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But you, our God, are gracious and true,
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For even if we sin, we are yours, knowing your dominion;
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For to be acquainted with you is[a] perfect righteousness,
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For we weren’t led astray by any evil plan of men’s,
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the sight of which leads fools into[b] lust.
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Lovers of evil things, and worthy of such hopes,
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For a potter, kneading soft earth,
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Also, labouring to an evil end, he moulds a vain god out of the same clay, when he is required to give back the[c] soul which was lent him.
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However he has anxious care, and he imitates molders in[d] brass,
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His heart is ashes.
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because he was ignorant of him who moulded him, and of him that inspired into him[e] an active[f] soul,
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But[g] he accounted our life to be a game, and our[h] lifetime a festival for profit;
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For this man, beyond all others, knows that he sins,
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But most foolish and more miserable than a baby,
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because they even considered all the idols of the nations to be gods,
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For a man made them,
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But, being mortal, he makes a dead thing by the work of lawless hands;
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Yes, and they worship the creatures that are most hateful,
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Neither, as seen beside other creatures, are they beautiful, so that one should desire them,