1 My son, give heed to my wisdom; bend your ear to my understanding,
2 that you may hold on to discretion and your lips may preserve knowledge.
3 For the lips of the strange woman drip with honey, and her palate is smoother than oil;
4 but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
5 Her feet descend to death; her steps lay hold on Sheol.
6 She never weighs the path of life; her tracks stray, and she is unaware of it.
7 So now, sons, hear me, and do not depart from the sayings of my mouth.
8 Keep your road far away from her; do not come near the doorway of her house,
9 or you will hand over your splendor to others and your years to one who is cruel,
10 or strangers will feast on your strength and your hard-won earnings end up in a foreigner's house,
11 and at the last you will moan, when your flesh and body are spent,
12 and you will say, "How I hated discipline, and how my heart scorned correction!
13 I did not heed the voice of my teachers or bend my ear to those who instructed me.
14 I came close to complete ruin in the midst of the gathered assembly."
15 Drink water from your own cistern, flowing water from within your own well.
16 Should your springs overflow out of doors, your streams of water in the public squares?
17 Let them belong to you alone, and not to strangers along with you.
18 May your fountain be blessed, and find your joy in the wife of your youth,
19 a lovely hind, a graceful doe; let her breasts content you at all times; be ever captivated by her love.
20 Why, my son, should you be captivated by a strange woman and clasp the bosom of a foreigner?
21 For the ways of a man lie open before the eyes of the LORD, and he weighs all his tracks.
22 The wicked man's own iniquities will trap him, and he will be gripped by the cords of his sin.
23 He will die for want of discipline, and through his great folly he will be led astray.