9:1 For all this I considered in my heart even to declare all
this, that the righteous, and the wise, and their works, [are]
in the hand of God: no man knoweth either love or hatred [by]
all [that is] before them.
9:2 All [things come] alike to all: [there is] one event to the
righteous, and to the wicked; to the good and to the clean, and
to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that
sacrificeth not: as [is] the good, so [is] the sinner; [and] he
that sweareth, as [he] that feareth an oath.
9:3 This [is] an evil among all [things] that are done under the
sun, that [there is] one event to all: yes, also the heart of
the sons of men is full of evil, and madness [is] in their
heart while they live, and after that [they go] to the dead.
9:4 For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope:
for a living dog is better than a dead lion.
9:5 For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know
not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the
memory of them is forgotten.
9:6 Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, hath now
perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any
[thing] that is done under the sun.
9:7 Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with
a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works.
9:8 Let thy garments be always white; and let thy head lack no
ointment.
9:9 Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of
the life of thy vanity, which he hath given thee under the sun,
all the days of thy vanity: for that [is] thy portion in [this]
life, and in thy labor which thou takest under the sun.
9:10 Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do [it] with thy might;
for [there is] no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom,
in the grave, whither thou goest.
9:11 I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to
the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to
the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor
to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.
9:12 For man also knoweth not his time: as the fishes that are
taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the
snare; so [are] the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it
falleth suddenly upon them.
9:13 This wisdom have I seen also under the sun, and it [seemed]
to me great:
9:14 [There was] a little city, and few men within it; and there
came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great
bulwarks against it:
9:15 Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his
wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor
man.
9:16 Then said I, wisdom [is] better than strength: nevertheless
the poor man's wisdom [is] despised, and his words are not
heard.
9:17 The words of wise [men are] heard in quiet more than the
cry of him that ruleth among fools.
9:18 Wisdom [is] better than weapons of war: but one sinner
destroyeth much good.
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