James 1
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition
2James, a servant of God, and of our Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are dispersed, greeting. 3My brethren, count it all joy, when you shall fall into divers temptations: 4Knowing that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 5And patience hath a perfect work: that you may be perfect and entire, deficient in nothing. 6But if any of you want wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all abundantly, and upbraideth not: and it shall be given him. 7But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering: for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, that is moved and carried about by the wind. 8Therefore let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. 9A double-minded man is inconstant in all his ways. 10But let the brother of low condition glory in his exaltation: 11But the rich, in his being low, because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away: 12For the sun rose with a burning heat, and parched the grass, and the flower thereof fell off, and the beauty of the shape thereof perished: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways. 13Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he hath been proved, he shall receive a crown of life, which God hath promised to them that love him. 14Let no man, when he is tempted, say, that he is tempted by God: For God is not a tempter of evils: and he tempteth no man. 15But every man is tempted, being drawn away by his own concupiscence, and allured. 16Then when concupiscence hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: But sin, when it is completed, begetteth death. 17Do not err, therefore, my dearest brethren. 18Every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of vicissitude. 19For of his own will hath he begotten us by the word of truth, that we might be some beginning of his creatures. 20You know, my dearest brethren: And let every man be swift to hear; but slow to speak, and slow to anger. 21For the anger of man worketh not the justice of God. 22Wherefore casting away all uncleanness, and abundance of malice, with meekness receive the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. 23But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. 24For if a man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer; he shall be compared to a man beholding his natural countenance in a glass: 25For he beheld himself, and went his way, and presently forgot what manner of man he was. 26But he that shall look into the perfect law of liberty, and continue in it, not becoming a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work; this man shall be blessed in his deed. 27But if any man think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his own heart, this man's religion is vain. 28Religion, pure and immaculate with God and the Father, is this: To visit the fatherless and widows in their tribulation, and to keep one's self immaculate from this world.