The Hebrews were happy in relating how men of their race had made their way up to places of honour at alien courts through the sheer force of their own personal ability. Here was Joseph coming up out of the prison house to the right hand of Pharaoh! Here was Daniel preferred above the other presidents and princes at the court of Darius! Here was Benjamin Disraeli belonging to a race formerly disfranchised in England becoming at last Prime Minister of Her Most Christian Majesty Queen Victoria! Let every man who looks down upon some lowly life beware lest he despise what God has blessed! Here was a young man who had vision! He saw things. He did not merely "look," as would some dog that bays the moon. When he walked across the plains of Dothan his mind was not altogether upon wool and mutton--he was already dreaming of high achievement in his future years. When he was thrown into the pit and sold into slavery his brain was busy with the stars. When he faced temptation he saw it all with the eye of faith--how could he do this great wickedness and sin against God. And when he was confronted with a problem confessedly too hard for him he lifted up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh help. "It is not in me. The interpretation of life belongs to God." He was only seventeen years old when he walked across the fields that day to the place where his brothers kept their flocks. Now he was thirty. He had increased in stature, in wisdom and in favour with God and man. It had taken thirteen long years to add those cubits to his height, but they had been well spent. The Almighty takes His time in working out His finer effects. The spoiled child, the censorious talebearer, the callow, conceited youth must be wrought upon by the beat and play of human life. When any man has vision and faith there is a divinity which shapes his ends, rough-hewn though they be by doting fathers and envious brothers, by false accusers, and by ungrateful companions. When a man is faced right, all things, no matter what shape they bear, will ultimately work together for his good. "A man in whom the spirit of God is"--that was Pharaoh's verdict when Joseph had skillfully interpreted his dream, indicating that the seven fat cows coming up out of the Nile meant seven years of plenty in the land of Egypt, and that the seven lean cows following them and devouring them meant seven years of famine, which would tax the resources of Pharaoh's empire in feeding the hungry people. And when the monarch had listened to the wise words, had sensed the humane spirit of this young Hebrew, and had seen the look of faith upon his face, he felt that no other man would be so competent to become High Commissioner of the Food Supply there in the land of Egypt. Thus Joseph was set in a place of authority at Pharaoh's right hand.