Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Chapter 42

¹Of these things be not thou ashamed, and accept no person to sin thereby: ²Of the law of the most High, and his covenant; and of judgment to justify the ungodly; ³Of reckoning with thy partners and travellers; or of the gift of the heritage of friends; ⁴Of exactness of balance and weights; or of getting much or little; ⁵And of merchants’ indifferent selling; of much correction of children; and to make the side of an evil servant to bleed. ⁶Sure keeping is good, where an evil wife is; and shut up, where many hands are. ⁷Deliver all things in number and weight; and put all in writing that thou givest out, or receivest in. ⁸Be not ashamed to inform the unwise and foolish, and the extreme aged that contendeth with those that are young: thus shalt thou be truly learned, and approved of all men living.

⁹The father waketh for the daughter, when no man knoweth; and the care for her taketh away sleep: when she is young, lest she pass away the flower of her age; and being married, lest she should be hated: ¹⁰In her virginity, lest she should be defiled and gotten with child in her father’s house; and having an husband, lest she should misbehave herself; and when she is married, lest she should be barren. ¹¹Keep a sure watch over a shameless daughter, lest she make thee a laughingstock to thine enemies, and a byword in the city, and a reproach among the people, and make thee ashamed before the multitude. ¹²Behold not every body’s beauty, and sit not in the midst of women. ¹³For from garments cometh a moth, and from women wickedness. ¹⁴Better is the churlishness of a man than a courteous woman, a woman, I say, which bringeth shame and reproach. ¹⁵I will now remember the works of the Lord, and declare the things that I have seen: In the words of the Lord are his works. ¹⁶The sun that giveth light looketh upon all things, and the work thereof is full of the glory of the Lord.

¹⁷The Lord hath not given power to the saints to declare all his marvellous works, which the Almighty Lord firmly settled, that whatsoever is might be established for his glory. ¹⁸He seeketh out the deep, and the heart, and considereth their crafty devices: for the Lord knoweth all that may be known, and he beholdeth the signs of the world. ¹⁹He declareth the things that are past, and for to come, and revealeth the steps of hidden things. ²⁰No thought escapeth him, neither any word is hidden from him. ²¹He hath garnished the excellent works of his wisdom, and he is from everlasting to everlasting: unto him may nothing be added, neither can he be diminished, and he hath no need of any counsellor. ²²Oh how desirable are all his works! and that a man may see even to a spark. ²³All these things live and remain for ever for all uses, and they are all obedient. ²⁴All things are double one against another: and he hath made nothing imperfect.

²⁵One thing establisheth the good or another: and who shall be filled with beholding his glory?