The words of a wise person win him favor, but the words of a fool are self-destructive.

Blessed are you, O land, when your king is the son of nobility, and your princes feast at the proper time -- with self-control and not in drunkenness.

I thought to myself, "Come now, I will try self-indulgent pleasure to see if it is worthwhile." But I found that it also is futile.

I said of partying, "It is folly," and of self-indulgent pleasure, "It accomplishes nothing!"

Use thy self to live joyfully with thy wife whom thou lovest, all the days of thy life which is but vanity, that God hath given thee under the Sun; all the days of thy vanity. For that is thy portion in this life, of all thy labor and travail that thou takest under the Sun.

Every person works for his own self-interests, but his desires remain unsatisfied.

It is better to focus on what you can see than to meander after your self-interest; this also is pointless and a chasing after wind.

Do not be overly righteous, nor be overly wise. Why be self-destructive?

For the fate of people and the fate of animals is the same. As one dies, so dies the other; they all have the same breath. People have no advantage over animals since everything is futile.

That which hath been, is the same that shall be, and, that which hath been done, is the same that shall be done, - and there is, nothing new, under the sun.

Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man.

There is a thing which is to no purpose done on the earth: that there are good men to whom is given the same punishment as those who are evil, and there are evil men who get the reward of the good. I say that this again is to no purpose.

The wise man's eyes are in his head, but the foolish man goes walking in the dark; but still I saw that the same event comes to them all.

And though he goes on living a thousand years twice over and does not see good, are not the two going to the same place?