therefore, give themselves up ¢o excess, to practise all kinds of uncleanness, ἐν πλεονεξίᾳ, with greediness, i. e. insatiably. The parallel passage, 2 Pet. 2,14, “ Hav- ing eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin,’ would favour this interpretation so far as the idea is concerned. But the word πλεονεξία always else- where means, covetousness ; a desire to have more. And as this gives a good sense it is not right to depart from the established meaning. “Ev πλεονεξίᾳ, therefore, means with, i. e. together with, covetousness. The heathen give themselves up to uncleanness and covet- ousness. These two vices are elsewhere thus asso- ciated, as in ch. 5, 8. 5, “Let not uncleanness or covetousness be named among you.” “No unclean person, nor covetous man, &c.” See also Col. 3, 5. Rom. 1, 29. 1 Cor. 5,10. Here as in Rom. 1, 24, im-
morality is connected with impiety as its inevitable | consequence. Men in their folly think that morality may be preserved without religion, and even that morality is religion; but reason, experience and Scrip- ture all prove that if men do not love and fear God they give themselves up to vice in some form, and com- monly either to uncleanness or avarice. There is a two-fold reason for this; one is the nature of the soul which has no independent source of goodness in itself, so that if it turns from God it sinks into pollution, and the other is the punitive justice of God. He abandons those who abandon him. In Rom. 1, 24 and elsewhere, it is said ‘God gives the impious up to uncleanness;’ here it is said, they give themselves up. These are only