1: My son! keep my sayings, And my commands lay up with thee. 2: Keep my commands, and live, And my law as the pupil of thine eye. 3: Bind them on thy fingers, Write them on the tablet of thy heart. 4: Say to wisdom, 'My sister Thou [art].' And cry to understanding, 'Kinswoman!' 5: To preserve thee from a strange woman, From a stranger who hath made smooth her sayings. 6: For, at a window of my house, Through my casement I have looked out, 7: And I do see among the simple ones, I discern among the sons, A young man lacking understanding, 8: Passing on in the street, near her corner, And the way [to] her house he doth step, 9: In the twilight -- in the evening of day, In the darkness of night and blackness. 10: And, lo, a woman to meet him -- (A harlot's dress, and watchful of heart, 11: Noisy she [is], and stubborn, In her house her feet rest not. 12: Now in an out-place, now in broad places, And near every corner she lieth in wait) -- 13: And she laid hold on him, and kissed him, She hath hardened her face, and saith to him, 14: 'Sacrifices of peace-offerings [are] by me, To-day I have completed my vows. 15: Therefore I have come forth to meet thee, To seek earnestly thy face, and I find thee. 16: [With] ornamental coverings I decked my couch, Carved works -- cotton of Egypt. 17: I sprinkled my bed -- myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. 18: Come, we are filled [with] loves till the morning, We delight ourselves in loves. 19: For the man is not in his house, He hath gone on a long journey. 20: A bag of money he hath taken in his hand, At the day of the new moon he cometh to his house.' 21: She turneth him aside with the abundance of her speech, With the flattery of her lips she forceth him. 22: He is going after her straightway, As an ox unto the slaughter he cometh, And as a fetter unto the chastisement of a fool, 23: Till an arrow doth split his liver, As a bird hath hastened unto a snare, And hath not known that it [is] for its life. 24: And now, ye sons, hearken to me, And give attention to sayings of my mouth. 25: Let not thy heart turn unto her ways, Do not wander in her paths, 26: For many [are] the wounded she caused to fall, And mighty [are] all her slain ones. 27: The ways of Sheol -- her house, Going down unto inner chambers of death!
