ye are, brethren--this is my request
to you: ye have not injured me in the least. (13)Ye know that with
infirmity of flesh I preached to you the gospel at the first. (14)And
my temptation, which was in my flesh, ye despised not, nor rejected
with disgust; but as an angel of God ye received me, even as Christ
Jesus himself. (15)What then was your blessedness, for I bear witness
to you that, if it were possible, ye would have plucked out your eyes,
and given them to me. (16)Am I therefore become your enemy because I
tell you the truth?

(17)They affect zeal for you, not honourably; but they wish to exclude
us, that you may be zealously attached to them. (18)It is good indeed
to be zealously affected in a good cause always, and not only when I am
present with you.

(19)My little children of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ
be formed in you, (20)I wish I could be with you now, and change my
address; for I am in doubt about you.

(21)Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the
law? (22)For it is written[113] that Abraham had two sons, the one by a
bondwoman, and the other by a free. (23)Now the son of the bond-maid
was born after the flesh, but that by the free woman was by promise.
(24)Which things are allegorical; for these are the two covenants, the
one from mount Sinai, gendering unto bondage, which is represented by
Agar. (25)For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds with
Jerusalem that now is, and is in bondage with her children. (26)But the
Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. (27)For it is
written, "Rejoice, thou barren who bearest not, cry out and shout for
joy, thou that travailest not, for more are the children of her that
was desolate, than of her which had an husband[114]." (28)So we,
brethren, as Isaac, are the children of the promise. (29)But as then he
that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the
Spirit, even so is it now. (30)But what saith the scripture? "Cast out
the bond-woman and her son for the son of the bond-maid shall in no
wise inherit with the son of the free woman[115]." (31)So then,
brethren, we are not the children of the bondwoman, but of the free.

CHAP. V.

STAND fast therefore in the liberty with which Christ has made you
free, and be not again held under a yoke of bondage. (2)Behold, I Paul
declare to you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ will be of no
advantage to you. (3)And again, I testify to