1. I may be able to speak the languages of human beings and even of angels, but if I have no love, my speech is no more than a noisy gong or a clanging bell.
2. I may have the gift of inspired preaching; I may have all knowledge and understand all secrets; I may have all the faith needed to move mountains — but if I have no love, I am nothing.
3. I may give away everything I have, and even give up my body to be burnt — but if I have no love, this does me no good.
4. Love is patient and kind; it is not jealous or conceited or proud;
5. love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs;
6. love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth.
7. Love never gives up; and its faith, hope, and patience never fail.
8. Love is eternal. There are inspired messages, but they are temporary; there are gifts of speaking in strange tongues, but they will cease; there is knowledge, but it will pass.
9. For our gifts of knowledge and of inspired messages are only partial;
10. but when what is perfect comes, then what is partial will disappear.
11. When I was a child, my speech, feelings, and thinking were all those of a child; now that I have grown up, I have no more use for childish ways.
12. What we see now is like a dim image in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. What I know now is only partial; then it will be complete — as complete as God's knowledge of me.
13. Meanwhile these three remain: faith, hope, and love; and the greatest of these is love.