

“ We are assembled here from different nations, having a variety of prejudices, different kinds of education, having imbibed different feelings, notions, and ideas; and we have now come together to learn to bend our minds, to yield our opinions, and not to follow our own notions, not to cling to our peculiar whims and caprices, but to bow to the holy Priesthood, which is the rule of God upon the earth. ”

“ He bids us worship in fearless loyalty to our own faith, but with ever stronger yearning after Union, Brotherhood, and Love; so turning ourselves in Spirit, and with our whole heart, that we may enter more into the mind of God, which is above class, above race, and beyond time. ”

“ A great humanity had assembled, as if at the call of some mysterious voice, and here they were laughing, playing, singing, care-free and happy, without a sign or a sound of discord—all members of a national family, as it were. ”

“ We believe that we, as a body of people, embracing all the various Quorums of this Church and kingdom, are engaged in this one great work; and hence there is a feeling of faith, union, and intensity—or power, if you please—of the Spirit of the living God, that quickens and vivifies the mind, gives energy to the body, and joy to the bosom. In this we all feel to participate. The Lord is here by his Spirit and power, and our hearts are joyful. ”

“ It is true that the resemblances between the modes of life and the bent of thought in the two Worlds are as striking and numerous as their divergences; but this fact is in itself of the highest significance in that it emphasizes that fundamental unity, spiritual as well as physical, which is of the whole human brotherhood. ”

“ Father, says he, keep them in thy name, that they may be one, like as we are! Observe, I beseech you, what a wonderful union Christ requires in his followers; he does not pray that they may be of one mind, but that they may be one; nor does he mention this union in a vague manner, but says, "That they may be one, as we are," who are one and the same in a most perfect, yet unspeakable and inexplicable manner. ”

“ Thus in the union of the soul and body, in the constitution and authority of the human commonwealth, and in the race's natural unity, God holds before us three analogies, which each in some respect, and altogether very largely, illustrate His finished work, to which all natural productions of His providence are subordinate, His work of predilection, His work of unbounded love and sovereign magnificence, the creation of that which is at once the Body, the Kingdom, and the Family of the Incarnate Word. ”

“ He proclaimed the universal brotherhood of mankind; he insisted upon universal justice, and he predicted the triumphs of universal unity. 'Thou shall love,' he said,'the Lord thy God with all thy mind and all thy heart, and all thy soul, and thy neighbour as thyself. ”

“ And if by following the truth now, we shall all be together hereafter in the Society of Prophets, Apostles, Saints, and Martyrs, you know then, Sir, we shall have nothing more to wish for, nothing more to fear; every doubt will be satisfied, every difficulty removed. ”

“ And here no thought is more welcome to Our soul than that happy unity of faith and wills for which our Redeemer and divine Master prayed in that earnest supplication—a unity which, if useful at all times even for temporal interests, both at home and abroad, is shown by the very divisions and confusions of these days to be more than ever needful. ”

“ Above all, I have known the love of the Fatherland, the faith of the humble, handed down at simple hearths,—the will to remain, whatever the cost, French. Well, if I am fated to lie in No-man’s-land, I am honestly thankful to have known life at its simplest, its keenest, and to have served some purpose. ”

“ For the first time in our lives, perhaps, we were in near concord with the Christian concept of Grace. A greater force than convention had pronounced upon us; not we upon ourselves, or either on the other. ”

“ We may well adopt the metaphor of the organizing soul of the Inner Mission: "We must stretch a holy net of love, whose separate threads are already spun, but which waits upon this union for a well-ordered, closely connected whole." ”

“ As Christians, how wide is the prospect which opens before you—how various the claims upon your attention—how vast your capabilities—how deep the responsibility which those capabilities involve! In the first place, you are not alone; you are one of a family—of a social circle—of a community—of a nation. ”

“ Who gathered the embittered together into one society? For they have all one end, a temporal and earthly felicity, for attaining whereof they do all things, though they waver up and down with an innumerable variety of cares. ”

“ That rushing mighty wind filled the whole house in which they were sitting, and they all were filled together with the presence; and as a sign that the old confusion and separation of mankind were in them to be done away, speaking in one tongue the one truth which was evermore to dwell with them, they were heard in all the various languages of the nations present at the feast. “The society by which men are made the one Body of the only Son of God belongs to the Spirit,”96 and He came upon all together in one House to indicate, as He made, that one Body. ”

“ Of the practical results of these changes in the moral sentiments of Society—of which Christianity, which teaches that all men are of one blood and of one family, has been the primary source—and of which the English nation—influenced by the example of a few men of extraordinary piety, wisdom, and humanity, to whom it gave birth in the last generation, have been the most conspicuous instruments—one example may be appropriately introduced in this place. ”

“ No, my brethren, all that we have to do is to say, “All our existing institutions are those under which God has placed us, under which we are to mould our lives according to His will.” It is our duty to vitalize our forms, to throw into them a holier, deeper meaning. ”

“ Thus in the amplitude of love, in the keenness of brotherhood, in the impartiality of truth, in the sincerity of good faith, may we be enabled to live our lives in Thee—transparent as a crystal, deep as the ocean, firm as a rock, yet soft and gentle as the dew that descends to refresh and the light that enters to cheer! May we be Thy servants, worshippers, workers, devotees, consecrated unto Thy purposes, dedicated unto Thy glory, seeking nought but Thy will, working for nought but the weal of Thy children! ”

“ They shall be my people. He will make them his by working in them all the characters and dispositions of his people, and then he will protect, and guide, and govern them as his people. "And, to make them truly, completely, and eternally happy, I will be their God." ”

“ That is, cut off, shut out of fellowship and intimacy. Life is union with God. Through union God's life flows into us. Union is rooted in knowledge and in sympathy, fellow-feeling, a common desire and purpose. ”

“ There we could have heart to heart talks with each other, and bethink ourselves of ways and means, in regard to all matters of national interest,—and with gentle and rustic alike we could hold communion in our own language. ”

“ To the man and his wife it seemed the one link that bound them to civilization—which spoke to them of the great world that they might else well forget. Through the windows they got many a lightning glance of that society they had left. ”

“ Are different from those of our own Nation; besides the want of Personal Conversation, which the Voice of Reason seems to say, should be previous to a married State; much tending to future Amity, and living in Obedience to the sacred Law of God, with great Peace, Satisfaction, and Comfort to their Minds. ”

“ The fact is that the most conscious conceit of people who believe themselves to be chosen, here simulates modesty: in this way they, the Christian community, the "good and the just" place themselves once and for all on a certain side, the side "of Truth"—and the rest of mankind, "the world" on the other.... ”