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¹ My son, attend unto my wisdom, incline thine ear to my understanding;

² that thou mayest keep reflection, and that thy lips may preserve knowledge.

³ For the lips of the strange woman drop honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil;

⁴ but her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.

⁵ Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on Sheol.

⁶ Lest she should ponder the path of life, her ways wander, she knoweth not [whither].

⁷ And now, children, hearken unto me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.

⁸ Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:

⁹ lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel;

¹⁰ lest strangers be filled with thy wealth, and the fruits of thy toil [come] into the house of a stranger;

¹¹ and thou mourn in thine end, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed;

¹² and thou say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof!

¹³ and I have not hearkened unto the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to those that instructed me;

¹⁴ I was well nigh in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.

¹⁵ Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.

¹⁶ Thy fountains shall be poured forth, as water-brooks in the broadways.

¹⁷ Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.

¹⁸ Let thy fountain be blessed; and have joy of the wife of thy youth.

¹⁹ As a lovely hind and a graceful roe, let her breasts satisfy thee at all times: be thou ravished continually with her love.

²⁰ And why shouldest thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?

²¹ For the ways of man are before the eyes of Jehovah, and he pondereth all his paths.

²² His own iniquities shall take the wicked, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sin.

²³ He shall die for want of discipline; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.