1: My son, if you will take my words to your heart, storing up my laws in your mind; 2: So that your ear gives attention to wisdom, and your heart is turned to knowledge; 3: Truly, if you are crying out for good sense, and your request is for knowledge; 4: If you are looking for her as for silver, and searching for her as for stored-up wealth; 5: Then the fear of the Lord will be clear to you, and knowledge of God will be yours. 6: For the Lord gives wisdom; out of his mouth come knowledge and reason: 7: He has salvation stored up for the upright, he is a breastplate to those in whom there is no evil; 8: He keeps watch on the ways which are right, and takes care of those who have the fear of him. 9: Then you will have knowledge of righteousness and right acting, and upright behaviour, even of every good way. 10: For wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasing to your soul; 11: Wise purposes will be watching over you, and knowledge will keep you; 12: Giving you salvation from the evil man, from those whose words are false; 13: Who give up the way of righteousness, to go by dark roads; 14: Who take pleasure in wrongdoing, and have joy in the evil designs of the sinner; 15: Whose ways are not straight, and whose footsteps are turned to evil: 16: To take you out of the power of the strange woman, who says smooth words with her tongue; 17: Who is false to the husband of her early years, and does not keep the agreement of her God in mind: 18: For her house is on the way down to death; her footsteps go down to the shades: 19: Those who go to her do not come back again; their feet do not keep in the ways of life: 20: So that you may go in the way of good men, and keep in the footsteps of the upright. 21: For the upright will be living in the land, and the good will have it for their heritage. 22: But sinners will be cut off from the land, and those whose acts are false will be uprooted.
