Chapter 16

¹Rejoice not in ungodly children, if they be multiplied: neither be delighted in them, if the fear of God be not with them. ²Trust not to their life, and respect not their labours. ³For better is one that feareth God, than a thousand ungodly children. ⁴And it is better to die without children, than to leave ungodly children. ⁵By one that is wise a country shall be inhabited, the tribe of the ungodly shall become desolate. ⁶Many such things hath my eyes seen, and greater things than these my ear hath heard. ⁷In the congregation of sinners a fire shall be kindled, and in an unbelieving nation wrath shall dame out. ⁸The ancient giants did not obtain pardon for their sine, who were destroyed trusting to their own strength: ⁹And he spared not the place where Lot sojourned, but abhorred them for the pride of their word. ¹⁰He had not pity on them, destroying the whole nation that extolled themselves in their sine. ¹¹So did he with the six hundred thousand footmen, who were gathered together in the hardness of their heart: and if one had been stiffnecked, it is a wonder if he had escaped unpunished: ¹²For mercy and wrath are with him. He is mighty to forgive, and to pour out indignation: ¹³According as his mercy is, so his correction judgeth a man according to his works. ¹⁴The sinner shall not escape in his rapines, and the patience of him that sheweth mercy shall not be put off. ¹⁵All mercy shall make a place for every man according to the merit of his works, and according to the wisdom of his sojournment. ¹⁶Say not: I shall be hidden from God. and who shall remember me from on high? ¹⁷In such a multitude I shall not be known: for what is my soul in such an immense creation? ¹⁸Behold the heaven, and the heavens of heavens, the deep, and all the earth, and the things that are in them, shall be moved in his sight, ¹⁹The mountains also, and the hills, end the foundations of the earth: when God shall look upon them, they shall be shaken with trembling. ²⁰And in all these things the heart is senseless: and every heart is understood by him: ²¹And his ways who shall understand, and the storm, which no eye of man see? ²²For many of his works are hidden: hut the works of his justice who shall declare? or who shall endure? for the testament is far from some, and the examination of all is in the end. ²³He that wanteth understanding thinketh vain things: and the foolish, and erring man, thinketh foolish things. ²⁴Hearken to me, my son, and learn the discipline of understanding, and attend to my words in thy heart. ²⁵And I will shew forth good doctrine in equity, and will seek to declare wisdom: and attend to my words in thy heart, whilst with equity of spirit I tell thee the virtues that God hath put upon his works from the beginning, and I shew forth in truth his knowledge. ²⁶The works of God are done in judgment from the beginning, and from the making of them he distinguished their parts, and their beginnings in their generations. ²⁷He beautified their works for ever, they have neither hungered, nor laboured, and they have not ceased from their works. ²⁸Nor shall any of them straiten his neighbour at any time. ²⁹Be not thou incredulous to his word. ³⁰After this God looked upon the earth, and filled it with his goods. ³¹The soul of every living thing hath shewn forth before the face thereof, and into it they return again.