People pray as earnestly to gain evil as one should to gain virtue. But people are hasty. 11 We have made the night and the day as two signs. We blotted out the sign of night and made the sign of the day illuminating, so that you may seek the bounty of your Lord and learn to compute the seasons and the years. We have set everything forth in detail. 12 Round each man's neck We have hung his ledger of deeds, and on the Day of Resurrection will present it as a book spread out (and say): 13 Read thine book; sufficeth today thy soul against thee as a reckoner. 14 Whoever goes aright, for his own soul does he go aright; and whoever goes astray, to its detriment only does he go astray: nor can the bearer of a burden bear the burden of another, nor do We chastise until We raise an apostle. 15 And when We intend to destroy a city, We command its affluent but they defiantly disobey therein; so the word comes into effect upon it, and We destroy it with [complete] destruction. 16 How many generations have We destroyed since Noah! And Allah sufficeth as Knower and Beholder of the sins of His slaves. 17 Whoever wishes for the quick-passing (transitory enjoyment of this world), We readily grant him what We will for whom We like. Then, afterwards, We have appointed for him Hell, he will burn therein disgraced and rejected, (far away from Allah's Mercy). 18 And whoever desires the Hereafter and strives for it, with the necessary effort due for it (i.e. do righteous deeds of Allah's Obedience) while he is a believer (in the Oneness of Allah Islamic Monotheism), then such are the ones whose striving shall be appreciated, thanked and rewarded (by Allah). 19 To all of these as well as those We shall provide the wherewithal of this life in the present world by dint of your Lord's Bounty; and from none shall the Bounty of your Lord be withheld. 20 See how We prefer one of them above another, and verily the Hereafter will be greater in degrees and greater in preferment. 21 Do not make [as equal] with Allah another deity and [thereby] become censured and forsaken. 22