¹ My son,
keep my words,
and lay up my commandments with thee.
² Keep my commandments,
and live;
and my law as the apple of thine eye.
³ Bind them upon thy fingers,
write them upon table of thine heart.
⁴ Say unto wisdom,
Thou art my sister;
and call understanding thy kinswoman:
⁵ That they may keep thee from the strange woman,
from the stranger which flattereth with her words.

⁶ For at the window of my house
I looked through my casement,
⁷ And beheld among the simple ones,
I discerned among the youths,
a young man void of understanding,
⁸ Passing through the street near her corner;
and went the way to her house,
⁹ In the twilight,
in the evening,
in the black and dark night:
¹⁰ And, behold,
there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot,
and subtil of heart.
¹¹ (She is loud and stubborn;
her feet abide not in her house:
¹² Now is she without,
now in the streets,
and lieth in wait at every corner.)
¹³ So she caught him,
and kissed him,
and with an impudent face said unto him,
¹⁴ I have peace offerings with me;
this day have I payed my vows.
¹⁵ Therefore came I forth to meet thee,
diligently to seek thy face,
and I have found thee.
¹⁶ I have decked my bed with coverings of tapestry,
with carved works,
with fine linen of Egypt.
¹⁷ I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.
¹⁸ Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning:
let us solace ourselves with loves.
¹⁹ For the goodman is not at home,
he is gone a long journey:
²⁰ He hath taken a bag of money with him,
and will come home at the day appointed.
²¹ With her much fair speech she caused him to yield,
with the flattering of her lips she forced him.
²² He goeth after her straightway,
as an ox goeth to the slaughter,
or as a fool to the correction of the stocks;
²³ Till a dart strike through his liver;
as a bird hasteth to the snare,
and knoweth not that it is for his life.

²⁴ Hearken unto me now therefore, O ye children,
and attend to the words of my mouth.
²⁵ Let not thine heart decline to her ways,
go not astray in her paths.
²⁶ For she hath cast down many wounded:
yea, many strong men have been slain by her.
²⁷ Her house is the way to hell,
going down to the chambers of death.