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8:1  Who can be compared with a wise person? Who else knows what a thing means? Wisdom lights up the face and softens a grim appearance.
8:2  Keep the king’s command because of the oath before God.
8:3  Don’t be quick to leave his presence, and don’t persist in doing what is wrong, for he does whatever he pleases.
8:4  After all, his word is final; who can challenge him, “Why are you doing that?”
8:5  Whoever obeys his command will never come to harm, and the wise person will know the right time and judgment.
8:6  For to everything there is a right time and a judgment, since people are greatly troubled
8:7  by uncertainty over the future; even when the event takes place, who will tell them about it?
8:8  Just as no one has the power to keep the wind from blowing, so no one has power over the day of death. If one is drafted to fight a war, one can’t send a substitute; likewise the wicked won’t escape death by their wickedness.
8:9  All this I have seen, as I applied my mind to everything done under the sun when one person tyrannizes another.
8:10  Thus I saw the wicked buried; they had even come from the Holy Place. But those who had acted uprightly were forgotten in the city. This too is a futile thing;
8:11  because the punishment decreed for an evil act is not promptly carried out; therefore people who plan to do evil are strengthened in their intentions.
8:12  For a sinner can do evil a hundred times and still live a long life; although I know that in the end things will go well with those who fear God, because they fear him.
8:13  But things will not go well with the wicked; and, like a shadow, he will not prolong his days; because he doesn’t fear God.
8:14  There is something frustrating that occurs on earth, namely, that there are righteous people to whom things happen as if they were doing wicked deeds; and, again, there are wicked people to whom things happen as if they were doing righteous deeds. I say that this too is pointless.
8:15  So I recommend enjoyment — a person can do nothing better under the sun than eat, drink and enjoy himself; this is what should accompany him as he does his work for as long as God gives him to live under the sun.
8:16  When I applied myself to gain wisdom and to observe how people occupy themselves on earth, that people’s eyes don’t see sleep either by day or by night,
8:17  then, on looking over all of God’s work, I realized that it is impossible to grasp all the activity taking place under the sun; because even if a person works hard at searching it out, he won’t grasp it; and even if a wise person thinks he knows it, he still won’t be able to grasp it.