The living or written testimony of those who have been actively engaged in the great latter-day {115} work will ever have a weight far superior to any given by inimical or disinterested parties. Still, the descriptions given and the historical facts and incidents related by such persons are often highly interesting as furnishing glimpses of scenes and facts unmentioned by more prominent actors. For example, the discourse delivered by Thomas L. Kane before the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, throws a flood of light upon the manners and customs of the Latter-day Saints and the scenes attending their expulsion from Nauvoo, which no history of the Church has exceeded; and this is all the more valuable as it corroborates many of the statements made by the Saints. So in like manner there are many references made by secular writers which throw light on New Testament history, and by this light we see a new beauty and force in the language of the inspired writers. No man of sense will for a moment hesitate to acknowledge the superiority of the narratives written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, to any merely human composition. The biographies of the Savior, written by Fleetwood and others bear no comparison to the simple, yet sublime records of the evangelists. But it does not militate against the authority of the scriptures to read a description of the personal appearance of the Savior as described by Marcus, a Roman lawyer who resided at Jerusalem, and still preserved in the works of Origen: {116} "Jesus of Nazareth, sometimes called the Galilean, was a most remarkable person. In stature He was above the medium hight, straight and tall. His complexion was fair: His hair was of a brown color, and fell in heavy curls upon His shoulders. His eyes were blue, and possessed such a penetrating power that no man could meet His gaze. His beard was of a deep wine color, fine and full: it is said that He was never shaved. His countenance was majestic, calm and serene, bearing the impress of wisdom, justice and love." Again, we have the testimony of Josephus, the celebrated Jewish historian who flourished between the thirty-seventh and ninety-eighth year of the Christian era. He was a Jewish priest and had no connection with the early saints; yet in the _History of the Antiquities of the Jews, Book xviii_, he declares: