tality? Who shall say that the pious sentiments expressed by Ahasuerus in the letter which he addressed to Ezra (ch. vii. 12-26.) are not as indicative of the acknowledgment of Jehovah as the one true God, combined with as sincere a desire to promote his will and worship, as are those recorded of Nebuchadnezzar, of whose change of heart no doubt seems to have been entertained? Ahasuerus deprecated the wrath of "the God of heaven" on behalf of his family and people, for their former negligence and indifference to the honour of his name and worship; and he afterwards parted with the faithful Nehemiah, whose services as cupbearer were to him invaluable, (for in an oriental court the subtle poison was a frequent and ready means for effecting the removal of obnoxious princes) when that devoted man desired of him permission "to go and build the walls of Jerusalem." If these " very worthy deeds" (Acts xxiv. 2.) were not the effects of a true and lively faith, they must at least have been the results of a powerful influence exerted on the mind and heart of Ahasuerus; and to what quarter can we look for the medium of that influence but to her who occupied the highest place in his kingdom and in his regard; to her whose affection saved his life, the life of the body from destruction, and whose piety must have led her to labour for the salvation of his soul? "Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She openeth her mouth, with wisdom and in her tongue is 1 The Ahasuerus of the Book of Esther is, according to Prideaux and others, the same with Artaxerxes Longimanus. the law of kindness. House and riches are the inheritance of fathers, and a prudent wife is from the Lord." Five years had passed away since Esther's elevation to the royal dignity, and during the whole of this period she appears to have enjoyed the favour of her husband, and the smiles of a court. It is in the very nature of a calm and gilded prosperity to lull the mind into a state of tranquil and luxurious ease, which is too often fatal to the soul's best interests. Surrounded by a circle of admiring friends, with an unclouded heaven above and a smiling world around, with no storm of adversity to agitate the soul, and not even a breeze to ruffle its surface, it is no marvel that a false and fatal peace steals on, bringing with it forgetfulness of the truth, that beneath this seeming tranquillity lie the elements of tumult and disorder, of destruction and death 'As barks that have gone down at sea, So has many a soul made shipwreck through the careless security which a state of long-continued prosperity induced. There is abundant evidence in this scripture narrative to prove that Esther was not uninjured by this season of uninterrupted ease, and that the hour of trial which her God had in mercy appointed for her, found her in a slothful, slumbering state, unprepared and unwilling to meet his chastisements. Living in the seclusion of her palace, with all that could minister to the pomp and pride of life around her; shut out from the sight of this world's wretchedness and the hearing of its woes :it was, to her, strange and unwelcome news to be told on a sudden, by her attendants, that Mordecai 66 had left his accustomed seat among the king's officers, and was sitting "without, clothed in sackcloth with ashes." “Then was the queen exceedingly grieved, and she sent raiment to clothe Mordecai, and to take away his sackcloth from him, but he received them not." What! were the eyes that had so long looked upon the glare of royalty—upon the jewels of the diadem and the purple of the throneunable to endure the sight of sackcloth and ashes? It does not appear strange to us that the king, her husband, should ask the sorrowing Nehemiah, on a similar occasion, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick?" for he knew not the heart of a stranger, and could not enter into the feelings which oppressed the mind of that servant of God in beholding the afflictions of "his brethren, his kinsmen according to the flesh;" but that Esther, who was reared amid sackcloth and ashes-whose youth had passed away among those who were accustomed to "mourning, and lamentation, and woe," and whose heart must have whispered to her, 'is there not a cause?'-that she-a daughter of Jerusalemshould have sent the emissaries of luxury, with fine raiment, to take away Mordecai's sackcloth, as a thing unbecoming the dignity of his office and her own high station, discovers to us a fearful state of mind in one who should have known, that "when pride cometh then cometh a snare, but with the lowly is wisdom:" that "the heart knoweth its own bitterness, and a stranger doth not intermeddle with his joy." Oh! foolish thought of a heart hardened by prosperity, to suppose that the trappings of luxury could beguile the heavy-laden soul of the burden it was called to bear!-that the wounds of sorrow could be healed by the mere touch of a royal hand! How could Mordecai 'go delicately,' with the bitterness of death in full prospect before him, with the sword hanging by a single hair over his own head and that of his devoted countrymen! Well might he have exclaimed to those who would have taken away his sackcloth from him, and clothed him with purple, "Miserable comforters are ye all! ease me of the burden of my grief, remove the cause of my anguish, and bid me not rejoice while that remains." And thus it is with the soul which has made discovery of the sentence gone forth against itself, and registered among the irrevocable decrees of the King of kings," the soul that sinneth it shall die." Then, whatever may have been its former relish of this world's joys, the dark uncertainty of terror, or the pallid misgivings of fear, forbid it any longer to take pleasure in them, and force from it that " loud and bitter cry." "Oh! wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me!" In this case, how often does the hand of misguided affection seek to charm away the grief of the soul, by the sounds of music and revelry, by the fascinations of pleasure, or the excitement of change: how many well-meant remonstrances are addressed in accents of kindness, "Put off thy sackcloth from thee-take thine ease-eat, drink and be merry:" yet will not such an one "hear the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely:" but, tell him of a mediator who has gone into the royal presence, and touched the golden sceptre of justice, that mercy might go forth-tell him of one who has obtained a decree of life for the decree of condemnation, and then will he quickly put on the "oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;" then will he gird himself resolutely to combat his spiritual foes, with the watchword in his mouth, "Greater is he that is for us, than he that is against us." Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth, who is he that condemneth it is Christ that died, yea rather that is risen again, who ever liveth to make intercession for us." LYDIA. OUR YOUTHFUL QUEEN. OUR youthful Queen! her forehead bears Our youthful Queen! unwritten still |