Combined with a stedfast Faith in the Life to come. Ch. xi., v. 9-Ch.

vv. 1-8.

1 Cast thy bread upon the waters,
For in time thou mayest find the good of it;
2 Give a portion to seven, and even to eight,
For thou knowest not what calamity may come upon the earth.
3 When the clouds are full of rain,
They empty it upon the earth;
And when the tree falleth, toward south or north,
In the place where the tree falleth there will it lie.
4 Whoso watcheth the wind shall not sow,
And he who observeth the clouds shall not reap;
5 As thou knowest the course of the wind
As little as that of the embryo in the womb of the pregnant,
So thou knowest not the work of God,
Who worketh all things.
6 Sow, then, thy seed in the morning,
And slack not thy hand in the evening,
Since thou knowest not which shall prosper, this or that,
Or whether both shall prove good:
7 And the light shall be sweet to thee,
And it shall be pleasant to thine eyes to behold the sun:
8 For even if a man should live many years,
He ought to rejoice in them all,
And to remember that there will be many dark days;
Yea, that all that cometh is vanity.

xii., v. 7.

9 Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth,
And let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth;
And pursue the ways of thine heart,
And that which thine eyes desire;
And know that for all these
God will bring thee into judgment:
10 Banish, therefore, care from thy mind,
And put away sadness from thy flesh,
For youth and manhood are vanity.

xii.

And remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth,
Before the evil days come,
And the years approach of which thou shalt say,
"I have no pleasure in them;"
2 Before the sun groweth dark,
And the light, and the moon, and the stars;
And the clouds return after the rain:
3 When the keepers of the house shall quake,
And the men of power crouch down;
When the grinding-maids shall stop because so few are left,
And the women who look out of the lattices shall be shrouded in
darkness,
And the door shall be closed on the street:

Ver. 3.: The women who look out of the lattices; i.e. the luxurious ladies of the harem looking through their windows to see what is going on outside. Compare Judges v. 28; 2 Samuel vi. 16; and 2 Kings ix. 30.

4 When the sound of the mills shall cease,
And the swallow fly shrieking to and fro,
And all the song-birds drop silently into their nests.

Ver. 4.: The swallow, etc. Literally, "the bird shall arise for a noise," i.e. the bird which flies abroad and makes a noise at the approach of a tempest: viz. the swallow. All the songbirds. Literally, "all the daughters of song," a Hebraism for birds.

5 There shall be terror at that which cometh from the height,
And fear shall beset the highway:
The almond also shall be rejected,
And the locust be loathed,
And the caper-berry provoke no appetite;
Because man goeth to his long home,
And the mourners pace up and down the street;--

Ver. 5.: From the height, i.e. from heaven. The locust be loathed. It is commonly assumed that the locust was only eaten by the poor; but Aristotle (Hist. Anim., v. 30) names them as a delicacy, and Ginsburg affirms that they are still considered so by the cultivated and well-to-do Arabs. His long home. Literally, "his eternal home," the domus æterna of the early Christian tombs.

6 Before the silver cord snappeth asunder,
And the golden bowl escapeth;
Before the pitcher be shattered at the fountain,
And the wheel is broken at the well;
7 And the body is cast into the earth from which it came,
And the spirit returneth to God who gave it.