And, behold, all was vanity - Emptiness and insufficiency in itself.
And vexation of spirit - Because it promised the good I wished for, but did not, could not, perform the promise; and left my soul discontented and chagrined.
Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labour that I had laboured to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun. Ecclesiastes 2:11. CC 196.1
Read in context »Age after age the curiosity of men has led them to seek for the tree of knowledge; and often they think they are plucking fruit most essential, when, like Solomon in his research, they find it altogether vanity and nothingness in comparison with the science of true holiness. OHC 276.2
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