Obey the King

1where as no man hath wysdome & vnderstodinge, to geue answere there vnto. wysdome maketh a mas face to shyne, but malice putteth it out of fauoure.

2Kepe the kynges commaundemet (I warne the) & the ooth yt thou hast made vnto God. 3Be not haistie to go out of his sight, & se thou cotynue in no euell thinge: for what so euer it pleaseth him, yt doeth he. 4Like as when a kynge geueth a charge, his commaundement is mightie: Euen so who maye saye vnto him: what doest thou?

5Who so kepeth the commaundement, shall fele no harme: but a wyse mans herte discerneth tyme and maner: 6For euery thinge wil haue opportunite and iudgment, and this is the thinge that maketh men full of carefulnes & sorowe. 7And why? a man knoweth not what is for to come, for who wyll tell him? 8Nether is there eny ma yt hath power ouer ye sprete, to kepe stil ye sprete, ner to haue eny power in the tyme of death: It is not he also that can make an ende of the batayll, nether maye vngodlynes delyuer him yt medleth withall. 9All these thinges haue I considered, and applied my mynde vnto euery worke that is vnder the Sonne: how one man hath lordshipe vpon another to his owne harme.

Fear God
(Isaiah 8:11–15)

10For I haue oft sene ye vngodly brought to their graues, and fallen downe from the hye and glorious place: in so moch yt they were forgotten in the cite, where they were had in so hye & greate reputacion. This is also a vayne thinge. 11Because now that euell workes are not haistely punyshed, the hert of man geueth him self ouer vnto wickednesse: 12But though an euell personne offende an hundreth tymes, and haue a longe life: yet am I sure, that it shal go well with the that feare God, because they haue him before their eyes. 13Agayne, as for the vngodly, it shall not be well with him, nether shal he prologe his dayes: but euen as a shadowe, so shall he be that feareth not God.

God’s Ways Are Mysterious

14Yet is there a vanite vpon earth: There be iust men, vnto whom it happeneth, as though they had the workes of the vngodly: Agayne, there be vngodly, with whom it goeth as though they had the workes of ye rightuous. This me thinke also a vaine thinge. 15Therfore I commende gladnesse, because a man hath no better thinge vnder the Sonne, then to eate and drynke, and to be mery: for that shal he haue of his laboure all the daies of his life, which God geueth him vnder the Sonne.+

16When I applied my mynde to lerne wysdome, and to knowe the trauayle that is in the worlde (and that of soch a fashion, yt I suffred not myne eyes to slepe nether daye ner night) 17I vnderstode of all ye workes of God, that it is not possible for a man, to attayne vnto ye workes that are done vnder ye Sonne: and though he bestowe his laboure to seke them out, yet can he not reach vnto the: yee though a wyse man wolde vndertake to knowe them, yet might he not fynde them.