Proverbs 23

¹ When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, Consider diligently him that is before thee;

² And put a knife to thy throat, If thou be a man given to appetite.

³ Be not desirous of his dainties; Seeing they are deceitful food.

⁴ Weary not thyself to be rich; Cease from thine own wisdom.

⁵ Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? For riches certainly make themselves wings, Like an eagle that flieth toward heaven.

⁶ Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, Neither desire thou his dainties:

⁷ For as he thinketh within himself, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; But his heart is not with thee.

⁸ The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up, And lose thy sweet words.

⁹ Speak not in the hearing of a fool; For he will despise the wisdom of thy words.

¹⁰ Remove not the ancient landmark; And enter not into the fields of the fatherless:

¹¹ For their Redeemer is strong; He will plead their cause against thee.

¹² Apply thy heart unto instruction, And thine ears to the words of knowledge.

¹³ Withhold not correction from the child; For if thou beat him with the rod, he will not die.

¹⁴ Thou shalt beat him with the rod, And shalt deliver his soul from Sheol.

¹⁵ My son, if thy heart be wise, My heart will be glad, even mine:

¹⁶ Yea, my heart will rejoice, When thy lips speak right things.

¹⁷ Let not thy heart envy sinners; But be thou in the fear of Jehovah all the day long:

¹⁸ For surely there is a reward; And thy hope shall not be cut off.

¹⁹ Hear thou, my son, and be wise, And guide thy heart in the way.

²⁰ Be not among winebibbers, Among gluttonous eaters of flesh:

²¹ For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty; And drowsiness will clothe a man with rags.

²² Hearken unto thy father that begat thee, And despise not thy mother when she is old.

²³ Buy the truth, and sell it not; Yea, wisdom, and instruction, and understanding.

²⁴ The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice; And he that begetteth a wise child will have joy of him.

²⁵ Let thy father and thy mother be glad, And let her that bare thee rejoice.

²⁶ My son, give me thy heart; And let thine eyes delight in my ways.

²⁷ For a harlot is a deep ditch; And a foreign woman is a narrow pit.

²⁸ Yea, she lieth in wait as a robber, And increaseth the treacherous among men.

²⁹ Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? Who hath complaining? who hath wounds without cause? Who hath redness of eyes?

³⁰ They that tarry long at the wine; They that go to seek out mixed wine.

³¹ Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, When it sparkleth in the cup, When it goeth down smoothly:

³² At the last it biteth like a serpent, And stingeth like an adder.

³³ Thine eyes shall behold strange things, And thy heart shall utter perverse things.

³⁴ Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down in the midst of the sea, Or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast.

³⁵ They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not hurt; They have beaten me, and I felt it not: When shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.