1My son, pay attention to my wisdom. Bend your ear to my understanding,
2so that you may hold on to good judgment, and your lips may keep knowledge.
3For the lips of a strange woman drip like a honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil.
4But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a sword with two edges.
5Her feet go down to death. Her steps take hold of hell.
6So that you should not think about the path of life, her ways keep shifting; you cannot know them.
7So listen to me now, you children, and do not turn away from the words of my mouth.
8Keep your way far from her, and do not go near the door of her house,
9or you will give your honour to others, and your years to the cruel.
10Strangers will be filled with your wealth, and what you worked for will go to the house of a stranger.
11At the end you will mourn, when your flesh and your body are worn away,
12and you will say, "How I hated instruction, and my heart hated correction."
13"I did not obey the voice of my teachers, and I did not bend my ear to those who taught me."
14"I was almost in every evil, in the middle of the congregation and assembly."
15Drink water out of your own cistern, and running water out of your own well.
16Let your springs be scattered abroad, and rivers of water in the streets.
17Let them be yours alone, and not shared with strangers.
18Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice with the wife of your youth.
19Let her be like a loving deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts satisfy you at all times, and be filled with delight always by her love.
20Why then, my son, should you be carried away by a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?
21For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he watches all his paths.
22The wicked man's own sins will catch him, and he will be held fast by the cords of his sins.
23He will die because he had no instruction, and in his great foolishness he will go astray.