8. Always be clothed in white, and always anoint your head with oil.
9. Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun – all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labour under the sun.
10. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.
11. I have seen something else under the sun:The race is not to the swiftor the battle to the strong,nor does food come to the wiseor wealth to the brilliantor favour to the learned;but time and chance happen to them all.
12. Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come:As fish are caught in a cruel net,or birds are taken in a snare,so people are trapped by evil timesthat fall unexpectedly upon them.
13. I also saw under the sun this example of wisdom that greatly impressed me:
14. there was once a small city with only a few people in it. And a powerful king came against it, surrounded it and built huge siege works against it.
15. Now there lived in that city a man poor but wise, and he saved the city by his wisdom. But nobody remembered that poor man.
16. So I said, ‘Wisdom is better than strength.’ But the poor man’s wisdom is despised, and his words are no longer heeded.
17. The quiet words of the wise are more to be heededthan the shouts of a ruler of fools.
18. Wisdom is better than weapons of war,but one sinner destroys much good.