1My son, attend unto my wisdom; incline thine ear to my understanding:
2That thou mayest preserve discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
3For the lips of a strange woman drop honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil:
4But her latter end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
5Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on Sheol;
6So that she findeth not the level path of life: her ways are unstable and she knoweth it not.
7Now therefore, my sons, hearken unto me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
8Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:
9Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel:
10Lest strangers be filled with thy strength; and thy labours be in the house of an alien;
11And thou mourn at thy latter end, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed,
12And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof;
13Neither have I obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me!
14I was well nigh in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
15Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.
16Should thy springs be dispersed abroad, and rivers of water in the streets?
17Let them be for thyself alone, and not for strangers with thee.
18Let thy fountain be blessed; and rejoice in the wife of thy youth.
19As a loving hind and a pleasant doe, let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.
20For why shouldest thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?
21For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he maketh level all his paths.
22His own iniquities shall take the wicked, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sin.
23He shall die for lack of instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.