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7My child, keep my words
and store up my commandments with you;
²keep my commandments and live,
keep my teachings as the apple of your eye;
³bind them on your fingers,
write them on the tablet of your heart.
⁴Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”
and call insight your intimate friend,
⁵that they may keep you from the loose woman,
from the adulteress with her smooth words. ⁶For at the window of my house
I looked out through my lattice,
⁷and I saw among the simple ones,
I observed among the youths,
a young man without sense,
⁸passing along the street near her corner,
taking the road to her house
⁹in the twilight, in the evening,
at the time of night and darkness. ¹⁰Then a woman comes toward him,
decked out like a prostitute, wily of heart.
¹¹She is loud and wayward;
her feet do not stay at home;
¹²now in the street, now in the squares,
and at every corner she lies in wait.
¹³She seizes him and kisses him,
and with impudent face she says to him:
¹⁴“I had to offer sacrifices,
and today I have paid my vows;
¹⁵so now I have come out to meet you,
to seek you eagerly, and I have found you!
¹⁶I have decked my couch with coverings,
colored spreads of Egyptian linen;
¹⁷I have perfumed my bed with myrrh,
aloes, and cinnamon.
¹⁸Come, let us take our fill of love until morning;
let us delight ourselves with love.
¹⁹For my husband is not at home;
he has gone on a long journey.
²⁰He took a bag of money with him;
he will not come home until full moon.” ²¹With much seductive speech she persuades him;
with her smooth talk she compels him.
²²Right away he follows her,
and goes like an ox to the slaughter,
or bounds like a stag toward the trap
²³until an arrow pierces its entrails.
He is like a bird rushing into a snare,
not knowing that it will cost him his life. ²⁴And now, my children, listen to me,
and be attentive to the words of my mouth.
²⁵Do not let your hearts turn aside to her ways;
do not stray into her paths.
²⁶for many are those she has laid low,
and numerous are her victims.
²⁷Her house is the way to Sheol,
going down to the chambers of death.