Ecclesiastes 9:6-17

⁶Also their loue, and their hatred, and their enuie is now perished, and they haue no more portion for euer, in all that is done vnder the sunne.

⁷Goe, eate thy bread with ioy, and drinke thy wine with a cheerefull heart: for God nowe accepteth thy workes.

⁸At all times let thy garments be white, and let not oyle be lacking vpon thine head.

⁹Reioyce with the wife whom thou hast loued all the dayes of the life of thy vanitie, which God hath giuen thee vnder the sunne all the dayes of thy vanitie: for this is thy portion in the life, and in thy trauaile wherein thou labourest vnder the sunne.

¹⁰All that thine hand shall finde to doe, doe it with all thy power: for there is neither worke nor inuention, nor knowledge, nor wisedome in the graue whither thou goest.

¹¹I returned, and I sawe vnder the sunne that the race is not to the swift, nor the battell to the strong, nor yet bread to the wise, nor also riches to men of vnderstanding, neither yet fauour to men of knowledge: but time and chance commeth to them all.

¹²For neither doth man knowe his time, but as the fishes which are taken in an euill net, and as the birdes that are caught in the snare: so are the children of men snared in the euill time when it falleth vpon them suddenly.

¹³I haue also seene this wisedome vnder the sunne, and it is great vnto me.

¹⁴A litle citie and fewe men in it, and a great King came against it, and compassed it about, and builded fortes against it.

¹⁵And there was founde therein a poore and wise man, and he deliuered the citie by his wisedome: but none remembred this poore man.

¹⁶Then said I, Better is wisdome then strength: yet the wisedome of the poore is despised, and his wordes are not heard.

¹⁷The wordes of the wise are more heard in quietnes, then the crye of him that ruleth among fooles.