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7:1  A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death, than the day of birth.
7:2  It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting; for this is the end of everyone, and the living will lay it to heart.
7:3  Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of countenance the heart is made glad.
7:4  The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth.
7:5  It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise than to hear the song of fools.
7:6  For like the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of fools; this also is vanity.
7:7  Surely oppression makes the wise foolish, and a bribe corrupts the heart.
7:8  Better is the end of a thing than its beginning; the patient in spirit are better than the proud in spirit.
7:9  Do not be quick to anger, for anger lodges in the bosom of fools.
7:10  Do not say, ‘Why were the former days better than these?’ For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
7:11  Wisdom is as good as an inheritance, an advantage to those who see the sun.
7:12  For the protection of wisdom is like the protection of money, and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom gives life to the one who possesses it.
7:13  Consider the work of God; who can make straight what he has made crooked?
7:14  On the day of prosperity be joyful, and on the day of adversity consider; God has made the one as well as the other, so that mortals may not find out anything that will come after them.
7:15  In my vain life I have seen everything; there are righteous people who perish in their righteousness, and there are wicked people who prolong their life in their evildoing.
7:16  Do not be too righteous, and do not act too wise; why should you destroy yourself?
7:17  Do not be too wicked, and do not be a fool; why should you die before your time?
7:18  It is good that you should take hold of the one, without letting go of the other; for the one who fears God shall succeed with both.
7:19  Wisdom gives strength to the wise more than ten rulers that are in a city.
7:20  Surely there is no one on earth so righteous as to do good without ever sinning.
7:21  Do not give heed to everything that people say, or you may hear your servant cursing you;
7:22  your heart knows that many times you have yourself cursed others.
7:23  All this I have tested by wisdom; I said, ‘I will be wise’, but it was far from me.
7:24  That which is, is far off, and deep, very deep; who can find it out?
7:25  I turned my mind to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the sum of things, and to know that wickedness is folly and that foolishness is madness.
7:26  I found more bitter than death the woman who is a trap, whose heart is snares and nets, whose hands are fetters; one who pleases God escapes her, but the sinner is taken by her.
7:27  See, this is what I found, says the Teacher, adding one thing to another to find the sum,
7:28  which my mind has sought repeatedly, but I have not found. One man among a thousand I found, but a woman among all these I have not found.
7:29  See, this alone I found, that God made human beings straightforward, but they have devised many schemes.