Reward for the seeker of wisdom
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My son, if you would accept my words, and conceal my commandments within you,
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so that your ears may listen to wisdom, then bend your heart in order to know prudence.
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For if you would call upon wisdom and bend your heart to prudence,
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if you will seek her like money, and dig for her as if for treasure,
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then you will understand the fear of the Lord, and you will discover the knowledge of God.
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For the Lord bestows wisdom, and out of his mouth, prudence and knowledge.
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He will preserve the salvation of the righteous, and he will protect those who walk in simplicity:
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serving the paths of justice, and guarding the ways of sanctity.
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Then you shall understand justice and judgment, and equity, and every good path.
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If wisdom is to enter into your heart, and if knowledge is to become pleasing to your soul,
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then counsel must guard you, and prudence must serve you,
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so that you may be rescued from the evil way, and from the man who speaks perversities,
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from those who leave the straight path to walk in dark ways,
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who rejoice when they have done evil, and who exult in the most wicked things.
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Their ways are perverse, and their steps are infamous.
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So may you be rescued from the foreign woman, and from the outsider, who softens her speech,(a)
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and who leaves behind the Guide of her youth,
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and who has forgotten the covenant of her God. For her household inclines toward death, and her paths toward Hell.
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All those who enter to her will not return again, nor will they take hold of the paths of life.
Walking in the way of wisdom
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So may you walk in the good way, and keep to the difficult paths of the just.(b)
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For those who are upright shall live upon the earth, and the simple shall continue upon it.
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Yet truly, the impious shall perish from the earth, and those who act unjustly shall be taken away from it.
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