Empty and false are the hopes of the senseless, and fools are borne aloft by dreams. Like a man who catches at shadows or chases the wind, is the one who believes in dreams. What is seen in dreams is to reality what the reflection of a face is to the face itself.
Tainted his gift who offers in sacrifice ill-gotten goods! Mock presents from the lawless win not God's favor. The Most High approves not the gifts of the godless, nor for their many sacrifices does he forgive their sins.
Like the man who slays a son in his father's presence is he who offers sacrifice from the possessions of the poor. The bread of charity is life itself for the needy; he who withholds it is a man of blood. He slays his neighbor who deprives him of his living: he sheds blood who denies the laborer his wages.
If one man prays and another curses, whose voice will the LORD hear? If a man again touches a corpse after he has bathed, what did he gain by the purification? So with a man who fasts for his sins, but then goes and commits them again, who will hear his prayer, and what has he gained by his mortification?
Sirach 34:1-3, 18-22, 24-26
Though any man may be accepted as a husband, yet one girl will be more suitable than another. A woman's beauty makes her husband's face light up, for it surpasses all else that charms the eye; And if, besides, her speech is kindly, his lot is beyond that of mortal men.
A wife is her husband's richest treasure, a helpmate, a steadying column. A vineyard with no hedge will be overrun; a man with no wife becomes a homeless wanderer.
Who will trust an armed band that shifts from city to city? Or a man who has no nest, but lodges where night overtakes him?
Sirach 36:21-27
A word is the source of every deed; a thought, of every act. The root of all conduct is the mind; four branches it shoots forth: Good and evil, death and life, their absolute mistress is the tongue.
While you are well, govern your appetite so that you allow it not what is bad for you; For not every food is good for everyone, nor is everything suited to every taste.
Be not drawn after every enjoyment, neither become a glutton for choice foods, For sickness comes with overeating, and gluttony brings on biliousness. Through lack of self-control many have died, but the abstemious man prolongs his life.
Sirach 37:16-18, 27-31
Tainted his gift who offers in sacrifice ill-gotten goods! Mock presents from the lawless win not God's favor. The Most High approves not the gifts of the godless, nor for their many sacrifices does he forgive their sins.
Like the man who slays a son in his father's presence is he who offers sacrifice from the possessions of the poor. The bread of charity is life itself for the needy; he who withholds it is a man of blood. He slays his neighbor who deprives him of his living: he sheds blood who denies the laborer his wages.
If one man prays and another curses, whose voice will the LORD hear? If a man again touches a corpse after he has bathed, what did he gain by the purification? So with a man who fasts for his sins, but then goes and commits them again, who will hear his prayer, and what has he gained by his mortification?
Sirach 34:1-3, 18-22, 24-26
Though any man may be accepted as a husband, yet one girl will be more suitable than another. A woman's beauty makes her husband's face light up, for it surpasses all else that charms the eye; And if, besides, her speech is kindly, his lot is beyond that of mortal men.
A wife is her husband's richest treasure, a helpmate, a steadying column. A vineyard with no hedge will be overrun; a man with no wife becomes a homeless wanderer.
Who will trust an armed band that shifts from city to city? Or a man who has no nest, but lodges where night overtakes him?
Sirach 36:21-27
A word is the source of every deed; a thought, of every act. The root of all conduct is the mind; four branches it shoots forth: Good and evil, death and life, their absolute mistress is the tongue.
While you are well, govern your appetite so that you allow it not what is bad for you; For not every food is good for everyone, nor is everything suited to every taste.
Be not drawn after every enjoyment, neither become a glutton for choice foods, For sickness comes with overeating, and gluttony brings on biliousness. Through lack of self-control many have died, but the abstemious man prolongs his life.
Sirach 37:16-18, 27-31