like Mark, he wrote, not what he had seen or heard, but what was delivered to him by others, especially by St. Paul, whom he accompanied in his travels. St. Luke was for several years the companion of St. Paul: and many ancient writers consider this Gospel to have had the sanction of St. Paul, as St. Mark's had that of St. Peter'. Considering that we owe to St. Luke so large a portion of that Sacred Volume which is the source of our hope and of our instruction in all truth, our information concerning him is exceedingly small, if we lay aside the uncertain traditions preserved by the early Christian writers. He is not once heard in any of the Gospels, and is only mentioned by name in his own Acts of the Apostles as Lucius of Cyrene, an elder of the Church of Antioch. From his using the first person plural in speaking of Paul and his party at Troas, we learn that he was there with that Apostle; but we do not know how long previously, or where, he had joined him. As he continues occasionally to employ the same form of expression, we gather that he accompanied Paul in his subsequent travels in Greece, after which he proceeded with him to Jerusalem, was present at the transactions which then took place; and that he attended the Apostle when sent as a prisoner to Rome, in consequence of Archbishop Sumner and Bishop Tomline.

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his appeal to Cæsar, and remained with him during his imprisonment in the imperial city. This last circumstance we know from Paul himself, who, in his Epistles from Rome to distant churches, mentions Luke as one whose greetings he sent to them. In the second Epistle to Timothy, St. Paul states, that, of all his fellow-labourers, none remained with him except Luke; and in the Epistle to Philemon he is named as Lucas, a fellow-labourer again with Antiochus. The Scriptures contain no later information of him than this ".

There was among the ancients a difference of opinion respecting the priority of the two Gospels of St. Mark and St. Luke; and it must be acknowledged to be a very doubtful point. The publication of St. Luke's Gospel is placed in the year 63, soon after St. Paul's release from imprisonment at Rome. From the preface to this Gospel we may conclude that the previous histories of our Saviour therein referred to must have been inaccurate and defective, or St. Luke would not have undertaken this work. It seems most probable that it was published in Greece for the use of Gentile converts, as it is to be observed that the Evangelist has inserted many explanations, particularly concerning the Scribes and Pharisees, which he would have omitted if he had been writing for those who

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were acquainted with the customs and sects of the Jews.

§ 4. St. John.-St. John the Evangelist was, as we learn from Matthew and Mark, the son of Zebedee and Salome, and the brother of James the Elder. His father, whose occupation the sons also followed, was a fisherman of Bethsaida, on the lake of Tiberias. It is thought that he was, at first, a disciple of John the Baptist, because, in giving a particular account of the two disciples who heard their master point out Jesus as the Lamb of God, and followed Him, St. John himself names Andrew as one of them, and does not name the other. It has been accordingly inferred that John himself was the other. Yet, had this been so, he must subsequently have returned home again'; for, although John has not recorded any further circumstance of his own call by Jesus, we learn from the three other Evangelists that it took place when he and his brother were fishing upon the sea of Galilee, and early in our Saviour's ministry. It is generally believed that John was the youngest of the Apostles, and some conceive him to have been about the same age as his Lord. Whatever his age may have been, however, it is certain that he became a most attached and faithful follower of Jesus, who appears to have regarded him with peculiar

favour and affection; as, whilst the Evangelist modestly suppresses his own name, he frequently speaks of himself as " the disciple whom Jesus loved." He was present at several scenes from which most of the other disciples were excluded, and at the Last Supper he sat next to Jesus, and "leaned on his bosom," on which occasion even St. Peter motioned him to ask a question, which he did not like to propose himself. Although he fled with the other disciples, when his Lord was taken in the garden, he yet followed at a distance, entered the palace of the high priest, and was present at the scene of judgment; he also was present at the crucifixion of his beloved Master, who there distinguished him by committing his mother to his care and affection. When the women brought the report of the resurrection, he was the first to reach the spot, of all the Apostles; and he was a witness to all the interesting circumstances that occurred between that event and the Ascension. Jesus foretold of him that he should survive the destruction of Jerusalem; and, by implication, as opposed to the violent death foretold to Peter, that he should die a natural death'.

St. John continued to preach the Gospel at Jerusalem for some time, was imprisoned with St. Peter and the other Apostles, and at last was banished to Patmos, where he wrote the

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Revelation. This is all the account given of St. John in the Scriptures; but it is certain that he lived for a considerable time at Ephesus, and that he planted churches at Smyrna, Pergamos, Laodicea, and many other places. After his return from his banishment at Patmos, he returned to Ephesus, and died there at an advanced age, in the year of our Lord 100. An opinion has prevailed that he was, by order of the Emperor Domitian, thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil at Rome; but this appears to deserve little credit, since it is not mentioned by those ecclesiastical writers who have related the sufferings of other Apostles'.

It is universally agreed that St. John published his Gospel in Asia, and that when he wrote it he had seen the other three. It is, therefore, not only valuable in itself, but also a tacit confirmation of them, since it disagrees with none of them in any material point. The time of the publication of this Gospel is fixed by the most eminent writers to about the year 97. Many explanations of Hebrew customs occur in his Gospel, which, although they have also been observed in those of St. Mark and St. Luke, have been thought to denote that when St. John wrote, many more Gentiles, and of more distant countries, had been converted to Christianity. The other Gospels had been Bishop Tomline.

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