For you have brought these men here, though they are neither robbers of Temples nor blasphemers of our Goddess.

If, however, Demetrius and the artisans who are acting with him have a charge to make against any one, there are Court Days and there are Magistrates; let both parties take legal proceedings.

But if you want anything more, it will have to be settled in the regular Assembly.

And now, I tell you, I know that none of you will ever see my face again--you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the Kingdom.

For I have not shrunk from announcing the whole purpose of God regarding you.

And now I commend you to the Lord and to the Message of his Love--a Message which has the power to build up your characters, and to give you your place among all those who have become Christ's People.

I have never coveted any one's gold or silver or clothing.

And, when they had heard it, they began praising God, and said to Paul: "You see, Brother, that the Jews who have become believers in Christ may be numbered by tens of thousands, and they are all naturally earnest in upholding the Jewish Law.

Now they have heard it said about you, that you teach all Jews in foreign countries to forsake Moses, for you tell them not to circumcise their children or even to observe Jewish customs.

We have four men here, who have of their own accord put themselves under a vow.

Join these men, share their purification, and bear their expenses, so that they may shave their heads; and then all will see that there is no truth in what they have been told about you, but that, on the contrary, you yourself rule your life in obedience to the Jewish Law.

As to the Gentiles who have become believers in Christ, we have sent our decision that they should avoid food offered to idols, and blood, and the flesh of strangled animals, and impurity."

On this, Paul joined the men, and the next day shared their purification, and went into the Temple, and gave notice of the expiration of the period of purification when the usual offering should have been made on behalf of each of them.

Then I said 'What am I to do, Lord?' 'Get up and go into Damascus,' The Lord said to me, 'and there you shall be told all that you have been appointed to do.'

For you shall be a witness for him to all the world of what you have just seen and heard.

Up to this point the people had been listening to Paul, but at these words they called out: "Kill him! A fellow like this ought not to have been allowed to live!"

The men who were to have examined Paul immediately drew back, and the Officer, finding that Paul was a Roman citizen, was alarmed at having put him in chains.

Paul fixed his eyes upon the Council, and began: "Brothers, for my part, I have always ordered my life before God, with a clear conscience, up to this very day."

That night the Lord came and stood by Paul, and said: "Courage! You have borne witness for me in Jerusalem and you must bear witness in Rome also."

And they went to the Chief Priests and the Councillors, and said: "We have taken a solemn oath not to touch food till we have killed Paul.

"The Jews have agreed," answered the lad, "to ask you to bring Paul down before the Council to-morrow, on the plea of your making further inquiry into his case.

But do not let them persuade you, for more than forty of them are lying in wait for him, who have taken an oath that they will not eat or drink, till they have made away with him; and they are at this very moment in readiness, counting upon your promise."

Then he called two Captains, and ordered them to have two hundred men ready to go to Caesarea, as well as seventy troopers and two hundred lancers, by nine o'clock that night,

And to have horses ready for Paul to ride, so that they might take him safely to Felix, the Governor.

Having, however, information of a plot against the man, which was about to be put into execution, I am sending him to you at once, and I have also directed his accusers to prosecute him before you.'

"I will hear all you have to say as soon as your accusers have arrived." And he ordered Paul to be kept under guard in Herod's Government House.

We have found this man a public pest; he is one who stirs up disputes among the Jews all the world over, and is a ringleader of the Nazarene heretics.

On a sign from the Governor, Paul made this reply: "Knowing, as I do, for how many years you have acted as Judge to this nation, it is with confidence that I undertake my own defense.

And I have a hope that rests in God--a hope which they also cherish--that there will one day be a resurrection of good and bad alike.

There were, however, some Jews from Roman Asia who ought to have been here before you, and to have made any charge that they may have against me--

And asked a favor of him, to Paul's injury--to have Paul brought to Jerusalem. All the while they were plotting to make away with him on the road.

Paul's answer to the charge was--'I have not committed any offence against the Jewish Law, or the Temple, or the Emperor.'

"No," replied Paul, "I am standing at the Emperor's Bar, where I ought to be tried. I have not wronged the Jews, as you yourself are well aware.

If, however, I am breaking the law and have committed any offence deserving death, I do not ask to escape the penalty; but, if there is nothing in the accusations of these people, no one has the power to give me up to them. I appeal to the Emperor."

Upon that, Festus, after conferring with his Council, answered: "You have appealed to the Emperor; to the Emperor you shall go."

Paul, however, appealed to have his case reserved for the consideration of his August Majesty, so I ordered him to be detained in custody, until I could send him to the Emperor."

Then Festus said: "King Agrippa, and all here present, you see before you the man about whom the whole Jewish people have applied to me, both at Jerusalem and here, loudly asserting that he ought not to be allowed to live.

But I have nothing definite to write about him to my Imperial Master; and for that reason I have brought him before you all, and especially before you, King Agrippa, that, after examining him, I may have something to write.

"I have been congratulating myself, King Agrippa," he said, "that it is before you that I have to make my defense to-day, with regard to all the charges brought against me by Jews,

And they have always known--if they choose to give evidence- -that, in accordance with the very strictest form of our religion, I lived a true Pharisee.

But get up and stand upright; for I have appeared to you in order to appoint you a servant and a witness of those revelations of me which you have already had, and of those in which I shall yet appear to you,

To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God; so that they may receive pardon for their sins, and a place among those who have become God's People, by faith in me.'

However I have received help from God to this very day, and so stand here, and bear my testimony to high and low alike--without adding a word to what the Prophets, as well as Moses, declared should happen--

Indeed, the King knows about these matters, so I speak before him without constraint. I am sure that there is nothing whatever of what I have been telling him that has escaped his attention; for all this has not been done in a corner.

And, speaking to Festus, Agrippa added: "The man might have been discharged, if he had not appealed to the Emperor."

It was then, when they had gone a long time without food, that Paul came forward, and said: "My friends, you should have listened to me, and not have sailed from Crete and so incurred this injury and damage.

'Have no fear, Paul; you must appear before the Emperor, and God himself has given you the lives of all your fellow-voyagers.'

Therefore, courage, my friends! for I believe God, that everything will happen exactly as I have been told.

We shall, however, have to be driven on some island."

In the interval before daybreak Paul kept urging them all to take something to eat. "It is a fortnight to-day," he said, "that, owing to your anxiety, you have gone without food, taking nothing.

"We," was their reply, "have not had any letter about you from Judea, nor have any of our fellow-Jews come and reported or said anything bad about you.

'Go to this nation and say--"You will hear with your ears without ever understanding, and, though you have eyes, you will see without ever perceiving."

For the mind of this nation has grown dense, and their ears are dull of hearing, their eyes also have they closed; lest some day they should see with their eyes, and with their ears they should hear, and in their mind they should understand, and should turn--and I should heal them.'

To all in Rome who are dear to God and have been called to become Christ's People, From Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, who has been called to become an Apostle, and has been set apart to tell God's Good News.

And among these nations are you-you who have been called to belong to Jesus Christ.

I want you to know, Brothers, that I have many times intended coming to see you-but until now I have been prevented-that I might find among you some fruit of my labors, as I have already among the other nations.

I have a duty to both the Greek and the Barbarian, to both the cultured and the ignorant.

For ever since the creation of the universe God's invisible attributes-his everlasting power and divinity-are to be seen and studied in his works, so that men have no excuse;

Therefore you have nothing to say in your own defense, whoever you are who set yourself up as a judge. In judging others you condemn yourself, for you who set yourself up as a judge do the very same things.

When Gentiles, who have no Law, do instinctively what the Law requires, they, though they have no Law, are a Law to themselves;

And, having been carefully instructed from the Law, have learned to appreciate the finer moral distinctions.

They have all gone astray; they have one and all become depraved; there is no one who is doing good-no, not one!'

For all have sinned, and all fall short of God's glorious ideal,

'Blessed are those whose wrong-doings have been forgiven and over whose sins a veil has been drawn!

Not after, but before. And it was as a sign of this that he received the rite of circumcision-to attest the righteousness due to the faith of an uncircumcised man-in order that he might be the father of all who have faith in God even when uncircumcised, that they also may be regarded by God as righteous;

As Scripture says-'I have made thee the Father of many nations.') And this they do in the sight of that God in whom Abraham had faith, and who gives life to the dead, and speaks of what does not yet exist as if it did.

But also with reference to us. Our faith, too, will be regarded by God in the same light, if we have faith in him who raised Jesus, our Lord, from the dead;

It is through him that, by reason of our faith, we have obtained admission to that place in God's favor in which we not stand. So let us exult in our hope of attaining God's glorious ideal.

Much more, then, now that we have been pronounced righteous by virtue of the shedding of his blood, shall we be saved through him from the Wrath of God.

For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, much more, now that we have become reconciled, shall we be saved by virtue of Christ's Life.

And not only that, but we exult in God, through Jesus Christ, our Lord, through whom we have now obtained this reconciliation.

If we have become united with him by the act symbolic of his death, surely we shall also become united with him by the act symbolic of his resurrection.

And our belief is, that, as we have shared Christ's Death, we shall also share his Life.

Do not offer any part of your bodies to Sin, in the cause of unrighteousness, but once for all offer yourselves to God (as those who, though once dead, now have Life), and devote every part of your bodies to the cause of righteousness.

But now that you have been set free from the control of Sin, and have become servants to God, the fruit that you reap is an ever-increasing holiness, and the end Immortal Life.

What are we to say, then? That Law and sin are the same thing? Heaven forbid! On the contrary, I should not have learned what sin is, had not it been for Law. If the Law did not say 'Thou shalt not covet,' I should not know what it is to covet.

The very Commandment that should have meant Life I found to result in Death!

And not Nature only; but we ourselves also, though we have already a first gift of the Spirit-we ourselves are inwardly groaning, while we eagerly await our full adoption as Sons-the redemption of our bodies.

But we do know that God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love him-those who have received the Call in accordance with his purpose.

For these words are the words of a promise-'About this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.'

It is as Isaiah foretold-'Had not the Lord of Hosts spared some few of our race to us, we should have become like Sodom and been made to resemble Gomorrah.'

As Scripture says-'See, I place a Stumbling-block in Zion-- a Rock which shall prove a hindrance; and he who believes in him shall have no cause for shame.'

As the passage of Scripture says--'No one who believes in him shall have any cause for shame.'

For no distinction is made between the Jew and the Greek, for all have the same Lord, and he is bountiful to all who invoke him.

But how, it may be asked, are they to invoke one in whom they have not learned to believe? And how are they to believe in one whose words they have not heard? And how are they to hear his words unless some one proclaims him?

But I ask 'Is it possible that men have never heard?' No, indeed, for--'Their voices spread through all the earth, and their Message to the very ends of the world.'

But of the people of Israel he says--'All day long I have stretched out my hands to a people who disobey and contradict.'

God has not rejected his People, whom he chose from the first. Have you forgotten the words of Scripture in the story of Elijah- how he appeals to God against Israel?

'Lord, they have killed thy Prophets, they have pulled down thy altars, and I only am left; and now they are eager to take my life.'

But what was the divine response? 'I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have never bowed the knee to Baal.'

And they shall see the fulfillment of my Covenant, when I have taken away their sins.'

Just as you at one time were disobedient to him, but have now found mercy in the day of their disobedience;

So, too, they have now become disobedient in your day of mercy, in order that they also in their turn may now find mercy.

In fulfillment of the charge with which I have been entrusted, I bid every one of you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think, but to think till he learns to think soberly--in accordance with the measure of faith that God has allotted to each.

Let every one obey the supreme Authorities. For no Authority exists except by the will of God, and the existing Authorities have been appointed by God.

A good action has nothing to fear from Rulers; a bad action has. Do you want to have no reason to fear the Authorities? Then do what is good, and you will win their praise.

This I say, because you know the crisis that we have reached, for the time has already come for you to rouse yourselves from sleep; our Salvation is nearer now than when we accepted the Faith.

The night is almost gone; the day is near. Therefore let us have done with the deeds of Darkness, and arm ourselves with the weapons of Light.

So, then, each one of us will have to render account of himself to God.

But in parts of this letter I have expressed myself somewhat boldly--by way of refreshing your memories--