"INNOCENT vices"-there are none. There are wrongs which persons may commit against themselves, and the observer says: "Well, he is only injuring himself, and if he will do so it is nobody's business, so long as he does not interfere with hers." I assume that this is a mistake, and one to be avoided. Man has no right to self-debasement of any kind, either mental or physical.

Some have excused their indulgences in vice and ruinous habits, with the idea that they injure no one but themselves; but this is a false conclusion, a deceitful, if not wicked perversion of truth. Man is but a link in the great chain of humanity, and he cannot do that which shall destroy the efficiency of that relation which he sustain to others, without incurring penalties that must be endured, peradventure, by the generations to come. Sin and the violation of the laws of life are not to be excused in anyone. All the energy of man's powers, mentally, physically or spiritually, should be secured to the generations following. It is their lawful inheritance, and should be transmitted to posterity in all the excellence, purity and divinity that man is capable of possessing. It is their right, a right of which they must not be deprived; cannot be, without violating an eternal compact of endless lives.

Ignorance of the eternal purpose and relation that man sustains to his fellowman, especially to his generations after him, is a fruitful, but inexcusable cause of much of the human frailty exhibited by sensual man.

The parent acknowledges his duty to educate, and implant in the minds of his children every principle of intelligence that can serve to qualify them for the realities of life. Of how much more inimportance it should be to endow that child with both physical and mental endowments, which are to be transmitted in the conception of the being, and are not otherwise acquired!

There is a higher relation, a higher obligation than that which is earthly, and the vicious qualities of one being should never become the inheritance of another.

A man has no more right to entail vicious propensities upon another by generation, than he has by education. When a man can habituate himself to profanity and lying (twin vices), to drunkenness, and the criminalities so prevalent in our professed Christian communities of enlightened notions, he has no right to posterity through which to perpetuate his sinful, God-defy ing career, in violation of every covenant by virture of which he holds any relation to the immortal, eternal and Divine.

Example is a great educator. Let a child know that his father can swear, curse, drink, and smoke without any compunctions of conscience, and that child's road is clear to infamy and disgrace, and the responsibility will be placed to the father's account. Α mother's influence, though more genial and consistent with the right, may not be sufficient to overcome, by precept, the force of example.

No mother should be under the necessity of assuming the opposite of a father's example, in doing her duty to her children. To thus antagonize father and mother, husband and wife, is a violation of the marital relation. Discord and strife ensue, and the relation that was in the councils of the just, devised as an eternal union, becomes undesirable, ofttimes unbearable, and is dissolved; all in consequence of the persistent vicious habits of the father-man. What a fearful debt such a man owes to justice! And what a woeful fact that the debt must be paid!

While the faith of the people may not generally seem to be impaired, vices creep in among them, and in some instances become so common, and are so freely indulged in without reproof or restraint, that they are looked upon as innocent, as without criminal liability; while in fact they are vices not to be tolerated—are directly in violation of law, or God's word and will, revealed for man's exaltation, and without observance of which none can be fully justified. He that offends in the least, may be adjudged guilty of all, if he turn not therefrom, for sin lieth at his door.

To those who are believers in the revelations of God to man, through his Prophet, Joseph Smith, I would invite special attention to the almost universally prevailing habit of using tobacco. Many who make such profession, both old and young, are completely enslaved by the filthy, abominable practice of either smoking or chewing this detestable weed, with which the earth and humanity are cursed. In the beginning, God, the Creator, forbade the use of one of the fruits of the garden by man. This, designed to be test of man's integrity to his Father's instructions, resulted in disobedience and punishment.

God has forbidden the Saints, in our day, the use of tobacco. He has said "it is not for the body, neither for the belly, and is not good for man;" while thousands who profess to be Saints, declare by their practice in the constant use of it, that it is good for man, and they will not do without it. The practice of one is directly opposite to the declaration of the other. There is a lie somewhere, and who is guilty of it? It becomes a very serious matter when we read that all liars shall have their part in the lake that burneth, while it is also written that "it is impossible for God to lie."

It is clear from this evidence that judgment must be rendered against him who is guilty of both the lie and the practice, even though he professes to be a Saint, and deliberately refuses to live by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. This he is commanded to do, and a persistent violation of law is sin, the wages of which is death. The fact that man may and does become a slave to such a deleterious weed, should be enough to cause him to shun it as he would the serpent of death. This most filthy, disgusting habit, to which so many have become abandoned, is as universally abhorred by sensitive woman, as it is entirely repugnant to the more sensitive nature of the Holy Spirit of promise, to those who are obedient.

Youthful reader, let me urge you to refrain from all that God has forbidden, and take delight in reforming, by your

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example as well as precept, those who have so freely indulged in the many habits and vices that prevail, as to look upon them as being innocent to the present life of man and to his future happiness, while they are in fact the subtle tempter leading him to degradation and misery.

Be admonished to go not in the way of the unbeliever nor approve the pernicious habits of the Gentiles, who have so far departed from the right, that their cup is full, and their day of grace is virtually passed; but remember that God has purposed to raise up a peculiar people, by calling out of Babylon those who are willing to forsake her ways, follies, vices, and sins, and walk in His paths, where all who will may find peace.

We live in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation; a generation so intensely given up to sensualities, that they are almost wholly lost to spiritualities. We live in a day that is dark with unbelief, full of deceit, when every man is seeking his own and not another's good; when greed, sensual indulgence, and appetites have no bounds; and in the last, the eleventh hour of that day, the last call is made for man to reform his ways, and bring all his desires in subjection to the laws of life; both the temporal and the spiritual life of man. To accomplish this the dark ways of unbelief must be abandoned, and that which is of God

the light of life-must be sought after, the voice and words of wisdom must be listened to, and be faithfully observed

turning away from all the evil propensities of humanity, and from the ways in which the Gentile nations have corrupted themselves, and walking in that narrow way which only a few ever find, that leads to a knowledge of God, the fountain of all life.

The Apostle has truly said in holy writ, that of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought into bondage. If by the lusts of the flesh and much wantonness, a man becomes the servant of corruption, by practicing that which is sensual, in gratifying the tastes, desires, or passions, he' shall utterly perish in his own corruption. To save man from

"Not of the material kind whose vision is probably outlined on the retina of your mind's eye, my good Abdar," returned the drawling tones of one of his companions. "I doubt if the preciousness of the discovery of a rare bit of old English autobiography in the heart of a desert supposed to have been trodden, until recently, only by the feet of camels, horses, sheep and barbarians, will be apparent to your guileless imagination; but the wealth it will furnish to delvers in mines of Haggard-ian literature can only be expressed by the hyperbolic language of an Arabian Night's tale."

Abdar's target-like eyes, in answer to this, took on the mystified glare which it was Greyton's unfailing pleasure to behold, and the latter once more devoted his attention to the parchment.

a

The two Englishmen were of a party who had started from Constantinople with the purpose of exploring the country east of the Taurus Mountains, a trip incited by the works of a French savant on the subject of archæological treasures, existing in some of the ancient Saracenic towns-one of which contained tomb bearing inscriptions and carvings as interesting and beautiful as those which had been discovered at Susa. It was Danvers, Greyton's friend and companion, who was greatly interested in archæological studies, to whom their present journey was owing; the latter accompaning him more for the novel experience promised, than for an interest in the object of the expedition. The worthy professor who set out with them having found material to interest him at Komo, the two friends, not wishing to bury themselves in the small town during the time it would take for his investigations, decided to go on to the valley of Ulbeck, which possessed not only the noted

The professor had insisted upon lending them the Turkish interpreter, who had been chartered for the expedition, and whose knowledge of dialects, picked up in his trips made with other travelers, rendered his services invaluable for the expedition. The savant before mentioned had been Abdar's first patron, and since then all travelers were to him "messieurs," and his manner of expressing this title alone, endowed its recipients with the prestige of distinction. They had been traveling with relays of horses and donkeys through the widely scattered villages lying along the western slope of the mountains, and now found themselves, in the noon hour of an August day, near the northern end of the circle of mountains which enclosed the vale of Ulbeck. The entrance to the valley still lay some miles further south, and, attracted by the shade of a cave, which opened in the steep slope of the mountain, they had dismounted, ordering Abdar to unpack the donkeys, intending to remain here until sundown, when the remainder of their journey might be made with more comfort. The cave which they entered seemed to extend far back into the mountain, though they made no effort to explore its recesses, contenting themselves with the grateful shelter afforded by the large compartment near its opening After luncheon, while Danvers, stretched out upon the floor, was enjoying his cigar, Greyton penetrated a short distance into the rear darkness, subjecting the walls of the cave to a careful mineralogical inspection. Lighting a match to search for a loose piece of the rock, which he might secure for a specimen, his eyes suddenly fell upon an object which caused his careless glance to change to one of alert interest. In a small cavity into which he had plunged the slender flame of his match, was a small iron box, rusted and time-stained, and bearing the appearance of having been undisturbed for centuries. Lifting