Verse 15
15. Labour of the foolish wearieth Not merely the talk, but the acts of the fool. These all work to his injury. Even the ordinary affairs of life are more than he can do well, much more politic and discreet behaviour under a despotic ruler. A road to town is sure to be plain and well beaten, and so are common duties clear and well defined, but some people will blunder in both.
In dismissing now the character of the fool, of which this book has said so much, it may be said that the amount of space allowed to it in this brief essay is justified by the sad frequency of the character itself. “There be,” says Carlyle, “twenty-seven millions of people in these islands, [Great Britain and Ireland,] most of them Fools.” The fool with Koheleth is not so much lacking in intellect as full of moral perversity. For this the cure revealed is the grace of the Great Physician. This grace, affecting the heart, renovates by degrees the whole nature, and the fool becomes a new man in Christ.
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