Who [is] like a wise [man?] And who knows the interpretation of a thing? A man's wisdom makes his face shine, And the sternness of his face is changed.
No one has power over the spirit to retain the spirit, And no one has power in the day of death. [There is] no release from that war, And wickedness will not deliver those who are given to it.
All this I have seen, and applied my heart to every work that is done under the sun: [There is] a time in which one man rules over another to his own hurt.
Then I saw the wicked buried, who had come and gone from the place of holiness, and they were forgotten in the city where they had so done. This also [is] vanity.
Though a sinner does evil a hundred [times,] and his [days] are prolonged, yet I surely know that it will be well with those who fear God, who fear before Him.
There is a vanity which occurs on earth, that there are just [men] to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked; again, there are wicked [men] to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. I said that this also [is] vanity.
So I commended enjoyment, because a man has nothing better under the sun than to eat, drink, and be merry; for this will remain with him in his labor [all] the days of his life which God gives him under the sun.
then I saw all the work of God, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. For though a man labors to discover [it,] yet he will not find [it;] moreover, though a wise [man] attempts to know [it,] he will not be able to find [it.]