17s THE HIDDEN LIFE .OF A- CHRISTIAN. [SEEM. X. [This sermon may be divided here.,] 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 instruction are such as these :, Ist, Instruction. What a glorious person is the poor- est, 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, andwith his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that yourjoymay 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 designee 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 de- grees 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 Cot. vii. 29, 50. 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 :.be has a nobler original, and sustains a higher character : His divine life must have divine food to support it. Let our thoughts take a turn to some bare common, or to the side of a wood, and visit the humble christian there; we shall find him cheerful, perhaps, at his din- , ner, of herbs, with all the circumstances of meanness around him : But what a glorious life be leads in that straw-cottage, and ,poor obscurity, ! The great and gay
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