Study Desk

Iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.

As the faces of them that look therein, shine in the water, so the hearts of men are laid open to the wise.

Hell and destruction are never filled: so the eyes of men are never satisfied.

As silver is tried in the fining-pot, and gold in the furnace: so a man is tried by the mouth of him that praiseth. The heart of the wicked seeketh after evils, but the righteous heart seeketh after knowledge.

As a roaring lion, and a hungry bear, so is a wicked prince over the poor people.

Whom I know not whether he will be a wise man or a fool, and he shall have rule over all my labours with which I have laboured and been solicitous: and is there anything so vain?

For when a man laboureth in wisdom, and knowledge, and carefulness, he leaveth what he hath gotten to an idle man: so this also is vanity, and a great evil.

Who shall so feast and abound with delights as I?

He hath made all things good in their time, and hath delivered the world to their consideration, so that man cannot find out the work which God hath made from the beginning to the end.

Therefore the death of man, and of beasts is one, and the condition of them both is equal: as man dieth, so they also die: all things breathe alike, and man hath nothing more than beast: all things are subject to vanity.

Again I considered all the labours of men, and I remarked that their industries are exposed to the envy of their neighbour: so in this also there is vanity, and fruitless care.

(5-9) A covetous man shall not be satisfied with money: and he that loveth riches shall reap no fruit from them: so this also is vanity.

(5-14) As he came forth naked from his mother’s womb, so shall he return, and shall take nothing away with him of his labour.

(5-15) A most deplorable evil: as he came, so shall he return. What then doth it profit him that he hath laboured for the wind?

(7-7) For as the crackling of thorns burning under a pot, so is the laughter of a fool: now this also is vanity.

(7-13) For as wisdom is a defence, so money is a defence: but learning and wisdom excel in this, that they give life to him that possesseth them.

And his word is full of power: neither can any man say to him: Why dost thou so?

And I understood that man can find no reason of all those works of God that are done under the sun: and the more he shall labour to seek, so much the less shall he find: yea, though the wise man shall say, that he knoweth it, he shall not be able to find it.

But all things are kept uncertain for the time to come, because all things equally happen to the just and to the wicked, to the good and to the evil, to the clean and to the unclean, to him that offereth victims, and to him that despiseth sacrifices. As the good is, so also is the sinner: as the perjured, so he also that sweareth truth.

Man knoweth not his own end: but as fishes are taken with the hook, and as birds are caught with the snare, so men are taken in the evil time, when it shall suddenly come upon them.