1 Though I spake with the tongues of men and angels, and yet had no love, I were even as sounding brass: or as a tinkling cymbal.
2 And though I could prophesy, and understood all secrets, and all knowledge: yea, if I had all faith so that I could move mountains out of their places, and yet had no love, I were nothing.
3 And though I bestowed all my goods to feed the poor, and though I gave my body even that I burned, and yet had no love, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Love suffereth long, and is courteous. Love envieth not. Love doth not forwardly, swelleth not,
5 dealeth not dishonestly, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh not evil,
6 rejoiceth not in iniquity: but rejoiceth in the truth,
7 suffereth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth in all things.
8 Though that prophesying fail, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge vanish away: yet love falleth never away.
9 For our knowledge is unperfect, and our prophesying is unperfect:
10 but when that which is perfect is come, then that which is unperfect shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I imagined as a child: but as soon as I was a man I put away childishness.
12 Now we see in a glass, even in a dark speaking: but then shall we see face to face. Now I know unperfectly: but then shall I know even as I am known.
13 Now abideth faith, hope, and love, even these three: but the chief of these is love.