all, and whose tender mercies are over all his works. (Psalm cxlv. 9.) "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits!" (Psalm ciii. 2.)
April Twenty-first.
JOSEPH AND POTIPHAR'S WIFE.
"How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?"—Gen. xxxix. 9.
THAT "the Lord was with Joseph," all the facts and incidents of his life tend to show. Honour, religion, integrity, innocence, and worth, must ultimately triumph over all difficulties, and become prosperous and happy in the end. The impure desire of Potiphar's wife consisted in endeavouring to entice Joseph to commit adultery with her. This temptation he repelled with a firm dignity of soul. The Lord was with Joseph, and therefore the Divine law, "thou shalt not commit adultery," was with him. He baffled the tempter and conquered the temptation, by saying to her, in the language of our motto, "How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" It is called sin against God, because in Scripture, marriage is compared to heaven, and adultery to hell.
Marriage is a source of all that is happy and blissful in time and eternity; adultery, of all that is profane, base, and wretched. A miracle was performed at a marriage-feast, but none can be wrought at the revellings of adultery. "The Lord is a swift witness against adulterers." (Mal. iii. 5.) Marriage, to be pure and heavenly, is the union of two congenial minds, whose chaste love each to the other increases and becomes more permanent as time rolls on. The
