Ecclesiastes 7

¹ A good name is better than fine perfume,
and the day of death better than the day of birth.

² Better to go to a house of mourning
than to go to a house of feasting,
for death is the end of every person,
and the living should take it to heart.

³ Sorrow is better than laughter,
for by a downcast face the heart is made glad.

⁴ The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,
but the heart of fools is in the house of pleasure.

⁵ Better to listen to the rebuke of the wise
than to listen to the song of fools.

⁶ For like the crackling of thorns under a pot,
so is the laughter of fools.
This too is a fleeting breath.

⁷ For oppression makes the wise foolish,
and a bribe corrupts the heart.

⁸ Better the end of a matter than its beginning;
better patience of spirit than pride of spirit.

⁹ Do not be quick in your spirit to become angry,
for anger rests in the lap of fools.

¹⁰ Do not say, 'Why were the former days better than these?'
For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.

¹¹ Wisdom is as good as an inheritance—
an advantage for those who see the sun.

¹² For wisdom is a shelter
just as money is a shelter,
but the advantage of knowledge is this:
wisdom preserves the life of its owner.

¹³ Consider the work of God:
who can straighten
what he has made crooked?

¹⁴ In the day of prosperity, enjoy the good;
in the day of adversity, consider:
God has made the one alongside the other
so that no one can discover
anything that comes after them.

¹⁵ In my fleeting life I have seen both of these:
a righteous person perishing in their righteousness,
and a wicked person living long in their wickedness.

¹⁶ Do not be excessively righteous,
and do not make yourself overly wise—
why destroy yourself?

¹⁷ Do not be excessively wicked,
and do not be a fool—
why die before your time?

¹⁸ It is good to grasp the one
without letting go of the other,
for the one who fears God
will go forth with both.

¹⁹ Wisdom makes the wise stronger
than ten rulers in a city.

²⁰ Surely there is no one righteous on earth
who does good and never sins.

²¹ Also, do not take to heart all the words people speak,
or you may hear your servant cursing you—

²² for your own heart knows
that many times you yourself
have cursed others.

²³ All this I tested by wisdom.
I said, 'I will be wise,'
but it was far from me.

²⁴ Whatever has been is far off
and deep, so deep—
who can find it out?

²⁵ I turned my heart to know and to search out
and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things,
and to know that wickedness is folly
and foolishness is madness.

²⁶ And I find more bitter than death
the woman who is a trap—
whose heart is snares and whose hands are chains.
Whoever pleases God escapes her,
but the sinner is captured by her.

²⁷ 'See, this is what I found,' says the Teacher,
'adding one thing to another to find the scheme of things—'

²⁸ 'which my soul has sought repeatedly
but I have not found:
One man among a thousand I found,
but a woman among all these I have not found.'

²⁹ 'See, this alone I found:
God made humanity upright,
but they have sought out many schemes.'