72:1 How good is God to Israel, * to them that are of a right heart!
72:2 But my feet were almost moved; * my steps had wellnigh slipped.
72:3 Because I had a zeal on occasion of the wicked, * seeing the prosperity of sinners.
72:4 For there is no regard to their death, * nor is there strength in their stripes.
72:5 They are not in the labour of men: * neither shall they be scourged like other men.
72:6 Therefore pride hath held them fast: * they are covered with their iniquity and their wickedness.
72:7 Their iniquity hath come forth, as it were from fatness: * they have passed into the affection of the heart.
72:8 They have thought and spoken wickedness: * they have spoken iniquity on high.
72:9 They have set their mouth against heaven: * and their tongue hath passed through the earth.
72:10 Therefore will my people return here * and full days shall be found in them.
72:11 And they said: How doth God know? * and is there knowledge in the most High?
72:12 Behold these are sinners; and yet abounding in the world * they have obtained riches.
72:13 And I said: Then have I in vain justified my heart, * and washed my hands among the innocent.
72:14 And I have been scourged all the day; * and my chastisement hath been in the mornings.
72:15 If I said: I will speak thus; * behold I should condemn the generation of thy children.
72:16 I studied that I might know this thing, * it is a labour in my sight:
72:17 Until I go into the sanctuary of God, * and understand concerning their last ends.
72:18 But indeed for deceits thou hast put it to them: * when they were lifted up, thou hast cast them down.
72:19 How are they brought to desolation? they have suddenly ceased to be: * they have perished by reason of their iniquity.
72:20 As the dream of them that awake, O Lord; * so in thy city thou shalt bring their image to nothing.
72:21 For my heart hath been inflamed, and my reins have been changed: * and I am brought to nothing, and I knew not.
72:23 I am become as a beast before thee: * and I am always with thee.
72:24 Thou hast held me by my right hand; and by thy will thou hast conducted me, * and with thy glory thou hast received me.
72:25 For what have I in heaven? * and besides thee what do I desire upon earth?
72:26 For thee my flesh and my heart hath fainted away: * thou art the God of my heart, and the God that is my portion for ever.
72:27 For behold they that go far from thee shall perish: * thou hast destroyed all them that are disloyal to thee.
72:28 But it is good for me to adhere to my God, * to put my hope in the Lord God:
72:28 That I may declare all thy praises, * in the gates of the daughter of Sion.