Proverbs 2

¹My son, if thou wilt receive my words, and wilt hide my commandments with thee,

²that thine ear may hear wisdom: incline thine heart to know prudence.

³For if thou shalt call for wisdom, and incline thine heart to prudence:

⁴If thou shalt seek her as money, and as treasures shalt dig her up:

⁵then shalt thou understand the fear of our Lord, and shalt find the knowledge of God.

⁶Because our Lord giveth wisdom: and out of his mouth prudence and knowledge.

⁷He will keep the salvation of the righteous, & protect them that walk simply.

⁸Keeping the paths of justice, & guarding the ways of Saints.

⁹Then shalt thou understand justice, and judgment, and equity, and every good path.

¹⁰If wisdom shall enter into thy heart, and knowledge please thy soul:

¹¹counsel shall keep thee, and prudence shall preserve thee,

¹²that thou mayst be delivered from the evil way, and from the man that speaketh perverse things:

¹³who leave the right way, and walk by dark ways:

¹⁴who are glad when they have done evil, and rejoice in most wicked things:

¹⁵whose ways are perverse, and their steps infamous.

¹⁶That thou mayst be delivered from the strange woman, and from the foreigner, which mollifieth her words,

¹⁷forsaketh the guide of her youth,

¹⁸and hath forgotten the covenant of her God. For her house is bowed down to death, and her paths to hell.

¹⁹All that go in unto her, shall not return neither shall they apprehend the paths of life.

²⁰That thou mayst walk in a good way: and mayst keep the paths of the just.

²¹For they that are right, shall dwell in the earth, and the simple shall continue in it.

²²But the impious shall be destroyed from the earth: and they that do unjustly shall be taken away from it.