adultery, said also, You shall not kill; and if you do not commit adultery, but kill, you are a transgressor of the law. So speak and so do, as being about to be judged by the law of liberty. For he shall have judgment without mercy who shows not mercy; mercy rejoices over judgment.

7 What is the profit, my brothers, if a man says he has faith, but has not works? Can faith save him? And if a brother or sister is naked, or destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, Go in peace, be warmed and be filled, but gives them not the necessary supplies for the body, what is the profit? So also faith, if it has not works, is dead, being alone. But some one will say, You have faith, and I have works; show me your faith without works, and I will show you my faith by works. You believe that there is one God? You do well; demons also believe and tremble. But will you know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? You see that faith cooperated with his works, and by works was faith made perfect, and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, And Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him a righteousness, and he was called God's friend. You see then that a man is justified by works and not by faith only. And in like manner also was not Rahab the harlot justified by works, when she received the messengers and sent them out another way? For as the body without a spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

CHAPTER II.

ON CENSORIOUSNESS, WISDOM, CONTENTION, ETC.

1 BE not many of you teachers, my brothers, knowing that we shall receive a severer judgment. For in many things we all offend; if one offends not in word he is a perfect man, able to keep in subjection also the whole body. But we put bits into the mouths of horses that they may obey us, and direct their whole body; behold also the ships, though of so great size and driven by powerful winds, are directed by a very small helm wherever the will of the pilot chooses; so also the tongue is a small member and boasts of great things. Behold, how much wood a little fire

kindles! And the tongue is a fire, the tongue is made a world of wickedness among our members, it defiles the whole body and sets on fire the course of nature and is set on fire by hell. For every kind of beasts, and birds, and reptiles, and fishes, is tamed and has been tamed by the human race, but the tongue can no man tame; it is a disorderly evil, full of a deadly poison. With it bless we the Lord and Father, and with it curse we men made in the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceeds a blessing and a curse. My brothers, these things ought not so to be. Does a fountain send forth sweet water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brothers, produce olives, or a vine, figs? So you cannot make salt water sweet.

2 What wise and intelligent man is there among you? Let him show his works by good conduct, in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, boast not and lie not against the truth. This wisdom comes not from above, but is earthly, natural, demoniacal. For where envy and strife are, there are disorder and every evil work. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be persuaded, full of mercy and of good fruits, without partiality, without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace to those who make peace.

You

3 Whence come wars and contentions among you ? Come they not thence, from your pleasures that war in members? your desire and have not; you kill, and envy, and cannot obtain; you fight and carry on war. You have not, because you do not ask; you ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, to expend on your pleasures. Adulteresses, know you not that the friendship of the world is enmity against God? Whoever therefore wishes to be a friend of the world, is made an enemy of God. Or do you suppose that the Scripture says in vain, The spirit which dwells in us desires to envy? But he gives more grace; wherefore he says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Be subject therefore to God; resist the devil and he will flee from you; draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, sinners, purify your hearts, double-minded. Lament, and mourn, and weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy into sorrow. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will

exalt you.

4 Speak not one against one another, brothers. He that speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law you are not a doer of the law, but a judge. There is one law-giver and judge, who is able to save and to destroy; but who are you that judge a neighbor?

5 Come now, you that say, To-day and to-morrow we will go to such a city and engage in business there a year, and trade and make profits, who know not what will be on the morrow; for what is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes away; for you ought to say, If the Lord wills, we shall both live and do this or that. But now you glory in your boasting; all such glorying is evil. He therefore that knows how to do good and does it not, to him it is sin. 6 Come now, rich men, weep and lament for the miseries which are coming upon you. Your riches have decayed, and your garments are moth-eaten, your gold and silver are destroyed with rust, and their rust will be a witness against you, and consume your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasures for the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who harvested your fields, kept back by you, cry, and the loud calls of the reapers have entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. You have lived in luxury on the earth and in pleasure, you have nourished your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and killed the just, and he does not resist you.

7 Wait patiently therefore, brothers, till the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waits for the precious fruit of the earth, and is of long patience, till he receives the autumnal and vernal rain. Do you also have long patience, confirm your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Complain not, brothers, against one another, that you be not judged; behold, the judge stands before the doors. You have the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord, my brothers, as an example of patience and long-suffering. Behold, we account them blessed who are patient. You have heard of the patience of Job, and you know the purpose of the Lord, that he is very merciful and compassionate.

8 Above all things, my brothers, swear not, neither by heaven, nor the earth, nor any other oath. But let your yes be yes, and your no, no, that you may not fall under condemnation.

9 If any one among you is afflicted, let him pray; if any one is happy, let him sing psalms; if any one is sick among you, let him send for the elders of the church, and let them pray for him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that you may be cured, for the prayer of the righteous operates with great power. Elijah was a man of like passions with us, and he prayed that it might not rain, and it rained not on the land for three years and six months; and again he prayed, and heaven gave rain, and the earth yielded her fruit.

10 Brothers, if any one among you errs from the truth, and one converts him, let him know that he who converts a sinner from an error of [his] way, shall save a soul from death, and hide a multitude of sins.

FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER.

BABYLON, A.D. 64.

CHAPTER I.

A FIRM ADHERENCE TO CHRIST, ETC.

1 PETER, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the elect strangers of the dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, to obedience and the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. Grace and peace be multiplied to you.

2 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy has begotten us to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith to salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In which you rejoice, though now for a little while if need be made sad by manifold trials, that the trial of your faith, which is much more precious than gold that is destroyed but proved by fire, may be found to

praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom not having seen you love, in whom believing though now you see him not you rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorious, receiving the end of the faith, the salvation of souls. Concerning which salvation the prophets also who prophesied concerning the grace [bestowed] on us inquired diligently and sought, inquiring as to what person or what time the Spirit of Christ which was in them signified, when it declared before the sufferings of Christ and after these the glories, to whom it was revealed that they ministered not to themselves but to us those things which have now been declared to you by those who preached to you the good news, with the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, into which the angels desire to look.

3 Wherefore, girding up the loins of your minds, be sober, and hope to the end for the gift to be brought to you by the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the desires of your former ignorance, but as he that called you is holy be you also holy in all [your] conduct, because it is written, Be you holy, for I am holy. And if you call on the Father, who without respect of persons judges according to each one's work, spend the time of your life with fear, knowing that you were not redeemed from your vain mode of life received by tradition from your fathers, with destructible things, silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish, and without a spot; who was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but made manifest in these last times for you, who through him believed in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope may be in God.

4 Having purified your souls by obeying the truth to unfeigned brotherly love, love one another fervently, from the heart, having been born again, not from destructible seed but from indestructible, through the word of God which lives and endures. For all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of the grass; the grass has withered, and its flower fell off; but the word of the Lord continues forever. And this is the word preached to you.

5 Laying aside therefore all malice and all deceit and hypocrisies and envies and all evil speakings, as new born babes desire earnestly the pure milk of the word, that you may grow by