Moff PROV Chapter 5

5 

My son, attend to wisdom,

bend your ear to knowledge,

2 

that caution may be your safeguard,

and prudence may take care of you;

keep hold of caution and sound sense,

3 

that they may save you from the loose woman:

her lips drop honied words,

her talk is smoother than oil itself,

4 

but the end with her is bitter as poison,

sharp as a sword with double edge;

5 

her feet go down to Death,

her steps lead straight to the grave;

6 

the high road of Life is not for her,

shifty and slippery are her tracks.

7 

Now listen to me, my son,

hold fast to what I say:

8 

keep clear of her,

never go near her door,

9 

lest you have to part with your money,

and hand your earnings over,

10 

lest outsiders enjoy all that you make,

and all your wealth goes to a stranger’s household,

11 

till you are left at last to moan,

when all you have is wasted,

12 

‘Ah! why did I hate guidance,

why did I despise all warning?

13 

Why did not I listen to those who trained me,

and bend my ear to those who were my guides?

14 

I was nearly sentenced to death

by the community.’

15 

Drink from your own cistern,

drink fresh water out of your own well.

16 

Are you to seek your pleasures here and there,

and drink them in the streets?

17 

Have them at home,

never share them abroad.

18 

Let your fountain flow for yourself alone:

let a young wife be your joy,

19 

a lovely hind, a charming doe is she;

let her breasts give you rapture,

let her love ever ravish you.

20 

Why be ravished with a loose creature,

and embrace the bosom of another woman?

21 

Man’s goings are observed by the Eternal,

he takes account of all his ways.

22 

A man’s misdeeds shall snare him,

his sin shall catch him in its meshes;

23 

for lack of sense he dies,

his utter folly ruins him.