The Ecclesiastes writer is indeed a cynic, but he is a gentle cynic who has not become embittered toward the world, for he resolves to make the best of what he can. Unlike the author of Job, who is emotionally troubled that innocent people suffer, the Ecclesiastes writer accepts his situation as it is and refuses to become upset about it. Throughout the book, again and again he says, "A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work." Although he accepts a kind of fatalism according to which there is a definite time and place for everything, his book is filled with advice about how a person should live in order to get the greatest enjoyment out of life. Above all else, he counsels moderation: "Do not be overrighteous, neither be overwise — why destroy yourself?" A person should find a happy medium. One of the tragedies of life, the author tells us, is for a person to spend so much time and energy preparing for old age that when it arrives, the person is unable to enjoy it. We should enjoy life while we are young, for old age is characterized by weakness and infirmities that are but a prelude to the time when "the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it."
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