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ness. Most gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Wherefore I am well pleased with infirmities, with injuries, with necessities, with persecutions, with distresses for Christ; for when I am weak, then am I strong.

9 I have become foolish; you compelled me. For I ought to have been commended by you; for in nothing am I behind the chief of the apostles, though I also am nothing. The signs of an apostle were performed among you with all patience, in miracles, and prodigies, and mighty works. For what is there in which you were inferior to the rest of the churches, except that I was not burdensome to you? Forgive me this wrong.

10 Behold, I am ready to come to you a third time, and I will not be burdensome to you; for I seek not yours, but you. For the children ought not to lay up treasure for the parents, but the parents for the children. And I most gladly will spend and will be spent for your souls, even if the more abundantly I love you the less I am loved. Be it so, I was not burdensome to you; but being crafty I caught you with deceit. Did I make any thing out of you by any of those I sent to you? I requested Titus, and sent the brother with him; did Titus make any thing out of you? Did we not walk in the same spirit, in the same steps?

CHAPTER V.

PROPOSED VISIT, ETC.

1 Do you again think that we are defending ourselves? We speak in Christ before God; all these things, beloved, are for your edification. For I fear lest when I come I shall not find you such as I wish, and that I shall be found such as you wish not; lest there shall be strife, envy, anger, contentions, evil speakings, whisperings, pride, dissensions; lest when I come again my God shall humble me before you, and I shall mourn for many who have sinned, and not changed their minds, in respect to impurity and fornication and lewdness which they have committed.

2 This third time I am coming to you; by the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established. I have said before, and I now foretell as if present a second time, although

absent, to those who have already sinned and to all the rest, that if I come again I will not spare; since you seek a proof in me of Christ speaking, who is not weak to you but powerful in you; for though he was crucified in weakness, yet he lives by the power of God; and we also are weak in him, but live with him by the power of God in you.

3 Try yourselves, whether you are in the faith; prove yourselves; or know you not yourselves that Christ is in you unless you are reprobates? But I hope you will know that we are not reprobates. We wish to God that you may do no evil, not that we may appear approved, but that you may do good though we should be as reprobates. For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth. For we rejoice when we are weak and you are strong; and we desire this, your perfection. For this reason, being absent, I write these things, that I may not use sharpness when present, with the power which the Lord has given me for building up, and not for pulling down.

4 Finally, brothers, rejoice, be perfect, be of good comfort, be of the same mind, live in peace, and the God of love and peace shall be with you. Salute one another with a holy kiss. All the saints salute you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

CORINTH, A.D., 58. (Acts, 18: 1.)

CHAPTER I.

HIMSELF, JESUS CHRIST, AND THE GOSPEL.

1 PAUL, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart to the gospel of God,-which he promised by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures,—concerning his Son born of the posterity of David as to the flesh, declared to be the Son of God in power as to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,—through whom we have received grace and an apostleship for the obedience of the faith in all nations in behalf of his name, among whom are you also the called of Jesus

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Christ, to all who are at Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints. Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

2 First, indeed, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is proclaimed in all the world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, how incessantly I make mention of you, always in my prayers asking if by any means I may now at some time have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come to you. For I greatly desire to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift, that you may be strengthened, that is, that I may be comforted in you by the mutual faith both of you and me.

3 But I wish you not to be ignorant, brothers, that I often purposed to come to you, and was hindered hitherto, that I might have some fruit also among you, as among the other gentiles. I am a debtor both to the Greeks and the Barbarians, both to the wise and the ignorant; so that as far as depends upon me I am ready also to preach the gospel to those at Rome. For I am not ashamed of the gospel; for it is the power of God to salvation to every one that believes, the Jew first and also the Greek. For God's righteousness is revealed in it by faith in the faith [the gospel]; as it is written; The righteous shall live by faith.

CHAPTER II.

WICKEDNESS DESTROYS GENTILES AND JEWS.

1 FOR the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all impiety and wickedness of men who hold the truth in wickedness, because what can be known of God is manifest among them; for God has manifested [himself] to them. For his invisible [attributes] are clearly seen from the creation of the world, being perceived by the things which are made, even his eternal power and deity, so that they have no defense, because having known God they glorified him not as God neither were thankful, but became vain in their reasonings and their ignorant mind was darkened. · Saying that they were wise they became foolish, and changed the glory of the imperishable God into the likeness of the image of perishable man, and of birds, and quadrupeds, and reptiles.

2 Wherefore God also gave them up with the desires of their hearts to impurity, to disgrace their bodies among themselves, who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creation more than the Creator, who is blessed forever, amen.

3 Therefore God gave them up to infamous affections; for their females changed a natural enjoyment for that which is against nature, and in like manner also the males, leaving the natural enjoyment of the female, became the subjects of inordinate desires for each other, males with males committing indecency, and receiving in return the recompense of their error which was fit.

4 And as they did not choose to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do things which are not proper, being filled with all wickedness, malice, covetousness, vice, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil dispositions, whisperers, evil speakers, haters of God, injurious, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, unintelligent, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, unmerciful, who knowing the ordinance of God, that those who do such things deserve death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in those who do them.

5 Wherefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are that judge, for in that in which you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge do the same things. But we know that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who do such things. But do you think this, O man, who judge those doing such things and do the same, that you shall escape the judgment of God? or do you despise the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to a change of mind? But according to your hardness and unchanged heart you treasure up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and of a revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render to each according to his works; to those who by patience in good works seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life; but to those who are contentious and disobey the truth, and obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath. Affliction and distress [shall be] on every soul of man that does evil, both the Jew first and the Greek; and glory and honor and peace to every one that does good, both the Jew first and the Greek.

6 For there is no respect of persons with God. For as many as have sinned without the law shall perish without the law, and as

many as have sinned with the law shall be judged by the law; for not the hearers of the law are righteous with God, but the doers of the law shall be justified; for when the nations which have not the law perform by nature [the commandments] of the law, these who have not the law are a law to themselves, and they show the work of the law written in their minds, their consciences testifying with them, and their judgments mutually accusing or defending one another;-in the day when God shall judge the secret [doings] of men according to my gospel through Jesus Christ.

7 But [what] if you are called a Jew and rest on the law, and boast of God, and know his will, and approve of things which are excellent, being instructed by the law, and believe yourself to be a guide of the blind, a light of those in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law; you that teach another, do you not teach yourself? You that preach not to steal, do you steal? You that command not to commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You that abhor idols, do you commit sacrilege? You who boast of the law, by the transgression of the law do you dishonor God? For the name of God is blasphemed on your account among the nations as it is written.

8 For circumcision indeed is profitable if you perform the law; but if you are a transgressor of the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. If therefore the uncircumcision keeps the ordinances of the law, shall not its uncircumcision be accounted for circumcision? And the uncircumcision by nature which keeps the law shall judge you who with the written law and circumcision are a transgressor of the law. For not that which is external is the Jew, nor is that which is external in the flesh circumcision. But that which is in secret is the Jew, and circumcision of the heart is in the spirit not in the writing, the commendation of which is not of men but of God.

9 What then is the preeminence of the Jew? or what the profit of circumcision? Much in every way. For first, indeed, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God. For what if some did not believe? Will their unbelief destroy the faith of God? By no means; but let God be true, and every man a liar; as it is written, That thou mayest be justified in thy sayings and overcome when thou art judged.

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