Joseph. She felt herself deeply mortified, and her infamous desires becoming changed into other equally sinful passions, she burnt to destroy him. She accused him to Potiphar as if he had been the offender against his honour, and herself the innocent person, and thereby had him cast into prison. But his almighty friend and protector did not leave him nor forsake him. "The Lord was with Joseph, and shewed him mercy, and gave him favour in the sight of the keeper of the prison." Now all places and persons are just what the Lord pleases to make them. We see, and unhappily we often think too, of nothing but the instrument or second cause. But we should learn in this as in all things, to walk by faith and not by sight, and to feel that it is the influence of God's spirit on the hearts of others which makes them kind to us. This will not subtract one particle of gratitude which we are bound to feel towards them; while it will also make us to give the glory and praise to God, and teach us to rely on his care and to feel ourselves safe while we conscientiously serve

him. As therefore it had previously been with Potiphar, so was it again with the keeper of the prison. This person, seeing the prudence and integrity of Joseph, soon learned to value and trust him, so that he "committed to Joseph's hand all the prisoners that were in the prison, and whatever they did there, he was the doer of it. The keeper of the prison looked not to any thing that was under his hand, because" (here is the invisibly-working cause of all) "the Lord was with him that which he did, the Lord made it to prosper." Thus we find that this favoured person, wherever he is, soon becomes invested with authority. It was so in Potiphar's family, it is so here in the prison, and soon we shall see him exercising it over the whole land of Egypt. The favour of the Lord maketh great, when it so pleaseth him, and he can take whom he will as it were from the dunghill, and set him with the princes of the people.

pose that dignities or

Yet let us not sup

wealth are always

tokens of his favour. Ah! no. They are often bestowed upon the most unworthy of

men, and his greatest enemies. They then become snares and traps by which they are taken and fall. They prove occasions of pride, oppression, or sensuality, and thus increase the guilt, and accelerate the final ruín, of their possessors. Let us seek the blessing and favour and presence of God, and then in whatever state we are as to the circumstances of this world, we may be therewith content.

In furtherance of the purposes of the almighty God towards Joseph, the chief butler and the chief baker of the King of Egypt were, for some offence against him, committed to the very same prison into which Joseph had been cast, and they also were given into his care. Now it so happened-not without the Lord-that each of these persons dreamed a dream, of which I trust you remember the particulars, and if not, read them at your leisure in the fortieth chapter. Joseph was enabled, by the teaching of God, to interpret the dream of each, and he forewarned them, that the chief butler would in three days be restored to his office,

I

but that the chief baker would in the same time be hanged on a tree; and as he foretold to them, so it came to pass. In a very affecting manner Joseph intreated the kind remembrance and good offices of the butler, when he should again be in favour with Pharaoh. "Think on me," he says, "when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness pray thee unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me out of this house." I think we must all of us here remember a very similar request preferred under circumstances similar in some respects, but very different in others. Do you not seem to see your Saviour and the penitent thief hanging together on the cross? And do you not seem to hear the latter saying, "Lord remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom?" That man saw in faith the approaching exaltation and glory of the then suffering and even dying Saviour, and he prayed to be remembered with mercy and grace. He was not forgotten; for the gracious answer instantly proceeded out of the mouth of Jesus, This day shalt thou be

with me in paradise." Although he could not say as Joseph, "For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews: and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon;" although he acknowledged that he suffered justly, and that Jesus only had done no wrong, yet where sin had abounded, grace did much more abound; and in that wondrous hour did Jesus make a most striking memorial of his willingness and power to save even one of the chief of sinners, coming to him in penitence and faith.

But see the difference between God and man. "Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him." Oh! base ingratitude! We are all ready to cry out against the man, and to think him a monster of inhumanity. But hold, brethren, and restrain your indignation, lest in accusing another, you should condemn yourselves: or if indignation must be excited, let it be directed against an object nearer home; for the directed remonstrance of Nathan to David, "Thou art the man," may apply to