Douay-Rheims><Vulgate><Knox Bible
A gradual canticle of Solomon.
Canticum graduum Salomonis.
(A song of ascents. Of Solomon.)
1
Unless the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it.
1
Nisi Dominus ædificaverit domum, in vanum laboraverunt qui ædificant eam. Nisi Dominus custodierit civitatem, frustra vigilat qui custodit eam.
1
Vain is the builder’s toil, if the house is not of the Lord’s building; vainly the guard keeps watch, if the city has not the Lord for its guardian.
2
Unless the Lord keep the city, he watcheth in vain that keepeth it. It is vain for you to rise before light: rise ye after you have sitten, you that eat the bread of sorrow. When he shall give sleep to his beloved:
2
Vanum est vobis ante lucem surgere: surgite postquam sederitis, qui manducatis panem doloris. Cum dederit dilectis suis somnum,
2
Vain, that you should be astir before daybreak, and sit on over your tasks late into the night, you whose bread is so hardly won; is it not in the hours of sleep that he blesses the men he loves?
3
behold the inheritance of the Lord are children: the reward, the fruit of the womb.
3
ecce hæreditas Domini, filii; merces, fructus ventris.
3
Fatherhood itself is the Lord’s gift, the fruitful womb is a reward that comes from him.
4
As arrows in the hand of the mighty, so the children of them that have been shaken.
4
Sicut sagittæ in manu potentis, ita filii excussorum.
4
Crown of thy youth, children are like arrows in a warrior’s hand.
5
Blessed is the man that hath filled his desire with them; he shall not be confounded when he shall speak to his enemies in the gate.
5
Beatus vir qui implevit desiderium suum ex ipsis: non confundetur cum loquetur inimicis suis in porta.
5
Happy, whose quiver is well filled with these; their cause will not be set aside when they plead against their enemies at the gate.