13. For now should I have lain down and been quiet; I should have slept; then had I been at rest,
14. With kings and counsellors of the earth, Who built up waste places for themselves;
15. Or with princes that had gold, Who filled their houses with silver:
16. Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, As infants that never saw light.
17. There the wicked cease from troubling; And there the weary are at rest.
18. There the prisoners are at ease together; They hear not the voice of the taskmaster.
19. The small and the great are there: And the servant is free from his master.
20. Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, And life unto the bitter in soul;
21. Who long for death, but it cometh not, And dig for it more than for hid treasures;
22. Who rejoice exceedingly, And are glad, when they can find the grave?
23. Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, And whom God hath hedged in?
24. For my sighing cometh before I eat, And my groanings are poured out like water.