¹⁸ For by speaking high-sounding but empty words^[a], they entice with desires of the flesh and with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, ¹⁹ promising them freedom although they^[b] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also^[c] enslaved. ²⁰ For if, after they^[d] have escaped from the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord^[e] and Savior Jesus Christ, and they are again entangled in these things and succumb to them, the last state has become worse for them than the first.