---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 2
number: 6
published: 1899-04
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "Sacred Lines," *Improvement Era* 2, no. 6 (April 1899): 463.'
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera26unse
  transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers.
  identifier: improvementera26unse
start_page: 463
end_page: 463
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1899-04)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera26unse
  publication_year: 1899
  note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1899, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# Sacred Lines

<!-- page:463 -->

LEGENDARY ANECDOTES OF ST. JOHN.                                 463

legendary myths, but his      life down   through the ages has been a
subject of reviving tradition.
       It is said that he lived in the reign of Trojan.    That would
have made him nearly ninety-eight.         The Chronicon Paschale says
he lived one hundred years and seven months, and pseudo-Chrysostom that he lived one hundred and twenty. Legend said also
that he had been taken alive to heaven like Enoch and Elijah, "and
that sometimes he still wandered and appeared on earth."                     Theodoret the historian tells us that the Emperor Theodsius on the eve
of a terrific battle beheld the Apostle John riding on a white horse.
This    omen Theodoret     interpreted favorably, and the next day's
encounter proved a fortunate one to him.               -It   is   claimed that
Gregory Thaumaturgus saw           him    in   the   fourth       century,    and
Edward the Confessor in the tenth century claimed a similar
privilege, which came perhaps as a reward for his piety.    The
vision which this penitent potentate received is now to be seen
represented on the screen of the Confessor's Chapel in Westminster
Abbey.
       In the early part of the sixteenth century he appeared, so               it

is   claimed, to   King James IV., on the eve of the fatal             battle of
Flodden.     This seems to have been his last visit to the kings and
princes, or else they have been either too           modest to tell of it or
feared their subjects would not believe them if they should tell it.

                                SACRED.

               Deep in each artist's soul some picture lies
               That he will never paint for mortal eyes;

               And every author in his heart doth hold
               Some sad, sweet tale that he will leave untold.
                                                       C. B. Morgan