¹My son , if you will receive my words,

and store up my commandments within you ,

²so as to turn your ear to wisdom ,

and apply your heart to understanding ;

³yes , if you call out for discernment ,

and lift up your voice for understanding ;

⁴if you seek her as silver ,

and search for her as for hidden treasures ;

⁵then you will understand the fear of the LORD ,

and find the knowledge of God .

⁶For the LORD gives wisdom .

Out of his mouth comes knowledge and understanding .

⁷He lays up sound wisdom for the upright .

He is a shield to those who walk in integrity ,

⁸that he may guard the paths of justice ,

and preserve the way of his saints .

⁹Then you will understand righteousness and justice ,

equity and every good path .

¹⁰For wisdom will enter into your heart .

Knowledge will be pleasant to your soul .

¹¹Discretion will watch over you .

Understanding will keep you ,

¹²to deliver you from the way of evil ,

from the men who speak perverse things ,

¹³who forsake the paths of uprightness ,

to walk in the ways of darkness ,

¹⁴who rejoice to do evil ,

and delight in the perverseness of evil ,

¹⁵who are crooked in their ways ,

and wayward in their paths ,

¹⁶to deliver you from the strange woman ,

even from the foreigner who flatters with her words,

¹⁷who forsakes the friend of her youth ,

and forgets the covenant of her God;

¹⁸for her house leads down to death ,

her paths to the departed spirits .

¹⁹None who go to her return again ,

neither do they attain to the paths of life .

²⁰Therefore walk in the way of good men ,

and keep the paths of the righteous .

²¹For the upright will dwell in the land.

The perfect will remain in it .

²²But the wicked will be cut off from the land.

The treacherous will be rooted out of it .