Thou shalt betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her: thou shalt build an house, and thou shalt not dwell therein: thou shalt plant a vineyard, and shalt not gather the grapes thereof.
Ver. 30. Thou shalt built a house, &c.] A great aggravation of a man's misery it is, to fall from high hopes, to fail of large expectations, as Haman did, and Absalom, and Alexander the Great, and Tamerlane, who preparing to perfect his conquest of the Greek Empire, and having given a good beginning thereunto, in the midst of his high hopes and greatest power, died of an ague, Jan. 27, 1462. a Many men spend their strength and waste their wits in getting these outward things, and in learning how to put them to their delightfullest use: and then, when to possess them might seem a happiness, either they die or are otherwise deprived of all the sweet they have laboured for.
a Turk. Hist.