4. I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards.
5. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them.
6. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees.
7. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me.
8. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well—the delights of a man’s heart.
9. I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.
10. I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil.
11. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.
12. Then I turned my thoughts to consider wisdom, and also madness and folly. What more can the king’s successor do than what has already been done?
13. I saw that wisdom is better than folly, just as light is better than darkness.
14. The wise have eyes in their heads, while the fool walks in the darkness; but I came to realize that the same fate overtakes them both.
15. Then I said to myself, “The fate of the fool will overtake me also. What then do I gain by being wise?” I said to myself, “This too is meaningless.”
16. For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered; the days have already come when both have been forgotten. Like the fool, the wise too must die!
17. So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
18. I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me.