| 1 | Hear, ye children, the instruction of a father, and attend that you may know prudence. |
| 2 | I will give you a good gift, forsake not my law. |
| 3 | For I also was my father's son, tender and as an only son in the sight of my mother: |
| 4 | And he taught me, and said: Let thy heart receive my words, keep my commandments, and thou shalt live. |
| 5 | Get wisdom, get prudence: forget not, neither decline from the words of my mouth. |
| 6 | Forsake her not, and she shall keep thee: love her, and she shall preserve thee. |
| 7 | The beginning of wisdom, get wisdom, and with all thy possession purchase prudence. |
| 8 | Take hold on her, and she shall exalt thee: thou shalt be glorified by her, when thou shalt embrace her. |
| 9 | She shall give to thy head increase of graces, and protect thee with a noble crown. |
| 10 | Hear, O my son, and receive my words, that years of life may be multiplied to thee. |
| 11 | I will shew thee the way of wisdom, I will lead thee by the paths of equity: |
| 12 | Which when thou shalt have entered, thy steps shall not be straitened, and when thou runnest thou shalt not meet a stumblingblock. |
| 13 | Take hold on instruction, leave it not: keep it, because it is thy life. |
| 14 | Be not delighted in the paths of the wicked, neither let the way of evil men please thee. |
| 15 | Flee from it, pass not by it: go aside, and forsake it. |
| 16 | For they sleep not except they have done evil: and their sleep is taken away unless they have made some to fall. |
| 17 | They eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of iniquity. |
| 18 | But the path of the just, as a shining light, goeth forwards and increaseth even to perfect day. |
| 19 | The way of the wicked is darksome: they know not where they fall. |
| 20 | My son, hearken to my words, and incline thy ear to my sayings. |
| 21 | Let them not depart from thy eyes, keep them in the midst of thy heart: |
| 22 | For they are life to those that find them, and health to all flesh. |
| 23 | With all watchfulness keep thy heart, because life issueth out from it. |
| 24 | Remove from thee a froward mouth, and let detracting lips be far from thee. |
| 25 | Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps. |
| 26 | Make straight the path for thy feet, and all thy ways shall be established. |
| 27 | Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knoweth the ways that are on the right hand: but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But he will make thy courses straight, he will bring forward thy ways in peace. |
