¶ Iames the servant of God, and of the Lord Iesus Christ, sendeth greeting to the xij. tribes which are scattered here and there. My brethren, count it exceeding joy when ye fall into diverse temptations, remembering how that the trying of your faith bringeth patience: and let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and sound, that nothing be lacking unto you.
¶ If any that is among you lack wisdom, let him ask of God (which giveth to all men without doubleness, and casteth no man in the teeth:) and it shall be given him: but let him ask in faith, and waver not. For he that doubteth is like the waves of the sea, tossed of the wind, and carried with violence. Neither let that man think that he shall receive any thing of God. A wavering minded man is unstable in all his ways.
¶ Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted, and the rich in that he is made low. For even as the flower of the grass shall he vanish away. The son riseth with heat, and the grass is withered, and his flower fallen away, and the beauty of the fashion of it is perished: even so shall the rich man perish in his abundance.
¶ Happy is the man that endureth in temptation, for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.
¶ Let no man say when he is tempted that he is tempted of God: for God tempteth not unto evil: he tempteth no man: But every man is tempted drawn away, and enticed of his own concupiscence. Then when lust hath conceived, she bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is finished bringeth forth death.
¶ Err not my dear brethren. Every good gift, and every perfect gift, is from above and cometh down from the father of light, with whom is no variableness, neither is he changed unto darkness. Of his own will begat he us with the word of life, that we should be the first of his creatures.
¶ Wherefore dear brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. For the wrath of man worketh not that which is righteous before God.
¶ Wherefore lay apart all filthiness, all superfluity of maliciousness, and receive with meekness the word that is grafted in you, which is able to save your souls: And see that ye be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any hear the word, and do it not, he is like unto a man that beholdeth his bodily face in a glass. For as soon as he hath looked on himself, he goeth his way, and hath immediately forgotten what his fashion was: but whosoever looketh in the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein (if he be not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work) he shall be happy in his deed.
¶ If any man among you seem devout, and refrain not his tongue: but deceive his own heart, this man's devotion is in vain. Pure devotion and undefiled before God the father, is this: To visit the friendless, and widows in their adversity, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
© Faith of God
William Tyndale 1526