enchantment over the scene was there.
In ancient times the festivals of Christians in Laodicea had been
regulated in the spirit of the command of Jesus, as recorded by Luke,
whose classical Greek had made his the established version in Asia
Minor. "And thou, when thou makest a feast, call not thy friends and thy
kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors, lest they also bid thee, and a
recompense be made thee. But when thou makest a feast, call the poor,
and the maimed, and the lame, and the blind, and thou shalt be blessed;
for they cannot recompense thee, but thou shalt be recompensed at the
resurrection of the just."

That very day, before the entertainment, had this passage been quoted in
the ears of the family by Cleon, the youngest son, who, different from
all his family, had cherished in his bosom the simplicity of the old
belief.

"How ridiculous! how absurd!" had been the reply of the more thoughtless
members of the family, when Cleon cited the above passage as in point to
the evening's entertainment. The dark-eyed mother looked reproof on the
levity of the younger children, and decorously applauded the passage,
which she said had no application to the matter in hand.

"But, mother, even if the passage be not literally taken, it must mean
_something_. What did the Lord Jesus intend by it? If we Christians may
make entertainments with all the parade and expense of our heathen
neighbors, and thus spend the money that might be devoted to charity,
what does this passage mean?"

"Your father gives in charity as handsomely as any Christian in
Laodicea," said his mother warmly.

"Nay, mother, that may be; but I bethink me now of two or three times
when means have been wanting for the relieving of the poor, and the
ransoming of captives, and the support of apostles, when we have said
that we could give no more."

"My son," said his mother, "you do not understand the ways of the
world."

"Nay, how should he?" said Thalia, "shut up day and night with that old
papyrus of St. Luke and Paul's Epistles. One may have too much of a good
thing."

"But does not the holy Paul say, 'Be not conformed to this world'?"

"Certainly," said the elder; "that means that we should be baptized, and
not worship in the heathen temples."

"My dear son," said his mother, "you intend well, doubtless; but you
have not sufficient knowledge of life to estimate our relations to
society. Entertainments of this sort are absolutely necessary to sust