• On Life and Conduct

  • 1 When you sit down to dine with a ruler, Consider carefully what is before you,
  • 2 And put a knife to your throat If you are a person of great appetite.
  • 3 Do not desire his delicacies, For it is deceptive food.
  • 4 Do not weary yourself to gain wealth; Stop dwelling on it.
  • 5 When you set your eyes on it, it is gone. For wealth certainly makes itself wings Like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.
  • 6 Do not eat the bread of a selfish person; Or desire his delicacies;
  • 7 For as he thinks within himself, so he is. He says to you, “Eat and drink!” But his heart is not with you.
  • 8 You will vomit up the morsel you have eaten And waste your compliments.
  • 9 Do not speak to be heard by a fool, For he will despise the wisdom of your words.
  • 10 Do not move the ancient boundary Or go into the fields of the fatherless,
  • 11 For their Redeemer is strong; He will plead their case against you.
  • 12 Apply your heart to discipline, And your ears to words of knowledge.
  • 13 Do not withhold discipline from a child; Though you strike him with the rod, he will not die.
  • 14 You shall strike him with the rod And rescue his soul from Sheol.
  • 15 My son, if your heart is wise, My own heart also will be glad,
  • 16 And my innermost being will rejoice When your lips speak what is right.
  • 17 Do not let your heart envy sinners, But live in the fear of the Lord always.
  • 18 Certainly there is a future, And your hope will not be cut off.
  • 19 Listen, my son, and be wise, And direct your heart in the way.
  • 20 Do not be with heavy drinkers of wine, Or with gluttonous eaters of meat;
  • 21 For the heavy drinker and the glutton will come to poverty, And drowsiness will clothe one with rags.
  • 22 Listen to your father, who fathered you, And do not despise your mother when she is old.
  • 23 Buy truth, and do not sell it, Get wisdom, instruction, and understanding.
  • 24 The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice, And he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him.
  • 25 Let your father and your mother be glad, And let her rejoice who gave birth to you.
  • 26 Give me your heart, my son, And let your eyes delight in my ways.
  • 27 For a prostitute is a deep pit, And a strange woman is a narrow well.
  • 28 Certainly she lurks as a robber, And increases the treacherous among mankind.
  • 29 Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has contentions? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has red eyes?
  • 30 Those who linger long over wine, Those who go to taste mixed wine.
  • 31 Do not look at wine when it is red, When it sparkles in the cup, When it goes down smoothly;
  • 32 In the end it bites like a snake And stings like a viper.
  • 33 Your eyes will see strange things And your mind will say perverse things.
  • 34 And you will be like one who lies down in the middle of the sea, Or like one who lies down on the top of a mast.
  • 35 “They struck me, but I did not become ill; They beat me, but I did not know it. When will I awake? I will seek another drink.”