sniifF ; more than a man at first, and less than a woman at last.' In all the ages of the world, the heads, the wits, the hands, the hearts, and the tongues of the wicked have been engaged against the just ; they have been still a-plotting and devising mischief against the favourites of heaven, as if rebels could meddle with none but the chil- dren of a king, and yet God's signal presence with his people, in point of affection and protection, has blasted all their designs, and frustrated all their counsels. As the rage of wicked men against the saints have been endless, so it has been fruitless, because God has been in the midst of them. Haman plots against the lives, liberties, and estates of the Jews, Esth. iii, 8, seq., but his plot was timely discovered and seasonably prevented, and the grand plotter and informer detected, debased, condemned, and executed : Esth. vii. 10, ' So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the king's wrath pacified.' The kings of Persia had absolute and un- questionable power to do whatsoever they listed. Quicquid libuit, licuit: all their subjects, except their queens, were no better than slaves, — ' whom they would they slew, and whom they would they kept alive ; whom they would they set up, and whom they would they put down,' Dan. v. 19; Esth. vii. 9. Haman is here without order of law, more than the king's command, adjudged to be hanged. The truth is, it was a clear case, and the malefactor was self-condemned. ' Hang him, therefore,' saith the king ; a short and a just sentence, and soon executed. Ah, how soon is Haman fallen from the palace to the gallows, from the highest stage of honour to the lowest stair of disgrace ; from feasting with the king to be made a feast for crows, and so lies wrapped up in the sheet of perpetual infamy. 'So let all thine enemies perish, 0 Lord.' It is a good observation of Josephus upon Esth. vii. 10 : ' I cannot,' saith he, ' but admire the Lord's wis- dom, and acknowledge his justice, in that he not only punished him for his malice to the church, but, by turning his own mischief upon himself, hath made him an example to all posterity ; hanging him up in gibbets that others may take warning.' i Let all plotters and in- formers beware of making a match with mischief, they may have enough of it in the end. Haman was a main stickler for the devil, who paid him his wages at last, with a witness, or, if you will, with a halter. Let all the enemies of the saints tremble at such ends, and be careful to avoid them by flying such like foul and flagitious practices. The bloody plot being thus laid by Haman, the king's minion, behold the footsteps of God's favourable, signal, and eminent presence for his people and with his people in their deadly dangers, and that in raising up in them a very great spirit of faith, prayer, and mourning, and by raising an undaunted courage and resolution in Esther : ' And so I will go in unto the king, and if I perish, I perish,' Esth. iv. 16. This she speaks not rashly or desperately, as prodigal of her life, but as one willing to sacrifice the same for the honour of God, his cause and people, say- ing, as that martyr, ' Can I die but once for Christ?' Esther had rather die than shrink from her duty. She thought it better to do worthily and perish for a kingdom, than unworthily and perish with a kingdom.
^ Unde mihi contigit mirari nomen Dei, et sapientiam, et justitiam ejus agnoscere, &c. — Joseph. Ant., lib. '. c. 6.
WITH HIS PEOPLE IN THEIR GKEATEST TROUBLES. 485