The Pulpit Commentary — Esther — Section 95

('Orne she used it in a moment; and when thought had done its fair amount of work l1esitation fled, and determination succeeded to its place. To ,vearied human inquiry to exhausted human resources, to bewildered human wisdom, comes in most welcom~ tii<' minist.~.r l~ttle. though! o~ before, of the Invisible. You are immediately dis- pos~~ to. gift. 1t with. ommsc1enc~ and all power.. And tl~e theory of a Providence, nnticipatmg, interposing, overruling, becomes faith. It 1s embraced with ardour and sovn shows that it possesses the highest stimulus to duty. Thie never fails t~ answer obedient to its call, even though when it answers obedient it brings this ex- clamation to the st~ps of the altar, "If I perish, I perish! " Let us observe that this is the impassioned exclamation- I. Of one WHO FELT THE RELIEF OF AT LAST SEEING DUTY. The mind must have groped about in darkness, must have been distressed by doubt, must have known conflict e,en to anguish, before it would have expressed itself thus, and here is some pa~ of its reli~f. ~sther had come to see it, not." through t~~rs," perhaps, with their more purified light, but through the most painful obscunties and harassing incertitude. II. Of one WHO SAW DUTY TO FOLLOW IT at its proper cost. The sight of duty is often the signal for shutting the eyes, for turning the back, for filling the mind with diverting occupation, for trying, by one method or another, to forget it. Not so here. III. Of one whose fixed resolve WAS NOT DUE TO DESPERATION, nor to stoicism; not due to over-wrought feeling, nor to blunted sense and affection and faculty. The fixed determination here betokened was that of one who had "counted the cost," who evidently felt the cost to be that denoted by a very large price, and one which merited consideration first. IV. Of one WHO HAD so ESTIMATED THE TASK WHICH SHE WAS TO ATTEMPT THAT SHE BEGGED HELP, begged sympathy-begged that chiefest kind of help, the union of all kindred souls in religions exercises, in religious prostration before the Unseen, in the faith unfeigned which believed it possible and right to strive with all conceiv- able endeavour to influence and prevail upon the sovereign Disposer of all things. V. Of one WHOSE ENTERPRISE, IF FATAL, WAS BOUND TO WIN THE CROWN OF THE MARTYR. VVhose enterprise, if not fatal, but yet unsuccessful, bore testimony to the -will, the courage, the spirit of the martyr. Whose enterprise, if neither fatal nor unsuccessful, but, on the contrary, leading the way to more abundant glory and joy here, yet still had this testimony about it, that it bad practically shown the beet part of any sacrifice, and through the cross had reached the crown. VI. Of one WHOSE SPIRIT BREATHED RESIGNATION WHERE IT DID NOT REACH TO THI: SUllLIMER HEIGHT OF TRUST. For whatever reason, Esther had not attained to the exercise of a calm trust. She more distrusted the badness of the circumstances than she trusted the goodness of her cause ; the badness of the king's whim than the goodness of the purpose which was far above his ; the badness of the earthly law than the goodness of that mercy which is "high as the heavens and vast ae the clouds." It would seem evident that her knowledge was not dear. One of the people of God, yet, for want of priest and prophet, of sacrifice and of temple-worship, of dream, of oracle, of seer, times went hard with her religious education. The "word of God was precious in those days," and in that land of her captivity; and sbe the sufferer thereby. The lessons suggested by the language of this supreme scene in the conflict of Esther are numerous, and of a remarkably diversified kind. 1. The figure of human virtue here is impressive in its consent to bow to vicarious suffering, though it were only consent ; in its love, and solicitude, and obedience, and in the conduct of its own struggles. 2. The reproach is ever memorable which it conveys to how many-whose knowledge is light itself, yet whose thought and deed fall eo far below those of one whose knowledge was manifestly very partial, very clouded. 3. The cry is arresting because of its strong sympathy of tone with the cry of one who feels himself a real sinner against the law of God, and finds himself as yet more " c/Jriven," because of the conviction of that sin, and the overshading dread of its liability to punishment, than he finds himself drawn of the mercy of his God, and able to repose deep, calm trust in hiB Saviour. The soul urged by conviction of sin, oppressed with the eens~ OH. lV. 1-17.] THE BOOK OF ESTHER. 9!J