⁷ “Consider now: Who, being innocent, has ever perished?^(A)
    Where were the upright ever destroyed?^(B)

²⁵ I was young and now I am old,
    yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken^(A)
    or their children begging^(B) bread.

⁷ He does not take his eyes off the righteous;^(A)
    he enthrones them with kings^(B)
    and exalts them forever.^(C)

²⁰ “Surely God does not reject one who is blameless^(A)
    or strengthen the hands of evildoers.^(B)

As it is with the good,
    so with the sinful;
as it is with those who take oaths,
    so with those who are afraid to take them.^(B)

the righteous perishing in their righteousness,
    and the wicked living long in their wickedness.^(B)

²² It is all the same; that is why I say,
    ‘He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.’^(A)
23 When a scourge^(B) brings sudden death,
    he mocks the despair of the innocent.^(C)