The advancement of Mordecai was the natural result of Haman's ruin. Esther having fully informed Ahasuerus of her relationship to the much-injured Jew and his nation, she was empowered to bestow upon him the house of the fallen minister. The Jews, however, were not yet exempted from the decree which the wickedness of Haman had inveigled the king to issue against them! so that Esther, not merely solicitous for her personal security or that of her friend and relative, ventured again before the king, "and fell down at his feet, and besought him with tears to put away the mischief of Haman the Agagite, and his device that he had devised against the Jews." The king renewed the testimony of his kindness, by stretching forth the golden sceptre; and the queen addressed him in these words, "If it please the king, and if I have found favour in his sight, and the thing seem right before the king, and I be pleasing in his eyes, let it be written to reverse the letters devised by Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote to destroy the Jews which are in all the kings' provinces: for how can I endure to see the evil that shall come unto my people? or how can I endure to see the destruction of my kindred?" The king was ready to concede every thing it was in his power to grant: but as the laws of Persia were irreversible, and he could not rescind an edict already issued in his several provinces, he adopted the plan of putting his ring into the hands of Mordecai and Esther, to seal whatever decree they might think it right to frame in the present emergency. Accordingly, they gave unlimited permission to the Jews to defend themselves, which it was likely would so plainly evince the royal wishes to nullify his former edict, that few if any would indulge their malice against this people, or endanger their own lives by availing themselves of the first order. Many, however, did so; and even in the royal city five hundred men attacked them, probably some of the partisans of the late minister; but their temerity hurried them on to their own destruction. The ten sons of Haman, were also slain, and at the request of the queen, hung on the gallows. An annual festival, called _Purim_, [53] was established in commemoration of the deliverances we have recorded, which the Jews continue to observe at this day. It seems to have been appointed by Mordecai and Esther, as a civil, rather than a religious feast; unless it be supposed, that they received some special revelation to authorize such a measure. It is observed in the month _Adar_, which corresponds with our _February_ and _March_.