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UST PRO Chapter 27

◄ PRO 27 ► ║ ©

27 Do not brag about what you think will happen tomorrow,

because you do not know what will happen then.

2 Do not praise yourself; let someone else praise you.

Indeed, let someone who does not know you praise you, not yourself.

3 Stones and sand are heavy,

but how provocative fools are is like something that is heavier than both of them.

4 Angry people are cruel and furious people are destructive,

but no one can resist jealous people!

5 It is better to correct people openly, than to love them without them knowing that you do.

6 Friends will be faithful to you by hurting your feelings when necessary,

but enemies will deceive you by acting affectionally toward you.

7 When people who have full stomachs see on the ground honey dripping from the comb, they step on it because they are not hungry.

but even bitter things taste sweet to hungry people because they are so hungry.

8 People who stray from their homes

are like birds that stray from their nests.

9 Just as fragrant oil and perfume make people feel happy,

so when your friends advise you sincerely, they show how kind they are.

10 Do not abandon your friends or your father’s friends.

Do not go to the houses of your relatives when something disastrous happens to you.

Rather, it is better to go to a neighbor than to relatives who live far away.

11 My child, act wisely and make me happy,

so that I will be able to reply to anyone who argues against me.

12 Sensible people observe something dangerous happening and avoid it,

but naive people ignorantly do not avoid it and suffer for doing so.

13 Take the coats of people who promise to pay a loan for someone whom they do not know.

Indeed, hold onto the coats of people who do so for a foreigner.

14 People will think that someone they know is cursing them if that person speaks loudly to bless them early in the morning.

15 A wife who always argues with you is as annoying as

constantly dripping water on a rainy day.

16 It is as difficult to stop her from arguing as stopping the wind,

or catching oil in one hand.

17 Just as iron can sharpen an iron blade, so too people can help people they know improve how they think.

18 Just as people who take care of fruit trees will eat the fruit from those trees as a result,

so too will masters honor their servants who guard them.

19 When people look in water, the water reflects their faces.

In the same way, what people think reveals what kinds of people they are.

20 Just as the place where dead people go never becomes full;

so people never stop wanting something.

21 People use crucibles and furnaces to test and refine silver and gold.

In the same way, people test what kind of person someone is by saying good things about that person.

22 If you were to crush a fool the way you would crush grain,

you would still not be able to stop that person from acting foolishly.

23 Be fully aware of how your sheep are doing.

Indeed, consider carefully how your animals fare. 24 Do so because riches will not last forever.

Even a king’s family will not rule forever!

25 Harvest the grass and then you will see new grass.

Collect and store the plants that grow on the hillside.

26 If you do these things, then you will have lambs with wool that you can clothe yourself with. You will also have male goats that you can sell for enough money to buy a field.

27 You will even have female goats that produce enough milk for yourself, your family,

and your servant girls to drink.

◄ PRO 27 ► ║ ©

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