The unity of the body is a turning-point with loose brethren; many brethren may not have learned it, but with the loose brethren it is a necessity to deny it. It makes an essential difference of the true position of the saints. Those loose had long been drifting there; the annihilation question brought it to a point, because some would, some would not have them. It was what brought me out and put me where I am, and made the difference of leaving the National system, not a point objected to as a dissenter, but on the positive real ground of the church of God united to the Head—the real ground of God's assembly formed by the Holy Ghost. The doctrine of the House came out much later: but 1 Cor. 10-12 formed the basis of the ground I came out to; Matt. 18 giving the practical feasibility of it now. All my Swiss controversies, for it was there I had them, turned on this point -the dissenters, semi-brethren, there rejecting it.
San Francisco,
June, 1876.