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