Proverbs

Chapter 1

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¶ The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel;

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To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding;

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To receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity;

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To give subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion.

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A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:

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To understand a proverb, and the interpretation; the words of the wise, and their dark sayings.

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¶ The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

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My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother:

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For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.

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¶ My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.

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If they say, Come with us, let us lay wait for blood, let us lurk privily for the innocent without cause:

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Let us swallow them up alive as the grave; and whole, as those that go down into the pit:

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We shall find all precious substance, we shall fill our houses with spoil:

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Cast in thy lot among us; let us all have one purse:

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My son, walk not thou in the way with them; refrain thy foot from their path:

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For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood.

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Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird.

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And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives.

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So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.

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¶ Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:

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She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,

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How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?

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Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.

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¶ Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded;

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But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof:

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I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh;

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When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you.

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Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me:

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For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD:

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They would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.

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Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.

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For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them.

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But whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil.