Never for a moment quail before your antagonists. Your fearlessness will be to them a sure token of impending destruction, but to you it will be a sure token of your salvation--a token coming from God.

Therefore, my dearly-loved friends, as I have always found you obedient, labour earnestly with fear and trembling--not merely as though I were present with you, but much more now since I am absent from you--labour earnestly, I say, to make sure of your own salvation.

For it is true that he has been ill, and was apparently at the point of death; but God had pity on him, and not only on him, but also on me, to save me from having sorrow upon sorrow.

I am therefore all the more eager to send him, in the hope that when you see him again you may be glad and I may have the less sorrow.