You will say, perhaps, that we are making a fresh attempt to recommend ourselves to your favour. What, do we need letters of recommendation to you, or from you, as some others do?

Incipimus iterum nosmetipsos commendare? aut numquid egemus (sicut quidam) commendatitiis epistolis ad vos, aut ex vobis?

Do we begin again to commend ourselves? Or do we need (as some do) epistles of commendation to you, or from you?

Why, you yourselves are the letter we carry about with us, written in our hearts, for all to recognize and to read.

Epistola nostra vos estis, scripta in cordibus nostris, quæ scitur, et legitur ab omnibus hominibus:

You are our epistle, written in our hearts, which is known and read by all men:

You are an open letter from Christ, promulgated through us; a message written not in ink, but in the Spirit of the living God, with human hearts, instead of stone, to carry it.

manifestati quod epistola estis Christi, ministrata a nobis, et scripta non atramento, sed Spiritu Dei vivi: non in tabulis lapideis, sed in tabulis cordis carnalibus.

Being manifested, that you are the epistle of Christ, ministered by us, and written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in the fleshly tables of the heart.

Such, through Christ, is the confidence in which we make our appeal to God.

Fiduciam autem talem habemus per Christum ad Deum:

And such confidence we have, through Christ, towards God.

Not that, left to ourselves, we are able to frame any thought as coming from ourselves; all our ability comes from God,

non quod sufficientes simus cogitare aliquid a nobis, quasi ex nobis: sed sufficientia nostra ex Deo est:

Not that we are sufficient to think any thing of ourselves, as of ourselves: but our sufficiency is from God.

since it is he who has enabled us to promulgate his new law to men. It is a spiritual, not a written law; the written law inflicts death, whereas the spiritual law brings life.

qui et idoneos nos fecit ministros novi testamenti: non littera, sed Spiritu: littera enim occidit, Spiritus autem vivificat.

Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit. For the letter killeth, but the spirit quickeneth.

We know how that sentence of death, engraved in writing upon stone, was promulgated to men in a dazzling cloud, so that the people of Israel could not look Moses in the face, for the brightness of it, although that brightness soon passed away.

Quod si ministratio mortis litteris deformata in lapidibus fuit in gloria, ita ut non possent intendere filii Israël in faciem Moysi propter gloriam vultus ejus, quæ evacuatur:

Now if the ministration of death, engraven with letters upon stones, was glorious; so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses, for the glory of his countenance, which is made void:

How much more dazzling, then, must be the brightness in which the spiritual law is promulgated to them!

quomodo non magis ministratio Spiritus erit in gloria?

How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather in glory?

If there is a splendour in the proclamation of our guilt, there must be more splendour yet in the proclamation of our acquittal;

Nam si ministratio damnationis gloria est: multo magis abundat ministerium justitiæ in gloria.

For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more the ministration of justice aboundeth in glory.

and indeed, what once seemed resplendent seems by comparison resplendent no longer, so much does the greater splendour outshine it.

Nam nec glorificatum est, quod claruit in hac parte, propter excellentem gloriam.

For even that which was glorious in this part was not glorified, by reason of the glory that excelleth.

What passed away passed in a flash of glory; what remains, remains instead in a blaze of glory.

Si enim quod evacuatur, per gloriam est: multo magis quod manet, in gloria est.

For if that which is done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is in glory.

Such is the ground of our confidence, and we speak out boldly enough.

Habentes igitur talem spem, multa fiducia utimur:

Having therefore such hope, we use much confidence:

It is not for us to use veiled language, as Moses veiled his face. He did it, so that the people of Israel might not go on gazing at the features of the old order, which was passing away.

et non sicut Moyses ponebat velamen super faciem suam, ut non intenderent filii Israël in faciem ejus, quod evacuatur,

And not as Moses put a veil upon his face, that the children of Israel might not steadfastly look on the face of that which is made void.

But in spite of that, dullness has crept over their senses, and to this day the reading of the old law is muffled with the same veil; no revelation tells them that it has been abrogated in Christ.

sed obtusi sunt sensus eorum. Usque in hodiernum enim diem, idipsum velamen in lectione veteris testamenti manet non revelatum (quoniam in Christo evacuatur),

But their senses were made dull. For, until this present day, the selfsame veil, in the reading of the old testament, remaineth not taken away (because in Christ it is made void).

To this day, I say, when the law of Moses is read out, a veil hangs over their hearts.

sed usque in hodiernum diem, cum legitur Moyses, velamen positum est super cor eorum.

But even until this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart.

There must be a turning to the Lord first, and then the veil will be taken away.

Cum autem conversus fuerit ad Dominum, auferetur velamen.

But when they shall be converted to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away.

The Spirit we have been speaking of is the Lord; and where the Lord’s Spirit is, there is freedom.

Dominus autem Spiritus est: ubi autem Spiritus Domini, ibi libertas.

Now the Lord is a Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

It is given to us, all alike, to catch the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, with faces unveiled; and so we become transfigured into the same likeness, borrowing glory from that glory, as the Spirit of the Lord enables us.

Nos vero omnes, revelata facie gloriam Domini speculantes, in eamdem imaginem transformamur a claritate in claritatem, tamquam a Domini Spiritu.

But we all beholding the glory of the Lord with open face, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord.