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Geneva Bible Notes (1560): Ecclesiastes 2

1 ! Pleasures, sumptuous buyldings, riches and possessions are but vanitie.

1 a Salomon maketh this discours with him self, as thogh he wolde trye whether there were contentation in ease and pleasures.

3 / Ebr. do

3 b Albeit I gaue my self to pleasures, yet I thoght to kepe wisdome & the feare of God in mine heart, and gouerne mine affaires by the same.

7 c Meaning, of the seruants or sclaues, which he had boght: so the children borne in their seruitude, were the masters.

8 e Which were the most beautiful of them that were taken in warre, as {Judges. 5, 30}. Some vnderstand by these wordes, noe women but instruments of musike.

9 f For all this God did not take his gift of wisdome from me.

10 g This was the frute of all my labout, a certeine pleasure mixt with care, which he calleth vanitie in the next verse.

12 h I bethoght with my self whether it were better to followe wisdome, or mine owne affections and pleasures, which he calleth madnes.

12 / Or, compare with the King.

14 ! The wise and the folle haue bothe one end, touching the bodelie death.

14 i He foreseth things, which the foole can not for lacke of wisdome.

14 k For bothe dye & are forgotten, as {verse 16}, or they bothe alike haue prosperitie or aduersitie.

16 m He wondereth that men forget a wise man, being dead, assone as thei do a foole.

20 n That I might seke the true felicitie which is in God.

21 o Among other griefs this was not the least to leaue that which he had gotten by great trauail, to one that had taken no peine therefore, and whome he knewe not whether he were a wise man or a foole.

24 p When man hathe all laboured, he can get no more then fode, and refreshing, yet he confesseth also that his cometh of Gods blessing, as {Chap. 3, 13}