Proverbs 23:1-14

¹When you sit to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before you;

²put a knife to your throat if you are a man given to appetite.

³Don’t be desirous of his dainties, since they are deceitful food.

⁴Don’t weary yourself to be rich. In your wisdom, show restraint.

⁵Why do you set your eyes on that which is not? For it certainly sprouts wings like an eagle and flies in the sky.

⁶Don’t eat the food of him who has a stingy eye, and don’t crave his delicacies,

⁷for as he thinks about the cost, so he is. “Eat and drink!” he says to you, but his heart is not with you.

⁸You will vomit up the morsel which you have eaten and waste your pleasant words.

⁹Don’t speak in the ears of a fool, for he will despise the wisdom of your words.

¹⁰Don’t move the ancient boundary stone. Don’t encroach on the fields of the fatherless,

¹¹for their Defender is strong. He will plead their case against you.

¹²Apply your heart to instruction, and your ears to the words of knowledge.

¹³Don’t withhold correction from a child. If you punish him with the rod, he will not die.

¹⁴Punish him with the rod, and save his soul from Sheol.