Being, as before obferved, a youth of uncommon beauty, his miftrefs could not withftand the attractive graces of his perfon, but tried, by every means in her power, to infpire him with a reciprocal affection. In vain did he combat both her folicitations and her threats. In vain did he point out to her the impropriety of her defiling her husband's bed, and of his abusing the unbounded confidence with which he was honoured by him. The vehemence of her unhappy paffion increased by oppofition, and at laft fo far overpowered her reason, that one day finding herself alone with the object of her defires, the caught him in her arms, and ftrove, by the most bewitching careffes and endearments, to overcome his obduracy. In this infatuating crifis, however, Jofeph, with almost more than mortal forbearance, exerted those virtuous principles which have rendered his name fo famous, and placed him as the most perfect model of chastity for the imitation of fucceeding ages. Instead of yielding to his mistress's defires, he fprung from her embraces; and thinking only how to avoid the impending evil, left his upper garment behind him.

Rage and refentment instantly supplanted

that

And

that affection which had fo fiercely raged in the breaft of the disappointed fair one. fearing that Jofeph, from his deteftation of the crime, fhould betray to her husband the imprudence she had been guilty of, with the ufual fubtlety of the abandoned part of her fex, fhe determined to turn the accidental circumftance of the garment to her advantage. She accordingly alarmed the other fervants; and on their entering the room where fhe was, informed them, with welldiffembled terror, that the Hebrew, in whom her husband fo much confided, had attempted to violate her honour; but on her making refiftance he had fled, leaving the garment which they faw in her hands behind him. This tale fhe likewife related to Potiphar on his return home; who was fo exasperated at Jofeph's prefumption, which he found corroborated by the testimony of his other fervants, that he ordered him to be fent to the prifon in which those belonging to the King's household were ufually confined for any mifdemeanour.

Here Jofeph continued a long time, behaving with so much prudence and difcretion, that the keeper of the prifon treated him with unusual lenity, and committed his fellow

C

fellow-prifoners entirely to his care. During the early part of his confinement, it happened that Pharaoh's chief butler, or cup-bearer, and his chief baker, for fome mifconduct, were fent to this prifon. The former dreamed, one night, that he faw three clusters of ripe grapes hanging from three branches of a vine, which he preffed into a cup, and presented to his royal mafter, who received it from his hands with apparent pleafure. The butler having obferved that Jofeph was penetrating and learned beyond his years, applied to him in the morning for the interpretation of his dream. With his other endowments, God had beftowed on the young Hebrew this faculty; he therefore readily bid the dreamer be of good cheer, for that in three days he fhould be released from his confinement, and be reftored to the King's favour. As the chief butler feemed to receive great confolation from this favourable explanation of his dream, and to be gratefully difpofed towards Jofeph, he afked of him as a boon, that when the completion of it took place, and he confequently returned to his former fituation, he would remember thefe circumftances, and endeavour to obtain his release. Jofeph's fellow-prifoner promifed to do fo; the fequel, however, fhews, that he thought neither of

the

the dream nor of him for a confiderable time.

The fame night the chief baker had a fimilar dream to that of the chief butler, and applied likewife to Jofeph for an interpretation. He thought in his fleep, that he carried three baskets upon his head, two full of loaves, and the third of fweatmeats, with other eatables, fuch as are prepared for kings; but the birds flew round the baskets, and ate up what was therein, notwithstanding his utmost endeavours to prevent them. The chief baker having repeated the foregoing dream to Jofeph, he waited with a ferene countenance for his interpretation of it, not in the leaft doubting but it would prove as favourable as that of the chief butler's, the circumftances being fomewhat fimilar. But how great was his dejection, when Jofeph reluctantly told him, that he much feared he had but three days to live! his dream seeming to foretell, that in fo fhort a time he fhould be crucified, and his body, being exposed to the ravenous fowls of the air, be foon devoured by them. And the exact completion of both these interpretations accordingly happened.

Jofeph, however, remained in confinement, unthought of by the chief butler, during the space of two years. At the expiration of that time, the unfeen hand of Providence released him from his bonds, and, by one of those unexpected turns of fortune, to which mankind, as we are here pointing out, are liable, raised him to a height of grandeur and authority that scarcely ever was equalled, and far beyond his utmost

wishes.

Pharaoh himself having seen in his fleep two vifions, which the wifeft men in his dominions could not interpret to his fatisfaction, he became extremely uneafy about them, especially as they feemed to forebode fomething of an alarming nature. It was now, for the first time, that the remembrance of Jofeph, and his skill in the interpretation of dreams, occurred to the King's cup-bearer; and he immediately, not without upbraiding himself for his ingratitude, related to his mafter what had paffed whilft he was in prifon.

Jofeph was accordingly brought into the royal prefence, when the King repeated to