And I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom concerning all that is done under heaven; it is a sore travail that God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised therewith.... I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I have gotten me great wisdom above all that were before me in Jerusalem; yea, my heart hath had great experience of wisdom and knowledge. And I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly; I perceived that this also was a striving after wind. For in much wisdom is much grief; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth grief (i. 13-18). This forlorn writer, furthermore, seems sometimes to approach the subject in an entirely perverse spirit; he says later: I saw that wisdom excelleth folly, as far as light excelleth darkness. The wise man’s eyes are in his head, and the fool walketh in darkness; and yet I perceived that one event happeneth to them all. Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so will it happen even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also was vanity. For of the wise man, even as of the fool, there is no remembrance for ever; seeing that in the days to come all will have been already forgotten. And how doth the wise man die even as the fool (ii. 13-16). This same spirit is manifested in the little parable in ix. 13-16: ... There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it. Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man. Then said I, Wisdom is better than strength; nevertheless the poor man’s wisdom is despised, and his words are not heard. We can only say that such an attitude is deplorable; the writer seems to think that unless Wisdom is recognized and the wise man rewarded, it is vanity! That is quite different from the usual attitude of the authors of the Wisdom Literature, who esteem and love Wisdom for its own sake. There are, it is true, a few passages in this book which witness to a better appreciation of Wisdom; for example, in vii. 11, 12 it is said: Wisdom is as good as an inheritance; yea, more excellent is it for them that see the sun. For Wisdom is a defence, even as money is a defence; but the excellency of knowledge is that Wisdom preserveth the life of him that hath it. Or again in viii. 1: A man’s wisdom maketh his face to shine, and the hardness of his face is changed.