And this is the crowning thing; and thus it comes as the closing thing, in this wondrous Book of Genesis--after this manner perfect in its structure, as it is truthful in its records. One moral after another is studied, one secret after another is revealed, in the artless family scenes which constitute its materials; and in them we learn our calling, the sources and the issues of our history, from our election to our inheritance. Thus is it for our learning in this Book of Genesis. But as yet, while we are in this Book, there is no _law_. We are taught that this was so in Romans v. 13, 14. But we might have perceived it for ourselves. Because, in dispensational age, so to speak, the time of this Book was the time of _infancy_. The elect were as children who had never left home, never as yet been under a schoolmaster. Neither is there any _miracle_. I mean no miracle by the hand of man. For power would no more have suited such hands, than law or a schoolmaster would have suited such an age. And, besides, there was no mission or apostleship to seal. Miracles or "signs following" were not demanded as credentials of a mission. But as soon as we leave this Book, and enter Exodus, we get a mission or an apostleship, and then we get miracles, as seals, to accredit it. So that what we do not get is just as fitting, from its absence, as what we do get. Neither power nor law would have been in season, and accordingly neither power nor law do we get. But I will now pass on to Joseph, or to chapters xxxvii.-l. The materials which we find in these chapters, and which form the history of Joseph, may be separated into four parts: 1. His early times at home in his father’s house, in the land of Canaan. 2. His life, as a separated man, in Egypt. 3. His recovery of his kindred, his father and his brethren, and the results of such recovery. 4. His latter times in the land of Egypt till the day of his death. This may be received as the contents of this wondrous story. The way in which it is told has been witnessed to by the sympathies and sensibilities of thousands of hearts in every generation. _Part I._ (xxxvii. xxxviii.)--As soon as we enter on the history, the heir is at once and immediately seen in Joseph. His dreams are dreams of _glory_. But _sufferings_ as quickly form his present reality.