14:1
Blessed is anyone who has not sinned in speech and who needs feel no remorse for sins.
14:2
Blessed is anyone whose conscience brings no reproach and who has never given up hope.
14:3
Wealth is not the right thing for the niggardly, and what use are possessions to the covetous?
14:4
Whoever hoards by stinting himself is hoarding for others, and others will live sumptuously on his riches.
14:5
If someone is mean to himself, whom does he benefit? he does not even enjoy what is his own.
14:6
No one is meaner than the person who is mean to himself, this is how his wickedness repays him.
14:7
If he does any good, he does it unintentionally, and in the end he himself reveals his wickedness.
14:8
Wicked the person who has an envious eye, averting his face, and careless of others' lives.
14:9
The eye of the grasping is not content with what he has, greed shrivels up the soul.
14:10
The miser is grudging of bread, there is famine at his table.
14:11
My child, treat yourself as well as you can afford, and bring worthy offerings to the Lord.
14:12
Remember that death will not delay, and that you have never seen Sheol's contract.
14:13
Be kind to your friend before you die, treat him as generously as you can afford.
14:14
Do not refuse yourself the good things of today, do not let your share of what is lawfully desired pass you by.
14:15
Will you not have to leave your fortune to another, and the fruit of your labour to be divided by lot?
14:16
Give and receive, enjoy yourself -- there are no pleasures to be found in Sheol.
14:17
Like clothes, every body will wear out, the age -- old law is, 'Everyone must die.'
14:18
Like foliage growing on a bushy tree, some leaves falling, others growing, so are the generations of flesh and blood: one dies, another is born.
14:19
Every achievement rots away and perishes, and with it goes its author.
14:20
Blessed is anyone who meditates on wisdom, and reasons with intelligence,
14:21
who studies her ways in his heart, and ponders her secrets.
14:22
He pursues her like a hunter, and lies in wait by her path;
14:23
he peeps in at her windows, and listens at her doors;
14:24
he lodges close to her house, and fixes his peg in her walls;
14:25
he pitches his tent at her side, and lodges in an excellent lodging;
14:26
he sets his children in her shade, and camps beneath her branches;
14:27
he is sheltered by her from the heat, and in her glory he makes his home.
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