to Abraham, should, in substance, and in a manner equally effectual for the trial of his principles, be put also to Joseph; namely, whether he loved and feared God supremely or not, and would take Him for his Master, renouncing the world, the flesh, and the devil, for his sake.

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All this was, in fact, submitted to Joseph's decision by the profligate wife of Potiphar, when she would have tempted him to adultery; and you have heard his answer. Behold," he says to her, "my master wotteth not what is with me in the house, and he hath committed all that he hath to my hand; there is none greater in this house than I; neither hath he kept back any thing from me but thee, because thou art hist wife: how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" And afterwards, when she renewed her base solicitations, he would neither "hearken to her," nor "be with her." At length, therefore, she became convinced that she could not prevail with him; and then her wicked passions took a new direction. Hatred, and the desire of revenge, possessed her. She accused Joseph falsely, and he was cast into prison. But there also God was with him, and you know how the history concludes. God took care for the clearing of his character; and what happened to him whilst he lay in bondage, prepared the way for his becoming ruler over all the land of Egypt, and the preserver also of his father and his brethren.

I do not mean, however, to pursue the particulars of the history at present, but shall confine myself to such instructions as may be drawn from what has been now rehearsed, and to the inferences arising out of them.

I. And, first, I think the history of Joseph's faithfulness may teach us what course to take, in dependence upon God's grace, for resisting temptation.

Temptations are to be expected by every body.

We must, the Apostle tells us, through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God. The very Captain of our salvation was made perfect in this way; "Though he were a son, yet learned he obe

dience by the things which he suffered '." Much more then may we expect the same. For in us there is a rebellious will to be mastered, an evil heart to be purified, and an old nature to be put off. There is in us also a readiness to bring evil out of good: and when by grace we have been in some low degree successful in our warfare, to become proud and self-sufficient, as if we had not only done great things, but done them also in our own strength. And therefore, ordinarily, we need repeated trials, and continual exercise, and many clear calls to us to let our souls still wait upon God, and to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, before we can be brought to that submissive, humble, and depending state, which befits us best, and before our characters can be fully formed, and the new man be raised up in us, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

The tempter, moreover, will take if he can, and God oftentimes will permit him to take all advantages, to make the temptation the greater, and to render it such as may be peculiarly fitted to ensnare us.

Joseph's time of life; the opportunities which Satan's agent had; her importunity, and the difficulty of getting out of her way; the licentious manners of the times, perhaps, and probably the light way in which sin might be regarded and spoken of in that heathen country; all this aggravated his peril. And whatever be the special nature of our trials, God may permit, and often does permit, that there should be attendant circumstances, which by a dishonest mind may be regarded as very plausible excuses for evil compliances, if not as absolute justifications of it, so that we may deceive ourselves into the persuasion that we are excusable, even though we fall.

Nevertheless, which is the main point to be considered, victory is always possible, and grace sufficient. "God is faithful," saith the Apostle, "who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able, but

1 Heb. v. 8.

will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it 2." He provides the means; it rests with ourselves, his Spirit helping us, to make use of them.

Here it is that Joseph may instruct us: and let us now attend to him.

Joseph then was proof against temptation, first, because he was prepared and forearmed.

He was evidently, in the first place, a man of business; one who was constantly occupied in the duties. of his station; and, assuredly, there is nothing which more tends to keep man out of mischief than God's ordinance of labour and fit employment. We are all saved from commission of iniquity in millions of instances, simply by having something else to do: and much more when we make a conscience of discharging the duties of our calling statedly and punctually as unto the Lord. But the idle are destitute of such good defences, so that the tempter finds them as a city broken down and without walls. And this applies very particularly to the class of sins which the history under review brings to our thoughts. It was in an idle hour that David was tempted to uncleanness; had he been as industrious and as honestly occupied as Joseph, he might have been preserved as well as he.

Besides this, however, Joseph was forearmed in another and still better way, by previous study of divine truth, and habits of communion and intercourse with God. He remembered his Creator in the days of his early youth; his spiritual armour was already on him; he had not his defences to seek when the assault was made; he was in a condition to see through the temptation at once; and there was an indisposition to evil already raised up in him. So he had his arguments of sound reason at hand, familiar to his mind, and producible the moment they were called for; and not having accustomed himself to sin against his conscience, they were not weak through the flesh, as the

2 1 Cor. x. 13.

best reasons are wont to be with so many. Prayer and meditation had strengthened all right resolutions in him, and confirmed his sound opinions, and given them practical force and weight. His duty to God and to his neighbour; the obligation which lay upon him to adorn the doctrine he professed; the wisdom of fearing God rather than man; what were the just demands of gratitude for favours received, and wherein the evil of sin consisted: all this he had weighed and studied; and in his reply to the tempter, it appeared that he had done so. His master Potiphar had honoured, favoured, trusted him, and kept back nothing from him which he could lawfully give him; and he had accordingly himself an instinctive perception and horror of such a base breach of trust as was now suggested to him, and of rendering evil for good to so kind a friend. Three arguments, moreover, he urges upon himself in the text:-" How then can I do this great wickedness," he says, "and sin against God?" I, of all men in the world! Not only was he the last man who should sin against Potiphar, being the most obliged to him; but he was the last, surely, that should sin at all in any wilful way. A professor as he was of the true religion, one who was continually endeavouring to bring others to it, should he give occasion to heathens to blaspheme? He feels and expresses himself much as Nehemiah did, when, upon the proposal made to him to do a cowardly action, he exclaims, " Should such a man as I flee?" This is his first argument. His next is taken from the sense he had of the enormity of the crime:-"How can I do this great wickedness?" Uncleanness, adultery, the light infringement of the marriage-vow, the desecration of God's first institution for the preservation of a godly seed upon the earth; was it possible that he could consent to this? If God's word was plain in any thing, and natural conscience clear in any thing, it was so here. If there was any thing which God did indisputably abhor, and had

3 Neh. vi. 11.

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testified against by word and deed; if there was any thing which the world knew by dreadful experience, to be the parent of misery and ruin, surely here it was. How could he do this? Such is his second argument. The last is taken from his knowledge of Him whom all sin offends. How could he sin against God? Did not God see him? Was it not against his law, and against his nature too? a thing utterly hateful to his purity? Should not such as loved God hate evil? and if any body had cause to love God, was not Joseph the man? For had not God loved him, and been as truly a Father to him as He was by right a Master. And should he be unmindful of these relations? David remembered all this when he had committed sin; and, therefore, he says in his penitential Psalm, Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight;" . . . . and "justified" art thou therefore, he confesses, "when thou speakest," that is, to condemn me. But Joseph's happiness was, that he remembered it when the sin was proposed to him; and this kept him upright.

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The first thing, then, which Joseph teaches us with reference to temptation is, that we are not to wait till it actually comes. We are forewarned that it may come any day: wherefore we must take unto ourselves every day, the whole armour of God; have the shield of faith habitually before us, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, ever in hand; and watch unto prayer continually; for no otherwise can we withstand in the evil day, or when the trial is actually arrived.

II. This however cannot prevent trials, though it will go far to secure from falls. Look we next, therefore, to Joseph's behaviour in the conflict itself.

Three things are noted, by which under God he gained and secured the victory; and I will take them in the order in which the history delivers them.

First, when the wicked proposal was made to Joseph,

4 Ps. li. 4.