Ecclesiastes 7:2

It is better to go to the house of {c} mourning, than to go to the house of feasting: for that is the end of all men; and the living will lay it to his heart. (c) Where we may see the hand of God and learn to examine our lives.

[It is] better to go to the house of mourning, than to go to the house of feasting: for that [is] the end of all men; and the living will lay [it] to his heart. It is better to go to the house of mourning. — To the terming house, as they term it, where a dead corpse is laid forth for burial, and in that respect weeping and wailing, which is one of the dues of the dead, τα νομιζομενα whose bodies are sown in corruption, and watered usually with tears. It is better therefore to sort with such, to mingle with mourners, to follow the hearse, to weep with those that weep, to visit the heavy hearted, this being a special means of mortification, than to go to the house of feasting, where is nothing but joy and jollity, slaying oxen and killing sheep, eating flesh and drinking wine, yea, therefore eating and drinking, because tomorrow they shall die. Ede, bibe, lude, post mortem nulla voluptas. Sardanapali vox belluina. What good can be gotten among such swinish epicures? What sound remedy against life’s vanity? It is far better therefore to go to the house of mourning, where a man may be moved with compassion, with compunction, with due and deep consideration of his doleful and dying condition; where he may hear dead Abel by a dumb eloquence preaching and pressing this necessary but much neglected lesson, that "this is the end of all men, and the living should lay it to heart"; or, as the Hebrew hath it, "lay it upon his heart," work it upon his affections; inditurus est iliad animo suo, so Tremelius renders it, he will so mind it as to make his best use of it, so as to say with Job, "I know that thou wilt bring me unto death"; Job 30:23 and with David, "Behold, thou hast made my days as a span"; Psalms 39:4-5 and as Moses, who when he saw the people’s carcases fall so fast in the wilderness, "Lord, teach us," said he, "so to number our days, as to cause our hearts" (of themselves never a whit willing) "to come to wisdom." Psalms 90:12

The house of mourning; where mourners meet together to celebrate the funerals of a deceased friend. That , to wit, death, the cause of that mourning, is the end of all men; it brings men to the serious consideration of their last end, which is their greatest wisdom and interest. Will lay it to his heart; will be seriously affected with it, and awakened to prepare for it; whereas feasting is commonly attended with mirth, and levity, and manifold temptations, and indisposeth men’s minds to spiritual and heavenly thoughts. Hence it is evident that those passages of this book which may seem to favour a sensual and voluptuous life, are not spoken by Solomon in his own name, or as his opinion, but in the person of an epicure.

It is better to go to the house of mourning,.... For deceased relations or friends, who either lie unburied, or have been lately inferred; for the Jews kept their mourning for their dead several days afterwards, when their friends visited them in order to comfort them, as the Jews did Martha and Mary, John 11:31 . So the Targum here, "it is better to go to a mourning man to comfort him;'' for at such times and places the conversation was serious and interesting, and turned upon the subjects of mortality and a future state, and preparation for it; from whence useful and instructive lessons are learned; and so it was much better to be there than to go to the house of feasting: the Targum is, "than to the house of a feast of wine of scorners;'' where there is nothing but noise and clamour, luxury and intemperance, carnal mirth and gaiety, vain and frothy conversation, idle talk and impure songs, and a jest made of true religion and godliness, death and another world; for that is the end of all men; not the house of feasting, but the house of mourning; or mourning itself, as Jarchi; every man must expect to lose his relation and friend, and so come to the house of mourning; and must die himself, and be the occasion of mourning: death itself seems rather intended, which is the end of all men, the way of all flesh; for it is appointed for men to die; and so the Targum, "seeing upon them all is decreed the decree of death;'' and the living will lay it to his heart; by going to the house of mourning, he will be put in mind of death, and will think of it seriously, and consider his latter end, how near it is; and that this must be his case shortly, as is the deceased's he comes to mourn for. So the Targum interprets it of words concerning death, or discourses of mortality he there hears, which he takes notice of and lays to his heart, and lays up in it. Jarchi's note is, "their thought is of the way of death.''

Reputation for piety and honesty is more desirable than all the wealth and pleasure in this world. It will do more good to go to a funeral than to a feast. We may lawfully go to both, as there is occasion; our Saviour both feasted at the wedding of his friend in Cana, and wept at the grave of his friend in Bethany. But, considering how apt we are to be vain and indulge the flesh, it is best to go to the house of mourning, to learn the end of man as to this world. Seriousness is better than mirth and jollity. That is best for us which is best for our souls, though it be unpleasing to sense. It is better to have our corruptions mortified by the rebuke of the wise, than to have them gratified by the song of fools. The laughter of a fool is soon gone, the end of his mirth is heaviness.

2. Proving that it is not a sensual enjoyment of earthly goods which is meant in Ec 3:13; 5:18. A thankful use of these is right, but frequent feasting Solomon had found dangerous to piety in his own case. So Job's fear (Ec 1:4, 5). The house of feasting often shuts out thoughts of God and eternity. The sight of the dead in the "house of mourning" causes "the living" to think of their own "end."

That - Namely, what is seen in the house of mourning. Lay it to his heart - Consider it attentively.