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Practical Admonitions

6My child, if you have given your pledge to your neighbour,
   if you have bound yourself to another,^*
2 you are snared by the utterance of your lips,^*
   caught by the words of your mouth.
³ So do this, my child, and save yourself,
   for you have come into your neighbour’s power:
   go, hurry,^* and plead with your neighbour.
⁴ Give your eyes no sleep
   and your eyelids no slumber;
⁵ save yourself like a gazelle from the hunter,^*
   like a bird from the hand of the fowler.

⁶ Go to the ant, you lazybones;
   consider its ways, and be wise.
⁷ Without having any chief
   or officer or ruler,
⁸ it prepares its food in summer,
   and gathers its sustenance in harvest.
⁹ How long will you lie there, O lazybones?
   When will you rise from your sleep?
¹⁰ A little sleep, a little slumber,
   a little folding of the hands to rest,
¹¹ and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
   and want, like an armed warrior.

¹² A scoundrel and a villain
   goes around with crooked speech,
¹³ winking the eyes, shuffling the feet,
   pointing the fingers,
¹⁴ with perverted mind devising evil,
   continually sowing discord;
¹⁵ on such a one calamity will descend suddenly;
   in a moment, damage beyond repair.

¹⁶ There are six things that the Lord hates,
   seven that are an abomination to him:
¹⁷ haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
   and hands that shed innocent blood,
¹⁸ a heart that devises wicked plans,
   feet that hurry to run to evil,
¹⁹ a lying witness who testifies falsely,
   and one who sows discord in a family.