e my
good luck, and listen to the words of the tempter?"

My dear friends, this is the way in which thousands have talked, in which
thousands talk to this day. This is the spirit which ends in breaking up
society, as happened in France eighty years ago, in the inward corruption
of a nation, and at last, in outward revolution and anarchy, from which
may God in His mercy deliver us and our fellow-countrymen, and the
generations yet to come. But any nation or any man, will only be
delivered from it, as Joseph was delivered from it, by saying, "I fear
God." No doubt it is most natural for a man who is injured and opprest
to think in that way. Most _natural_--just as it is most natural for the
trapped dog to struggle vainly, and, in his blind rage, bite at
everything around him, even at his own master's hand when it offers to
set him free. And if men are to be mere children of nature, like the
animals, and not children of grace and sons of God, like Joseph, and like
one greater than Joseph, then I suppose they must needs tear each other
to pieces in envy and revenge, for there is nought better to be done. But
if they wish to escape from the misery and ruin which envy and revenge
bring with them, then they had better recollect that they are not
children of nature, but children of God--they had best follow Joseph's
example, and say, "I fear God."

For this poor, betrayed, enslaved lad had got into his heart something
above Nature--something which Nature cannot give, but only the
inspiration of the Spirit of God gives. He had got into his heart the
belief that God's laws were sacred things and must not be broken, and
that whatever befel him he must fear God. However unjust and lawless the
world looked, God's laws were still in it, and over it, and would avenge
themselves, and he must obey them at all risks. And what were God's laws
in Joseph's opinion?

These--the common relations of humanity between master to servant, and
servant to master; between parent to child, and child to parent; brother
to brother and sister to sister, and between the man who is trusted and
the man who trusts him. These laws were sacred; and if all the rest of
the world broke them, he (Joseph) must not. He was bound to his master,
not only by any law of man, but by the Law of God. His master trusted
him, and left all that he had in his hand, and to Joseph the law of
honour was the law of God. Then he must be justly faithful to his
master