and SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST, and his APOSTLES, &c. 309 4e'§tJtiCtirC101W10-23,zz',104V5te5tr4' St. L U K E, the EVANGELIST. ST. Luke was born at Antioch, the metropolis of Syria, a city celebrated for the pleafantnefs of it's fituation, the fertility of it's foil, the riches of it's com- merce, the wifdom of it's fenate, and the civility and politenefs of it's inhabitants, by the pens of fome of the greateft ora- tors of thofe times. It was eminent for fchools of learning, which produced the molt renowned mailers in the arts and fciences ; fo that being born, as it were, in the lap ofthe mufes, he could not well fail ofacquiring an ingenious and liberal education : but he was not contented with the learning of his own country, he tra- velled for improvement into feveral parts of Greece and Egypt, and became parti- cularly {killed in phyfc, which he made his profefíion. They who would, from this particular, infer the quality of his birth and fortune, feem to forget that the healing art was, in thefe early times, generallypraltifed by fervants ; and hence Grotius is ofopinion, that St. Luke was carried to Rome, and lived there a fervant to fome noble family, in quality of phyfician : but after obtain- ing his freedom, he returned intohis own country, and probably continued his pro- feffion till his death, it being fo highly confiftent with, and in many cafes fubfer- vient to, the care of fouls. He is alto fa- mous for his {kill in another art, namely, painting, and an ancient infcription was found in a vault near the church of St. Maria de Via Lata, at Rome, fuppofed to have been the place where St. Paul dwelt, . which mentions a .pid-ture of the bleffed Virgin, UNA LX vii. AB LUCA DEPICTÍS, being one of the feven painted by St. Luke. No. 26. it is not certainly knownwhen St. Lukë became a Chriflian, after having been Jewifh profelyte : thofe who underftand him in the beginning of his gofpel, to fay that he had the falls from the 'reports of others, who were eyewitneffes, fup- pofe him tohave been converted by St: Paul, and that he learned the hiflory of his gofpel from the converfation of tha apoftle, and wrote it under his direllion and that when St. Paul, in one of his epiftles, fays, according to my gofpel, hé means this of St. Luke, which he Pyles his, from the great fhare he had in it's compofition. They, on the other hand, who hold that he wrote his gofpel from his own perfonal knowledge, obferve, that he could not receive it from St. Paul, at ata eye-witnefs of the matters contained in it, becaufe all thofe matters were tranfalled before his converfron ; and that he never law our Lord, before he appeared to hint in his journey to Damafcus, which was fome time after lie. afcended into heaven. Confequently, when St.Paul fays, according to my gofpel, he means no more than that gofpel in general which he preached ; the whole preaching of the apoílles being flyled the gofpel, all having an uniform tendency to inculcate and eftablilh the faith andprallice of the Chriflian religion. But they further obferve, that it is not probable that St. Luke was converted by, St. Paul, becaufe the latter would in that cafe have flyled him his fon, it being the confiant prallice of the apoílles to call all eminent converts by that appellation; but he mentions him by the name of Luke, the' belovedphyfcian. They therefore foppofe, 41? that
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