✧1When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, Consider diligently him that is before thee; ✧2And put a knife to thy throat, If thou be a man given to appetite. ✧3Be not desirous of his dainties; Seeing they are deceitful food. ✧4Weary not thyself to be rich; Cease from thine own wisdom. ✧5Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? For [riches] certainly make themselves wings, Like an eagle that flieth toward heaven. ✧6Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, Neither desire thou his dainties: ✧7For as he thinketh within himself, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; But his heart is not with thee. ✧8The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up, And lose thy sweet words. ✧
American Standard Version (ASV). American Standard Version (1901). Public domain.
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Speak not in the hearing of a fool; For he will despise the wisdom of thy words.
✧10Remove not the ancient landmark; And enter not into the fields of the fatherless:
✧11For their Redeemer is strong; He will plead their cause against thee.
✧12Apply thy heart unto instruction, And thine ears to the words of knowledge.
✧13Withhold not correction from the child; [For] if thou beat him with the rod, he will not die.
✧14Thou shalt beat him with the rod, And shalt deliver his soul from Sheol.
✧15My son, if thy heart be wise, My heart will be glad, even mine:
✧16Yea, my heart will rejoice, When thy lips speak right things.
✧17Let not thy heart envy sinners; But [be thou] in the fear of Jehovah all the day long:
✧18For surely there is a reward; And thy hope shall not be cut off.
✧19Hear thou, my son, and be wise, And guide thy heart in the way.
✧20Be not among winebibbers, Among gluttonous eaters of flesh:
✧21For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty; And drowsiness will clothe [a man] with rags.
✧22Hearken unto thy father that begat thee, And despise not thy mother when she is old.
✧23Buy the truth, and sell it not; [Yea], wisdom, and instruction, and understanding.
✧24The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice; And he that begetteth a wise child will have joy of him.
✧25Let thy father and thy mother be glad, And let her that bare thee rejoice.
✧26My son, give me thy heart; And let thine eyes delight in my ways.
✧27For a harlot is a deep ditch; And a foreign woman is a narrow pit.
✧28Yea, she lieth in wait as a robber, And increaseth the treacherous among men.
✧29Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? Who hath complaining? who hath wounds without cause? Who hath redness of eyes?
✧30They that tarry long at the wine; They that go to seek out mixed wine.
✧31Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, When it sparkleth in the cup, When it goeth down smoothly:
✧32At the last it biteth like a serpent, And stingeth like an adder.