For if I pain you, then who is to give me pleasure? None but the very people I am paining!

For I wrote you in sore distress and misery of heart, with many a tear ??not to pain you but to convince you of my love, my special love for you.

If a certain individual has been causing pain, he has been causing pain not so much to me as to all of you ??at anyrate (for I am not going to overstate the case) to a section of you.

In fact, if I did pain you by that letter, I do not regret it. I did regret it when I discovered that my letter had pained you even for the time being,

but I am glad now ??not glad that you were pained but glad that your pain induced you to repent. For you were pained as God meant you to be pained, and so you got no harm from what I did;

the pain God is allowed to guide ends in a saving repentance never to be regretted, whereas the world's pain ends in death.

See what this pain divine has done for you, how serious it has made you, how keen to clear yourselves, how indignant, how alarmed, how eager for me, how determined, how relentless! You have shown in every way that you were honest in the business.