1 For they said within themselves, with unsound reasoning, “Our life is short and sorrowful. There is no healing when a man comes to his end, and no one was ever known who was released from Hades. (WEB) 2 Because we were born by mere chance, and hereafter we will be as though we had never been, because the breath in our nostrils is smoke, and reason is a spark kindled by the beating of our heart, (WEB) 3 which being extinguished, the body will be turned into ashes, and the spirit will be dispersed as thin air. (WEB) 4 Our name will be forgotten in time. No one will remember our works. Our life will pass away as the traces of a cloud, and will be scattered as is a mist, when it is chased by the rays of the sun, and overcome by its heat. (WEB) 5 For our allotted time is the passing of a shadow, and our end doesn’t retreat, because it is securely sealed, and no one turns it back. (WEB)
Wisdom of Solomon 2:1–5
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