King James VersionEcclesiastes5

Ecclesiastes

1 Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sac­ri­fice of fools: for they con­sid­er not that they do evil. 2 Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to ut­ter any thing be­fore God: for God is in heav­en, and thou upon earth: there­fore let thy words be few. 3 For a dream cometh through the mul­ti­tude of busi­ness; and a fool's voice is known by mul­ti­tude of words. 4 When thou vow­est a vow unto God, de­fer not to pay it; for he hath no plea­sure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed. 5 Bet­ter is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay. 6 Suf­fer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; nei­ther say thou be­fore the an­gel, that it was an er­ror: where­fore should God be an­gry at thy voice, and de­stroy the work of thine hands? 7 For in the mul­ti­tude of dreams and many words there are also divers van­i­ties: but fear thou God. 8 If thou seest the op­pres­sion of the poor, and vi­o­lent per­vert­ing of judg­ment and jus­tice in a province, mar­vel not at the mat­ter: for he that is high­er than the high­est re­gardeth; and there be high­er than they. 9 More­over the prof­it of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field. 10 He that loveth sil­ver shall not be sat­is­fied with sil­ver; nor he that loveth abun­dance with in­crease: this is also van­i­ty. 11 When goods in­crease, they are in­creased that eat them: and what good is there to the own­ers there­of, sav­ing the be­hold­ing of them with their eyes? 12 The sleep of a labour­ing man is sweet, whether he eat lit­tle or much: but the abun­dance of the rich will not suf­fer him to sleep. 13 There is a sore evil which I have seen un­der the sun, namely, rich­es kept for the own­ers there­of to their hurt. 14 But those rich­es per­ish by evil tra­vail: and he beget­teth a son, and there is noth­ing in his hand. 15 As he came forth of his mother's womb, naked shall he re­turn to go as he came, and shall take noth­ing of his labour, which he may car­ry away in his hand. 16 And this also is a sore evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go: and what prof­it hath he that hath laboured for the wind? 17 All his days also he eateth in dark­ness, and he hath much sor­row and wrath with his sick­ness. 18 Be­hold that which I have seen: it is good and come­ly ­for one to eat and to drink, and to en­joy the good of all his labour that he taketh un­der the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his por­tion. 19 Ev­ery man also to whom God hath giv­en rich­es and wealth, and hath giv­en him pow­er to eat there­of, and to take his por­tion, and to re­joice in his labour; this is the gift of God. 20 For he shall not much re­mem­ber the days of his life; be­cause God an­swereth him in the joy of his heart.