Ecclesiastes 10:3

Yea also, when he that is a fool walketh by the way,.... The king's highway, the common road; as he passeth along the streets, going to any place, or about any business: his wisdom faileth [him]; or

Yea also, when he that is a fool walketh by the way, his wisdom faileth him, and he saith to every one that he is a fool. By the way - in his ordinary course; in his simplest acts (Proverbs 6:12-14).

Walketh by the way; not only in great undertakings, but in his daily conversation with men, in his looks, and gestures, and common talk. His wisdom faileth him; or, he wants a heart; as if he had said, Did I say, his heart is at his left hand? I must recall it, for in truth he hath no heart in him. He saith to every one that he is a fool; he publicly discovers his folly to all that meet him, or converse with him.

Ecclesiastes 10:3 Yea also, when he that is a fool walketh by the way, his wisdom faileth [him], and he saith to every one [that] he [is] a fool.Ver. 3. Yea, also when he that is a fool walketh, &c.] In his very gait, gestures, looks, laughings, &c., he bewrays his witlessness, as Jehu did his furiousness, by the manner of his marches. "He winketh with his eyes, speaketh with his feet, teacheth with his fingers, frowardness is in his heart," &c. Such a froward fool was Julian the apostate, as Nazianzen describes him, with his colli crebrae conversiones, oculi vagi, pedes instabiles, &c., frequent turning of his neck, tossing up his head, wild eyes, wandering feet, &c. And such were those "haughty daughters of Sion, that walked with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, mincing and making a tinkling as they went"; their haughtiness and hauntiness spake them little better than harlots. And he saith to every one that he is a fool.] Upon the matter he saith it, though he say nothing. It is said that a fool, while he holds his tongue is held a wise man; that is, if neither by his tongue nor any other part of his body he discover himself: but that can hardly be, since folly flows from man as excrements do from sick folk, and they feel it not, will hardly be persuaded of it. Symmachus, Jerome, and others, refer the last he in this sentence not to the fool himself, but to every one else whom he looks upon as so many fools like himself; ex suo ingenio universos iudicans, judging of others according to his own disposition. For as the philosopher saith, Qualis quisque est tales existimat alios such as any one is, the same he thinks others to be, and as men muse so they use, whether it be for the better or the worse. Jacob could not imagine that his sons were so base as to make away their brother Joseph, but said, "Surely some evil beast hath devoured him." Joshua never suspected the false Gibeonites, nor the rest of the disciples Judas, when our Saviour said, "What thou dost, do quickly"; and again when he said, "One of you shall betray me." On the other side, fools conceit the whole world to be made up of folly; as the Lacedemonians once, neminem bonum fieri publicis literis columna incisis sanxerunt, scored it upon their public posts that there was none good, no, not one; as Claudius and Caligula, being themselves notorious whoremongers, would not be persuaded that there was any chaste person upon earth; as the devil charged God with envy, which is his own proper disease. The old proverb saith, The mother seeks the daughter in the oven, as having been there some time herself. I daresay, quoth Bonner, that Cranmer would recant if he might have his living, so judging of another by himself. Dicit de omnibus, stultus est. Arist. Polit., lib. iii. cap. 6. Plut. in Quaest. Graec. Dio. Acts and Mon.

(3) That he is a fool.—In Hebrew, as in English, the antecedent of “he” may be taken differently, and so the Vulg. and other authorities understand the verse as meaning that the fool in his self-conceit attributes folly to everyone else. But it is better, as well as more obvious, to take the verse of the self-betrayal of the fool (Proverbs 13:16; Proverbs 17:28; Proverbs 18:2).

Verse 3. When - a fool walketh by the way] In every act of life, and in every company he frequents, the irreligious man shows what he is. Vanity, nonsense, and wickedness are his themes: so that in effect he saith to every one that he is a fool.

3. Yea also, when he that is a fool walketh by the way] The general drift of the proverb seems plain enough. “Even when the fool is in the way (either literally, ‘whenever and wherever he goes,’ or figuratively, ‘when he has been put in the right path of conduct’), his heart (i. e. his intellect) fails him, and he manifests his folly.” The last clause, however, admits of two constructions, each of which has the support of high authorities, (1) he saith to every one that he (the fool himself) is a fool, i. e. betrays his unwisdom in every word he utters; or (2) he says to every man that he (the man he meets) is a fool, i. e. in his self-conceit he thinks that he alone is wise (comp. Romans 12:16). On the whole the latter construction seems preferable. So it is notoriously the most significant symptom of insanity that the patient looks on all others as insane. It may be noted that (1) finds a parallel in Proverbs 13:16; Proverbs 18:2; (2) in Proverbs 26:16.

“Way” may be understood either literally (compare Ecclesiastes 10:15), or figuratively, of the course of action which he follows. He saith ... - He exposes his folly to every one he meets.

3. The fool is the subject. His wisdom faileth, should be, He lacketh wisdom. He, in the last clause, refers to every one, and the sense would be plainer if that were not inserted: He saith to every one, He is a fool!