Warnings Against Folly

1My son, if you become surety for your friend, if you have struck your hand with a stranger,

2You are snared with the words of your mouth, you are taken with the words of your mouth.

3Do this now, my son, and deliver yourself, when you have come into the hand of your friend; go, humble yourself, and plead with your friend.

4Give not sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids.

5Deliver yourself as a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the fowler.

6Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise:

7Who having no guide, overseer, or ruler,

8Provides her food in the summer, and gathers her food in the harvest.

9How long will you sleep, O sluggard? when will you arise out of your sleep?

10Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep:

11So shall your poverty come upon you like a vagabond, and your want like an armed man.

12A worthless person, a wicked man, walks with a perverse mouth.

13He winks with his eyes, he signals with his feet, he motions with his fingers;

14Perversity is in his heart, he devises evil continually; he sows discord.

15Therefore shall his calamity come suddenly; suddenly shall he be broken without remedy.

16These six things does the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him:

17A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood,

18A heart that devises wicked imaginations, feet that are swift in running to evil,

19A false witness that speaks lies, and he that sows discord among brethren.

Warnings Against Adultery

20My son, keep your father's commandment, and forsake not the law of your mother:

21Bind them continually upon your heart, and tie them about your neck.

22When you go, it shall lead you; when you sleep, it shall keep you; and when you awake, it shall talk with you.

23For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life:

24To keep you from the evil woman, from the flattery of the tongue of a seductress.

25Lust not after her beauty in your heart; neither let her allure you with her eyelids.

26For by means of a harlot a man is reduced to a piece of bread: and the adulteress will prey upon his precious life.

27Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?

28Can one go upon hot coals, and his feet not be burned?

29So is he that goes in to his neighbor's wife; whosoever touches her shall not be innocent.

30Men do not despise a thief, if he steals to satisfy his soul when he is hungry;

31But if he is found, he shall restore sevenfold; he shall give up all the goods of his house.

32But whosoever commits adultery with a woman lacks understanding: he that does it destroys his own soul.

33A wound and dishonor shall he get; and his reproach shall not be wiped away.

34For jealousy causes the rage of a man: therefore he will not spare in the day of vengeance.

35He will not regard any ransom; neither will he be appeased, though you give many gifts.