.

"O, no danger of me being called. They do not want men of my stamp. Well, if I were as well satisfied with religion as Oscar is I might go and preach it."

"Well, Herbert, dear, take his advice and study the gospel, and pray for a testimony of its truth. Nothing in the world would afford me greater happiness than to see you take an interest in the Church."

"Some day, mother, I may 'get religion,' if there is anything in it."

"But do not delay it too long-start now, before it is too late. And you ought to be thinking of getting married before very long. Your brothers and sisters were all married before they reached your age, my son."

"Married! There you go again! Urging marriage! I suppose I am old enough for that-perhaps too old. My married associates tell me they have abandoned me-left me behind to come along with the next generation."

"In your half joking way you confessed to the teachers that you admired Alice Williams. You ought to prove your worthiness for such a girl as she is. Indeed, I think she is one of the best

and sweetest young ladies in the community."

"Do you really think so, mother?

So do I. I may be more

in earnest than you think. I believe she is just handsome and bright and witty. But then she's religious, and won't marry a fellow unless he is the same. Well, I can't blame her."

"Nor I," added Mrs. Melbourne. "She is deserving of a good man, and the best thing for you to do is to attend your meetings and begin to pay your tithing and perform your other duties as I have always pleaded with you in kindness to do."

Herbert said no more upon the subject that night. When he retired to his bed a short time later, he could not sleep. He could not help thinking of the words of those teachers and those of his mother and of Alice. He tried to dismiss the thoughts from his mind, but they would not vanish. He lay awake far into the night pondering in his mind the arguments of his visitors, reviewing his career, and reflecting upon the almost aimless course of life he had been leading for the past few years. True, he had been industrious and temperate, but of what benefit was his life to

the community or to mankind at large? He called to mind his mother's oft-repeated counsel and encouragement. He fully believed that it was through her influence he had been kept free from the deadly evils and temptations of the world. He really loved his mother, his dearest friend on earth, who was ever patient and kind-willing to sacrifice everything, even life itself, for his welfare. He was the idol of her existence. He was her dear "baby;" and since all the others were married and living in their own homes, and her husband was dead, her attentions were mostly confined to him.

The next day the same thoughts haunted him. He could not drive them away. He felt a sense of ingratitude such as he had never experienced before. While he had always sought to be kind to his mother and considerate of her feelings, he had treated her counsel respecting religion, somewhat lightly, not with the least intention of causing her grief, only thoughtlessly. Now he realized that his conduct in this regard was unkind to a parent who manifested everlasting kindness towards him. Hitherto he had justified himself in the thought that he could not force himself to comply with his mother's wishes and be interested in religious matters. If he pretended to be religious, just to please his mother, he knew he would be a hypocrite, and a hypocrite he despised. But now he remembered that his mother never asked more than that he study and investigate her religion. In truth, it never dawned upon him before that there was anything to study about religion. He had regarded it as only a sentiment. Before this visit of the teachers the night before, he had never dreamed that there was logic in religion-that anyone claimed for it a place in rational philosophy, or that it could be harmonized with science. He now promised himself that he would make an attempt, at least, to investigate the gospel. He would not announce this intention, not even to his mother, but would proceed quietly to carry it out. He decided to attend meetings on the Sabbath day, and to read those "Lectures on Faith" found in the Doctrine and Covenants; and further, he decided he would prayyes, he would make an attempt at it-a practice he had neglected. since he was a boy.

TWIN BUTTES, NEAR BLUFF, SAN JUAN COUNTY, UTAH. The Men in the Picture are Bishop Samuel Redd, and Patriarch

Kumen Jones, of Bluff.

ST. PAUL'S COMPANIONS IN ROME.

BY COL. R. M. BRYCE-THOMAS.

Démas.

III.-LUKE.

Another of St. Paul's companions was his biographer, St. Luke, the evangelist. The friendship that existed between these two men was perhaps as remarkable as that between the great Apostle and his son in the faith, Timothy. Both Paul and Luke were doubtless men of education, of a high intellectual order, but while one was the cultivated Jew, the other was the cultivated Gentile. It is evident from the names mentioned by St. Paul in Colossians 4: 10, 11, of those who were of the circumcision, that Luke was not one, his name being coupled subsequently in verse 14 with that of Hence, he must have been a Gentile convert, and Dr. Farrar thinks that there is no reason to reject the unanimous tradition that he was by birth an Antiochene. Dr. John Kitto, in his Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature, tells us that the name Luke is a contracted form of Lucanus, indicating that St. Luke was descended from heathen ancestors; while Dr. Scott, in his Commentary on St. Luke's Gospel, clearly points out that in the Acts of the Apostles the writer (St. Luke) does not say, in "our," but in "their," tongue (Acts 1:49), showing that he could not have been a Hebrew, but a Greek or Gentile. Origen and Epiphanius say that he was one of the seventy disciples of our Lord, but if so he must have been an eye witness of nearly all the facts recorded in his gospel, and to this he himself would seem to give the denial in chapter 1: 12 of the Acts of the Apostles, in which he would appear to suggest that he was merely making a declaration of those things which had been delivered unto him, among others by eye witnesses and ministers of the word. Had he been one of the seventy, he would scarcely have written in this way.

The Apostle calls his friend Luke, "the beloved physician," thus indicating the profession to which he had been educated; and Dr. Farrar thinks that he may have been a freed-man. Some ancient writers credit St. Luke with having been a skilful painter, and the picture of the Madonna which the writer saw over the high altar in the church of Santa Maria del Popolo, in Rome, is one of those attributed to him by the Roman hierarchy.

The Revd. John Healy, LL. D., the author of St. Luke as the Amanuensis of St. Paul, writes thus of the Evangelist:

Assuming that he was a Gentile convert and a physician, we may fairly conclude that the great writers of the ancient world were his study, that he had read the history and witnessed the struggles of different schools of thought, that the artistic refinement of Greece and the broad justice of Rome had both their influence upon him; and we know that, to crown all, he had by his conversion to Christianity learnt all that is most real and true in Judaism itself. The two (Paul and Luke) were as different in their training as men could be, yet, as Christians, they had that in common which united them in the closest bonds of friendship.

When and where, or by whom, St. Luke was converted to Christianity is not known, and he himself does not appear to have alluded to the subject either in his own gospel, or in the Acts of the Apostles; the tradition, however, is that he accepted the faith at Antioch. From the fact that St. Paul never refers to him as his son, as he does in the case of his converts Timothy, Titus, and Onessimus, but merely as "the beloved physician," it is presumed that he was not converted by the great Apostle. St. Luke must have been a Christian before A. D. 57, for it is said that he wrote his gospel some twenty-four years after the ascension of our Lord, and that event occurred, according to Bible chronology, in A. D. 33.

Owing to the nobleness and sweetness of his disposition, St. Paul appears to have had the gift of attracting and drawing to himself many individuals of very diverse temperaments and characters. St. Luke among others was soon brought under his spell, and, notwithstanding the fact that a friendship with the Apostle was at all times fraught with great danger, his faithfulness to Paul was very manifest throughout all that is known of his life. The author of The Saints our Example writes of him thus:

Throughout perils and hardships to which we shall never be exposed, St. Luke stood steadfastly by St. Paul even unto death.