The Complete Works of Brann - The Iconoclast, vol 1 | Page 8

the world has changed most wondrously. It transcends the
probable and rests upon such doubtful ex parte evidence that a modern
court would give her a certificate of good character. It is not in accord
with our criminal code to damn a woman on the unsupported
deposition of a young dude whom she has had arrested for attempted
ravishment. Had Joseph simply filed a general denial and proven
previous good character we might suspect the madame of malicious

prosecution; but he doth protest too much.
Mrs. Potiphar was doubtless a young and pretty woman. She was the
wife of a wealthy and prominent official of Pharaoh's court, and those
old fellows were a trifle exacting in their tastes. They sought out the
handsomest women of the world to grace their homes, for sensuous
love was then the supreme law of wedded life. Joseph was a young
Hebrew slave belonging to Mrs. Potiphar's husband, who treated him
with exceptional consideration because of his business ability. One day
the lad found himself alone with the lady. The latter suddenly turned in
a fire alarm, and Jacob's favorite son jogged along Josie in such hot
haste that he left his garment behind. Mrs. Potiphar informed those who
responded to her signal of distress that the slave had attempted a
criminal assault. She is supposed to have repeated the story to her
husband when he came home, and the chronicler adds, in a tone of
pained surprise, that the old captain's "anger was kindled." Neither Mrs.
Potiphar's husband nor her dearest female friends appear to have
doubted her version of the affair, which argues that, for a woman who
moved in the highest social circles, she enjoyed a reasonably good
reputation.
But Joseph had a different tale to tell. He said that the poor lady
became desperately enamored of his beauty and day by day assailed his
continence, but that he was as deaf to her amorous entreaties as Adonis
to the dear blandishments of Venus Pandemos. Finally she became so
importunate that he was compelled to seek safety in flight. He saved his
virtue but lost his vestments. It was a narrow escape, and the poor
fellow must have been dreadfully frightened. Suppose that the
she-Tarquin had accomplished her hellish design, and that her victim
had died of shame? She would have changed the whole current of the
world's history! Old Jacob and his other interesting if less virtuous sons,
would have starved to death, and there would have been neither
Miracles nor Mosaic Law, Ten Commandments nor Vicarious
Atonement. Talmage and other industrious exploiters of intellectual
tommyrot, now ladling out saving grace for fat salaries, might be as
unctuously mouthing for Mumbo Jumbo, fanning the flies off some
sacred bull or bowing the knee to Baal. The Potiphar-Joseph episode
deserves the profoundest study. It was an awful crisis in the history of
the human race! How thankful we, who live in these latter days, should

be that the female rape fiend has passed into the unreturning erstwhile
with the horned unicorn and dreadful hippogriff, the minotaur and other
monsters that once affrighted the fearful souls of men--that sensuous
sirens do not so assail us and rip our coat-tails off in a foul attempt to
wreck our virtue and fill our lives with fierce regret. True, the Rev.
Parkhurst doth protest that he was hard beset by beer and beauty
unadorned; but he seems to have been seeking the loaded "schooner"
and listening for the siren's dizzy song. Had Joseph lived in Texas he
could never have persuaded Judge Lynch that the lady and not he
should be hanged. The youngster dreamed himself into slavery, and I
opine that he dreamed himself into jail. With the internal evidence of
the story for guide, I herewith present, on behalf of Mrs. Potiphar, a
revised and reasonable version of the affaire d'amour.
Joseph was, the chronicler informs us, young "a goodly person and well
favored." His Hebraic type of manly beauty and mercurial temperament
must have contrasted strangely with Mrs. Potiphar's dark and stolid
countrymen. Mistress and slave were much together, the master's duties
requiring his presence near his prince. Time hung heavily on the lady's
hands and, as an ennui antidote, she embarked in a desperate flirtation
with the handsome fellow, for Egypt's dark-eyed daughters dearly love
to play fast and loose with the hearts of men. Of course it was very
wrong; but youth and beauty will not be strictly bound, the opportunity
seemed made for mischief, and Mrs. Potiphar cared little for her lord--a
grizzly old warrior who treated her as a pretty toy his wealth had
purchased, to be petted or put aside at pleasure.
A neglected wife whose charms attract the admiring eyes of men may
not depart one step from the