Eccclesiastes 9
9
SONG 15
8,8,8,8
tune: Soldau, 22.
Eccles 9:4, 5, 6, 10
4As long as life its term extends,
Hope’s blest dominion never ends;
For while the lamp holds on to burn,
The greatest sinner may return.
5 Life is the season God hath giv’n
To fly from hell, and rise to heav’n;
That day of grace fleets fast away,
And none its rapid course can stay.
3 The living know that they must die;
But all the dead forgotten lie:
Their mem’ry and their name is gone,
Alike unknowing and unknown.
6 Their hatred and their love is lost,
Their envy bury’d in the dust;
They have no share in all that’s done
Beneath the circuit of the sun.
10 Then what thy thoughts design to do,
Still let thy hands with might pursue;
Since no device nor work is found,
Nor wisdom underneath the ground.
6 In the cold grave, to which we haste,
There are no acts of pardon past:
But fix’d the doom of all remains,
And everlasting silence reigns.
First published by the Church of Scotland in 1781.