To follow after God is great glory, And length of days it is for thee to be accepted of Him. And again in the addition to xxiv. 23: Faint not, but be strong in the Lord, And cleave unto Him that He may strengthen you. Cleave unto Him, the Lord, the Almighty; He is the one and only God, and beside Him there is no Saviour. Although not explicitly stated it is men of Israel who are meant in these quotations, but sometimes Israel is specially mentioned; so, for example, in the addition to xvii. 17: Whom [i.e. Israel] He brought up as His first-born With severity, yet loving them, Imparting to them the light of love; And He forsook them not. This teaching of the Divine governance of the world, involving as it does man’s dependence upon God, is balanced by the doctrine of human free-will; an example of this may be seen in the addition to xx. 31: Better is persistent endurance (_lit._ patience) in seeking the Lord, Than a driver (_lit._ charioteer) of his own life without a master. In this couplet the Pharisaic doctrine of man’s free-will is maintained, while the Sadducæan denial of providence is combated. Turning now to the teaching of the Pharisees concerning the future life, the following addition is found after xix. 17: ... The knowledge of the commandments of the Lord is life-giving instruction, And they who do the things that are pleasing unto Him shall pluck the fruit of the tree of immortality. The teaching of reward hereafter for the righteous may be instanced from xviii. 22 and the addition to this verse. The original text runs: Delay not to pay thy vow in due time, And wait not till death to be justified. Death is here regarded as a means of atonement, as in the later Rabbinical literature; but from the Pharisaic point of view these words seemed inadequate, so the following words were added: For the reward of God abideth to eternity. It has been stated above that _repentance_ was one of the watchwords of the Pharisees; for the Sadducees, with their cold doctrine of God, repentance could have had but little meaning; not that Ben-Sira did not teach the need of repentance (see xviii. 21; but in xliv. 16 the Greek text is corrupt), but it occupies an extremely modest place in his book, and therefore we shall not be surprised to find that it is insisted upon several times in the additions; thus after the words of the text of xvii. 22: The righteousness of men is to Him as a signet, And the mercy of man He preserveth as the apple of an eye, the following addition is made: Granting repentance to his sons and daughters. Again, after xx. 2 this addition occurs: How good it is when he who is reproved manifesteth repentance, For thus wilt thou escape wilful sin.