Loving the Creature, and not the Creator.
STRANGE as sad are the unnatural, irrational exercises of human love. Men love to excess the things of earth, even when they are yet unseen, and only hoped for; and yet love not themselves, their souls, or their God. They love things without them, and things that perish in the using; and yet love not what is within them, and Him who is over all, and blessed for ever. Men value human friendship when it is directed to their persons, and not their purses—to their characters, and not to their condition; and yet they profess to love God, while they take interest only in his gifts, and are unmindful of the glorious Giver.