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4:1  Hear, ye children, the instruction of a father, and attend that you may know prudence.
4:2  I will give you a good gift, forsake not my law.
4:3  For I also was my father's son, tender and as an only son in the sight of my mother:
4:4  And he taught me, and said: Let thy heart receive my words, keep my commandments, and thou shalt live.
4:5  Get wisdom, get prudence: forget not, neither decline from the words of my mouth.
4:6  Forsake her not, and she shall keep thee: love her, and she shall preserve thee.
4:7  The beginning of wisdom, get wisdom, and with all thy possession purchase prudence.
4:8  Take hold on her, and she shall exalt thee: thou shalt be glorified by her, when thou shalt embrace her.
4:9  She shall give to thy head increase of graces, and protect thee with a noble crown.
4:10  Hear, O my son, and receive my words, that years of life may be multiplied to thee.
4:11  I will shew thee the way of wisdom, I will lead thee by the paths of equity:
4:12  Which when thou shalt have entered, thy steps shall not be straitened, and when thou runnest thou shalt not meet a stumblingblock.
4:13  Take hold on instruction, leave it not: keep it, because it is thy life.
4:14  Be not delighted in the paths of the wicked, neither let the way of evil men please thee.
4:15  Flee from it, pass not by it: go aside, and forsake it.
4:16  For they sleep not except they have done evil: and their sleep is taken away unless they have made some to fall.
4:17  They eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of iniquity.
4:18  But the path of the just, as a shining light, goeth forwards and increaseth even to perfect day.
4:19  The way of the wicked is darksome: they know not where they fall.
4:20  My son, hearken to my words, and incline thy ear to my sayings.
4:21  Let them not depart from thy eyes, keep them in the midst of thy heart:
4:22  For they are life to those that find them, and health to all flesh.
4:23  With all watchfulness keep thy heart, because life issueth out from it.
4:24  Remove from thee a froward mouth, and let detracting lips be far from thee.
4:25  Let thy eyes look straight on, and let thy eyelids go before thy steps.
4:26  Make straight the path for thy feet, and all thy ways shall be established.
4:27  Decline not to the right hand, nor to the left: turn away thy foot from evil. For the Lord knoweth the ways that are on the right hand: but those are perverse which are on the left hand. But he will make thy courses straight, he will bring forward thy ways in peace.