On Life and Conduct

1A good name is to be more desired than great wealth,
         Favor is better than silver and gold.

2The rich and the poor have a common bond,
         The LORD is the maker of them all.

3The prudent sees the evil and hides himself,
         But the naive go on, and are punished for it.

4The reward of humility and the fear of the LORD
         Are riches, honor and life.

5Thorns and snares are in the way of the perverse;
         He who guards himself will be far from them.

6Train up a child in the way he should go,
         Even when he is old he will not depart from it.

7The rich rules over the poor,
         And the borrower becomes the lender’s slave.

8He who sows iniquity will reap vanity,
         And the rod of his fury will perish.

9He who is generous will be blessed,
         For he gives some of his food to the poor.

10Drive out the scoffer, and contention will go out,
         Even strife and dishonor will cease.

11He who loves purity of heart
         And whose speech is gracious, the king is his friend.

12The eyes of the LORD preserve knowledge,
         But He overthrows the words of the treacherous man.

13The sluggard says, “There is a lion outside;
         I will be killed in the streets!”

14The mouth of an adulteress is a deep pit;
         He who is cursed of the LORD will fall into it.

15Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child;
         The rod of discipline will remove it far from him.

16He who oppresses the poor to make more for himself
         Or who gives to the rich, will only come to poverty.

17Incline your ear and hear the words of the wise,
         And apply your mind to my knowledge;

18For it will be pleasant if you keep them within you,
         That they may be ready on your lips.

19So that your trust may be in the LORD,
         I have taught you today, even you.

20Have I not written to you excellent things
         Of counsels and knowledge,

21To make you know the certainty of the words of truth
         That you may correctly answer him who sent you?

22Do not rob the poor because he is poor,
         Or crush the afflicted at the gate;

23For the LORD will plead their case
         And take the life of those who rob them.

24Do not associate with a man given to anger;
         Or go with a hot-tempered man,

25Or you will learn his ways
         And find a snare for yourself.

26Do not be among those who give pledges,
         Among those who become guarantors for debts.

27If you have nothing with which to pay,
         Why should he take your bed from under you?

28Do not move the ancient boundary
         Which your fathers have set.

29Do you see a man skilled in his work?
         He will stand before kings;
         He will not stand before obscure men.

NASB ©1995

American Standard Version
A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, And loving favor rather than silver and gold.

Douay-Rheims Bible
A good name is better than great riches: and good favour is above silver and gold.

Darby Bible Translation
A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches; loving favour rather than silver and gold.

English Revised Version
A GOOD name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favour rather than silver and gold.

Webster's Bible Translation
A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favor rather than silver and gold.

World English Bible
A good name is more desirable than great riches, and loving favor is better than silver and gold.

Young's Literal Translation
A name is chosen rather than much wealth, Than silver and than gold -- good grace.The Rich and the Poor
Chapel Royal, Whitehall, 1871. Proverbs xxii. 2. "The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all." I have been asked to preach here this afternoon on behalf of the Parochial Mission Women's Fund. I may best describe the object for which I plead, as an attempt to civilise and Christianise the women of the lower classes in the poorer districts of London and other great towns, by means of women of their own class--women, who have gone through the same struggles as they have, …
Charles Kingsley—All Saints' Day and Other Sermons

One Lion Two Lions no Lion at All
A sermon (No. 1670) delivered on Thursday Evening, June 8th, 1882, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, by C. H. Spurgeon. "The slothful man saith, There is a lion without, I shall be slain in the streets."--Proverbs 22:13. "The slothful man saith, There is a lion in the way; a lion is in the streets."--Proverbs 26:13. This slothful man seems to cherish that one dread of his about the lions, as if it were his favorite aversion and he felt it to be too much trouble to invent another excuse. …
C.H. Spurgeon—Sermons on Proverbs

The Formation of Habits.
School Sermon. Proverbs xxii. 6. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." INTRODUCTION.--There is a district, high up in the Black Forest, where the ground is full of springs. It is a plain some nine hundred feet above the sea. Thousands upon thousands of little springs gush out of the soil; you seem to be on the rose of a vast watering-can. Now, from this great source flow a good many rivers, and they flow in very different, nay, opposite directions. …
S. Baring-Gould—The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent

The Christian Business World
Scripture references: Proverbs 22:29; Romans 12:11; Psalms 24:1; 50:10-12; Haggai 2:8; Psalm 49:6,10,16,17; 62:10; Matthew 13:22; Mark 10:23,24; Job 31:24-26; Proverbs 3:9; Matthew 25:14-30; 24:45-51; 6:19-21; Luke 12:16-21. THE IDEAL IN THE BUSINESS WORLD There is often a wide difference between the methods actually employed in doing business and when they should be. Good men who are in the thick of the battle of competition and rivalry with other firms in the same line of trade, are the quickest …
Henry T. Sell—Studies in the Life of the Christian

Philip and the Emperor
Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.--Prov. xxii. 29. Kallias stayed a fortnight under the hospitable roof of Olympias, and during those days he had the pleasure of seeing how greatly his honest and genial simplicity brightened the thoughts both of his hostess and of his friend. The general outline of his own future seemed now to be approximately settled. Like Philip, he had acquired an incurable disgust for Constantinople, with …
Frederic William Farrar—Gathering Clouds: A Tale of the Days of St. Chrysostom

He Accuses Abaelard for Preferring his Own Opinions and Even Fancies to the Unanimous Consent of the Fathers, Especially Where He Declares that Christ did Not
He accuses Abaelard for preferring his own opinions and even fancies to the unanimous consent of the Fathers, especially where he declares that Christ did not become incarnate in order to save man from the power of the devil. 11. I find in a book of his sentences, and also in an exposition of his of the Epistle to the Romans, that this rash inquirer into the Divine Majesty attacks the mystery of our Redemption. He admits in the very beginning of his disputation that there has never been but one conclusion …
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux—Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux

The Baptismal Covenant Can be Kept Unbroken. Aim and Responsibility of Parents.
We have gone "to the Law and to the Testimony" to find out what the nature and benefits of Baptism are. We have gathered out of the Word all the principal passages bearing on this subject. We have grouped them together, and studied them side by side. We have noticed that their sense is uniform, clear, and strong. Unless we are willing to throw aside all sound principles of interpretation, we can extract from the words of inspiration only one meaning, and that is that the baptized child is, by virtue …
G. H. Gerberding—The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

"But Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God, and his Righteousness, and all These Things Shall be Added unto You. "
Matth. vi. 33.--"But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." The perfection even of the most upright creature, speaks always some imperfection in comparison of God, who is most perfect. The heavens, the sun and moon, in respect of lower things here, how glorious do they appear, and without spot! But behold, they are not clean in God's sight! How far are the angels above us who dwell in clay! They appear to be a pure mass of light and …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

We Shall not be Curious in the Ranking of the Duties in which Christian Love...
We shall not be curious in the ranking of the duties in which Christian love should exercise itself. All the commandments of the second table are but branches of it: they might be reduced all to the works of righteousness and of mercy. But truly these are interwoven through other. Though mercy uses to be restricted to the showing of compassion upon men in misery, yet there is a righteousness in that mercy, and there is mercy in the most part of the acts of righteousness, as in not judging rashly, …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Proverbs
Many specimens of the so-called Wisdom Literature are preserved for us in the book of Proverbs, for its contents are by no means confined to what we call proverbs. The first nine chapters constitute a continuous discourse, almost in the manner of a sermon; and of the last two chapters, ch. xxx. is largely made up of enigmas, and xxxi. is in part a description of the good housewife. All, however, are rightly subsumed under the idea of wisdom, which to the Hebrew had always moral relations. The Hebrew …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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