1: My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with thee. 2: Keep my commandments, and live; and my law as the apple of thine eye. 3: Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart. 4: Say unto wisdom, Thou art my sister; and call understanding thy kinswoman: 5: That they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words. 6: For at the window of my house I looked through my casement, 7: And beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding, 8: Passing through the street near her corner; and he went the way to her house, 9: In the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night: 10: And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtil of heart. 11: (She is loud and stubborn; her feet abide not in her house: 12: Now is she without, now in the streets, and lieth in wait at every corner.) 13: So she caught him, and kissed him, and with an impudent face said unto him, 14: I have peace offerings with me; this day have I payed my vows. 15: Therefore came I forth to meet thee, diligently to seek thy face, and I have found thee. 16: I have decked my bed with coverings of tapestry, with carved works, with fine linen of Egypt. 17: I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. 18: Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning: let us solace ourselves with loves. 19: For the goodman is not at home, he is gone a long journey: 20: He hath taken a bag of money with him, and will come home at the day appointed. 21: With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him. 22: He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks; 23: Till a dart strike through his liver; as a bird hasteth to the snare, and knoweth not that it is for his life. 24: Hearken unto me now therefore, O ye children, and attend to the words of my mouth. 25: Let not thine heart decline to her ways, go not astray in her paths. 26: For she hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her. 27: Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.
