(No prolog)

[1] When thou shalt sit to eat with a prince, consider diligently what is set before thy face. [2] And put a knife to thy throat, if it be so that thou have thy soul in thy own power. [3] Be not desirous of his meats, in which is the bread of deceit. [4] Labour not to be rich: but set bounds to thy prudence. [5] Lift not up thy eyes to riches which thou canst not have: because they shall make themselves wings like those of an eagle, and shall fly towards heaven.

[6] Eat not with an envious man, and desire not his meats: [7] Because like a soothsayer, and diviner, he thinketh that which he knoweth not. Eat and drink, will he say to thee: and his mind is not with thee. [8] The meats which thou hadst eaten, thou shalt vomit up: and shalt loose thy beautiful words. [9] Speak not in the ears of fools: because they will despise the instruction of thy speech. [10] Touch not the bounds of little ones: and enter not into the field of the fatherless:

[11] For their near kinsman is strong: and he will judge their cause against thee. [12] Let thy heart apply itself to instruction: and thy ears to words of knowledge. [13] Withhold not correction from a child: for if thou strike him with the rod, he shall not die. [14] Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from hell. [15] My son, if thy mind be wise, my heart shall rejoice with thee:

[16] And my reins shall rejoice, when thy lips shall speak what is right. [17] Let not thy heart envy sinners: but be thou in the fear of the Lord all the day long: [18] Because thou shalt have hope in the latter end, and thy expectation shall not be taken away. [19] Hear thou, my son, and be wise: and guide thy mind in the way. [20] Be not in the feasts of great drinkers, nor in their revellings, who contribute flesh to eat:

[21] Because they that give themselves to drinking, and that club together shall be consumed; and drowsiness shall be clothed with rags. [22] Hearken to thy father, that beget thee: and despise not thy mother when she is old. [23] Buy truth, and do not sell wisdom, and instruction, and understanding. [24] The father of the just rejoiceth greatly: he that hath begotten a wise son, shall have joy in him. [25] Let thy father, and thy mother be joyful, and let her rejoice that bore thee.

[26] My son, give me thy heart: and let thy eyes keep my ways. [27] For a harlot is a deep ditch: and a strange woman is a narrow pit. [28] She lieth in wait in the way as a robber, and him whom she shall see unwary, she will kill. [29] Who hath woe? whose father hath woe? who hath contentions? who falls into pits? who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes? [30] Surely they that pass their time in wine, and study to drink of their cups.

[31] Look not upon the wine when it is yellow, when the colour thereof shineth in the glass: it goeth in pleasantly, [32] But in the end, it will bite like a snake, and will spread abroad poison like a basilisk. [33] Thy eyes shall behold strange women, and thy heart shall utter perverse things. [34] And thou shalt be as one sleeping in the midst of the sea, and as a pilot fast asleep, when the stern is lost. [35] And thou shalt say: They have beaten me, but I was not sensible of pain: they drew me, and I felt not: when shall I awake, and find wine again?