² O Lord, how long shall I cry,
and thou wilt not hear!
even cry out unto thee of violence,
and thou wilt not save!
³ Why dost thou shew me iniquity,
and cause me to behold grievance?
for spoiling and violence are before me:
and there are that raise up strife and contention.
⁴ Therefore the law is slacked,
and judgment doth never go forth:
for the wicked doth compass about the righteous;
therefore wrong judgment proceedeth.

¹² Art thou not from everlasting,
O Lord my God, mine Holy One?
we shall not die.
O Lord, thou hast ordained them for judgment;
and, O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction.
¹³ Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil,
and canst not look on iniquity:
wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously,
and holdest thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?
¹⁴ And makest men as the fishes of the sea,
as the creeping things, that have no ruler over them?
¹⁵ They take up all of them with the angle,
they catch them in their net, and gather them in their drag:
therefore they rejoice and are glad.
¹⁶ Therefore they sacrifice unto their net,
and burn incense unto their drag;
because by them their portion is fat,
and their meat plenteous.
¹⁷ Shall they therefore empty their net,
and not spare continually to slay the nations?

2 I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower,
and will watch to see what he will say unto me,
and what I shall answer when I am reproved.