Simon Patrick on the Proverbs 1683
1. "My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with thee." There is great reason then, my son, to repeat the caution I have often given thee, against this and other vices: and to beseech thee, to observe my instructions, and to lay up my commandments in such faithful] remembrance; that they may not fail to produce the fruit of obedience.
2. "Keep my commandments, and live; and my law as the apple of thine eye." For if thou wilt be ruled by them, assure thy self (as I have said before in chap. 4:4) thou shalt enjoy long happiness. Therefore observe them carefully with a tender affection to them; and looking upon them as thy safest guide and director, consent as soon to wound the apple of thine eye, as in the least to violate any of my laws.
3. "Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart." Do not merely read what I write, imagining thou canst have continual recourse to them here in this book; but be so well acquainted with them, as to have them (as we speak) at thy fingers ends: or rather, let them be transcribed from hence into thy very heart.
4. "Say unto wisdom, Thou an my sister; and call understanding thy kinswoman." There embrace them with ardent love; and set such an high esteem on wisdom, that thou mayest invite it more and more unto thee: till it be as familiar with thee as an only sister, born at the same time with thee; and thou understand and delight in all her precepts, as so near a kin t Iwo, that thou find them to be the very reason and sense of thine own mind.
5. "Thai they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words." Which will be a powerful preservative to thee from the snares of the naughty woman: who, though her company be so pernicious that God would have thee perfectly estranged from her, as if she were not of the Commonwealth of Israel, yet hath powerful charms about her, to flatter those into her embraces, who are not heartily in love with wisdom.