27 Do not make your boast about the next day,+ for you do not know what a day will give birth to.+

² May a stranger, and not your own mouth, praise you; may a foreigner, and not your own lips, do so.+

³ The heaviness of a stone and a load of sand+—but the vexation by someone foolish is heavier than both of them.+

⁴ There is the cruelty of rage, also the flood of anger,+ but who can stand before jealousy?+

⁵ Better is a revealed reproof+ than a concealed love.

⁶ The wounds inflicted by a lover* are faithful,+ but the kisses of a hater are things to be entreated.*+

⁷ A soul that is satisfied will tread down comb honey, but to a hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.+

⁸ Just like a bird fleeing away from its nest,+ so is a man fleeing away from his place.+

⁹ Oil and incense+ are what make the heart rejoice, also the sweetness of one’s companion due to the counsel of the soul.+

¹⁰ Do not leave your own companion or the companion of your father, and do not enter the house of your own brother on the day of your disaster. Better is a neighbor that is near than a brother that is far away.+

¹¹ Be wise, my son, and make my heart rejoice,+ that I may make a reply to him that is taunting me.+

¹² The shrewd one that has seen the calamity has concealed himself;+ the inexperienced that have passed along have suffered the penalty.+

¹³ Take one’s garment, in case one has gone surety for a stranger;+ and in the instance of a foreign woman, seize from him a pledge.+

¹⁴ He that is blessing his fellowman with a loud voice early in the morning, as a malediction it will be accounted on his part.+

¹⁵ A leaking roof that drives one away in the day of a steady rain and a contentious wife are comparable.+ ¹⁶ Anyone sheltering her has sheltered the wind, and oil is what his right hand encounters.*

¹⁷ By iron, iron itself is sharpened. So one man* sharpens the face of another.*+

¹⁸ He that is safeguarding the fig tree will himself eat its fruit,+ and he that is guarding his master* will be honored.+

¹⁹ As in water face corresponds with face, so the heart of a man* with [that of] a man.

²⁰ She′ol and [the place of] destruction*+ themselves do not get satisfied;+ neither do the eyes of a man get satisfied.+

²¹ The refining pot is for silver,+ and the furnace is for gold;+ and an individual is according to his praise.+

²² Even if you should pound the foolish one fine with a pestle in a mortar, in among cracked grain, his foolishness will not depart from him.+

²³ You ought to know positively the appearance of your flock. Set your heart to your droves;+ ²⁴ for treasure will not be to time indefinite,+ nor a diadem for all generations.

²⁵ The green grass has departed, and the new grass has appeared, and the vegetation of the mountains has been gathered.+ ²⁶ The young rams are for your clothing,+ and the he-goats are the price of the field. ²⁷ And there is a sufficiency of goats’ milk for your food, for the food of your household, and the means+ of life for your girls.