The use I shall make of this doctrine, is, to draw four inferences from it for our instruction, and three for our consolation. The inferences for our instructions are such as these: 1st Instruction. What a glorious person is the poorest, meanest christian? He lives by communion with God the Father and the Son; for his life is hid with Christ in God; 1 John i. 3.—“Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full; the joy that you may justly derive from so glorious an advancement.” A true christian does not live upon the creatures, but upon the infinite and almighty Creator: upon God who created all things by Jesus Christ. Created beings were never designed to be his life and his happiness; they are too mean and coarse a fare for a christian to feed upon, in order to support his best life: He converses with them indeed, and transacts many affairs that relate to them in this lower world: While he dwells in flesh and blood, his heavenly Father has appointed these to be a great part of his business; but he does not make them his portion and his life. They possess but the lower degrees of his affection: He rejoices in the possession of them, as though he rejoiced not; and he weeps for the loss of them, as though he wept not: He enjoys the dearest comforts of life, as though he had them not; and buys with such a holy indifference, as though he were not to possess; 1 Cor. vii. 29, 30. for the fashion of them passes away: But the food of his life is infinite and immortal. It is no wonder that a man of this world lets loose all the powers of his soul in the pursuit and enjoyment of creatures, for they are his portion and his life. But it is quite otherwise with a christian: he has a nobler original, and sustains a higher character: His divine life must have divine food to support it.