22. for you know in your heartthat many times you yourself have cursed others.
23. All this I tested by wisdom and I said,‘I am determined to be wise’ –but this was beyond me.
24. Whatever exists is far off and most profound –who can discover it?
25. So I turned my mind to understand,to investigate and to search out wisdom and the scheme of thingsand to understand the stupidity of wickednessand the madness of folly.
26. I find more bitter than deaththe woman who is a snare,whose heart is a trapand whose hands are chains.The man who pleases God will escape her,but the sinner she will ensnare.
27. ‘Look,’ says the Teacher, ‘this is what I have discovered:‘Adding one thing to another to discover the scheme of things –
28. while I was still searchingbut not finding –I found one upright man among a thousand,but not one upright woman among them all.
29. This only have I found:God created mankind upright,but they have gone in search of many schemes.’