Editor's reflections.--Lorenzo writes to President Richards.--Completed Translation of the Book of Mormon.--Visits Paris.--Pleasure of meeting Saints.--Condition of the people.--Goes to Geneva.--Degradation of woman.--Meets Elder Stenhouse.--Interesting meetings.--At Lausanne.--Professor Reta.--Benefit of Elder Taylor's French publications. There are many passages in human life, wherein, by close and careful observation and reflection--silently watching the results of the course and doings of others, we may learn by their experience. There are many others which can only be learned by individual, personal acquaintance. When contemplating the life of my brother as a missionary abroad in stranger lands, unacquainted with the manners and customs of the people, and ignorant of their languages and dialects, with the responsibility of the salvation of souls to whom he is sent resting upon him, in connection with the fulness of the Gospel of the Son of God committed unto him, it seems that he has to do with some of the realities of life, of which no one can form a just conception except in the school of experience. It would seem that the most indifferent reader must feel an interest in these gigantic movements of my brother--this broad platform for missionary work--a parallel of which is not to be found on record, either ancient or modern. An all-absorbing devotion to the cause he was seeking to promote must have possessed the soul and inspired the mind of Lorenzo in generating this broad missionary platform, and a corresponding self-abnegation must have reigned supremely over all selfish, personal considerations. Let it be remembered that at this time he had a home with all its endearments, in the midst of the Saints of God gathered in the Great American Desert, in the midst of the Rocky Mountains of the West; and in that home a loving family, where he knew that the little one ones were lisping his name, and daily missing their loving father's knee; but with him all was laid on the altar for the interest of the Kingdom of God and the salvation of the souls of men. Paris, January 6, 1852. _Dear President Richards_: After a very boisterous and stormy passage over the Channel, with its usual unpleasant accompaniments, I am quietly and agreeably cloistered with Elder Bolton, together with a number of interesting and intelligent Saints, and begin to think that my homeward journey of some twenty-five or thirty thousand miles is now commenced. Before leaving London, I had completed the translation of the Book of Mormon, and got the printing forward to the last hundred pages. Elder Joseph Richards, whom I appointed to a mission to Calcutta, to assist Elder Willis, left London a few days before my departure. I repose much confidence in this brother, as one who will magnify his calling and do much towards establishing the Gospel in that country.