1Guard your foot when you go to the house of God; for to draw near to hear is better than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they do not know that they do evil.
2Do not be rash with your mouth, and do not let your heart be hasty to utter anything before God; for God is in heaven, and you upon earth: therefore let your words be few.
3For a dream comes with a multitude of business, and a fool’s voice with a multitude of words.
4When you vow a vow to God, do not delay to pay it; for he has no pleasure in fools: pay what you vow.
5It is better that you should not vow, than that you should vow and not pay.
6Do not allow your mouth to cause your flesh to sin; nor say before the angel, that it was an error: why should God be angry at your voice, and destroy the work of your hands?
7For in the multitude of dreams there are vanities, and in many words: but fear God.
8If you see the oppression of the poor, and the violent taking away of justice and righteousness in a province, do not marvel at the matter: for one higher than the high watches; and there are higher than they.
9Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field.
10He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he who loves abundance, with increase: this also is vanity.
11When goods increase, those who eat them are increased; and what advantage is there to their owner, except the beholding of them with his eyes?
12The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eats little or much; but the fullness of the rich will not allow him to sleep.
13There is a grievous evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept by their owner to his hurt:
14and those riches perish by a bad venture; and if he has fathered a son, there is nothing in his hand.
15As he came forth from his mother’s womb, naked he shall go again as he came, and shall take nothing for his labor, which he may carry away in his hand.
16And this also is a grievous evil, that in all points as he came, so he shall go: and what profit has he that he labors for the wind?
17All his days also he eats in darkness, and he is greatly vexed, and has sickness and wrath.
18Behold, what I have seen to be good and to be fitting is for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy good in all his labor, in which he labors under the sun, all the days of his life which God has given him: for this is his portion.
19Every man also to whom God has given riches and wealth, and has given him power to eat of it, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labor—this is the gift of God.
20For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answers him in the joy of his heart.