There is no man that hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit; neither hath he power in the day of death: and there is no discharge in that war; neither shall wickedness deliver those that are given to it.
No man ... hath power over the spirit - breath of life (Ecclesiastes 3:19), as the words following require. This verse naturally follows the subject of "time" and "judgment" (Ecclesiastes 8:6-7).
No discharge - alluding to the liability to military service of all above twenty years old (Numbers 1:3); yet many were exempted (Deuteronomy 20:5-8). But in that war (death) there is no exemption.
Neither shall wickedness deliver ... - literally, its patrons or master. Wickedness can get money for the sinner, but cannot deliver him from the death temporal and eternal which is its penalty (Isaiah 28:15; Isaiah 28:18). The thought of the short-lived power of wicked oppressors, and the universality of death, which ends all oppression-a consideration terrible to the wicked-is the comfort of the saint in affliction.