Chapter 38

(To the choir-master, Idithun. A psalm. Of David.)

It was my resolve to live watchfully, and never use my tongue amiss; still, while I was in the presence of sinners, I kept my mouth gagged,

dumb and patient, impotent for good. But indignation came back,

and my heart burned within me, the fire kindled by my thoughts,

so that at last I kept silence no longer. Lord, warn me of my end, and how few my days are; teach me to know my own insufficiency.

See how thou hast measured my years with a brief span, how my life is nothing in thy reckoning! Nay, what is any man living but a breath that passes?

Truly man walks the world like a shadow; with what vain anxiety he hoards up riches, when he cannot tell who will have the counting of them!

What hope then is mine, Lord? In thee alone I trust.

Clear me of that manifold guilt which makes me the laughing-stock of fools,

tongue-tied and uncomplaining, because I know that my troubles come from thee;

spare me this punishment; I faint under thy powerful hand.

When thou dost chasten man to punish his sins, gone is all he loved, as if the moth had fretted it away; a breath that passes, and no more.

Listen, Lord, to my prayer, let my cry reach thy hearing, and my tears win answer. What am I in thy sight but a passer-by, a wanderer, as all my fathers were?

Thy frown relax, give me some breath of comfort, before I go away and am known no more.