¶ My son, attend unto my wisdom, incline thine ear to my understanding;
that thou mayest keep reflection, and that thy lips may preserve knowledge.
¶ For the lips of the strange woman drop honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil;
but her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on Sheol.
Lest she should ponder the path of life, her ways wander, she knoweth not whither.
¶ And now, children, hearken unto me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:
lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel;
lest strangers be filled with thy wealth, and the fruits of thy toil come into the house of a stranger;
and thou mourn in thine end, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed;
and thou say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof!
and I have not hearkened unto the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to those that instructed me;
I was well nigh in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
¶ Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.
Thy fountains shall be poured forth, as water-brooks in the broadways.
Let them be only thine own, and not strangers’ with thee.
Let thy fountain be blessed; and have joy of the wife of thy youth.
As a lovely hind and a graceful roe, let her breasts satisfy thee at all times: be thou ravished continually with her love.
And why shouldest thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?
¶ For the ways of man are before the eyes of Jehovah, and he pondereth all his paths.
His own iniquities shall take the wicked, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sin.
He shall die for want of discipline; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.