English Standard Version ESV
New International Version NIV
12 So I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly. For what can the man do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done.
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 Then I saw that there is more gain in wisdom than in folly, as there is more gain in light than in darkness.
13
I saw that wisdom is better than folly, just as light is better than darkness.
14 The wise person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them.
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 in my heart, "What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?" And I said in my heart that this also is vanity.
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 of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the fool!
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 what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind.
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.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.
Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide.