2 Samuel 14:12-14

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition

¹² Then the woman said, “Pray let your handmaid speak a word to my lord the king.” He said, “Speak.” ¹³ And the woman said, “Why then have you planned such a thing against the people of God? For in giving this decision the king convicts himself, inasmuch as the king does not bring his banished one home again. ¹⁴ We must all die, we are like water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; but God will not take away the life of him who devises^[a] means not to keep his banished one an outcast.