Chapter XXVII · Location 27 of 31
Chapter 27 · Open to readFrom Proverbs · Douay–Rheims / Challoner (1749–1752)
What does Proverbs Chapter 27 say, and which statements belong to its speaker?
Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary
The chapter’s statements remain attributed to its speaker. Exact images, future and conditional wording are preserved; edition notes are separately identified. The closing teachings retain their unresolved limits without added outcome guarantees.
Chapter breakdown
Proverbs 27 forbids boasting of tomorrow’s unknown events and asks another or a stranger to praise rather than oneself. Stone and sand are heavy, a fool’s anger heavier; anger has no mercy, fury breaks forth and provoked violence is difficult to bear. Open rebuke exceeds hidden love; a lover’s wounds contrast an enemy’s deceitful kisses. Fullness tramples honey, hunger finds bitterness sweet. A wandering bird compares a man leaving his place. Ointment, perfume and a friend’s counsel sweeten the heart. Keep your friend and your father’s friend; do not go to a brother’s house in affliction, for a near neighbor exceeds a distant brother. The son’s wisdom gladdens the speaker and answers reproach. Prudence sees evil and hides; little ones pass and suffer loss. Take a stranger-surety’s garment and pledge. A loud blessing while rising in the night resembles a curse.
A wrangling woman resembles a leaking roof on a cold day; retaining her compares holding wind and calling oil in the right hand. Iron sharpens iron, a friend’s countenance a friend. Fig-tree keeping brings fruit, keeping a master future glory. Faces shine in water, hearts open to the wise. Hell and destruction never fill, nor men’s eyes. A praising mouth tests a man like silver and gold testing; the wicked heart seeks evil, the righteous knowledge. Even pounding a fool with a pestle among sodden barley will not remove folly. Know cattle’s countenance and consider flocks: power is not always, but a crown shall be given from generation to generation. Open meadows, green herbs and mountain hay lead to lambs for clothing and kids for the field’s price. Let goats’ milk suffice for food, household and handmaids. This closing counsel does not report achieved prosperity or reverse the crown’s wording.
The story inside
Opening: The chapter’s statements remain attributed to its speaker. Development: Exact images, future and conditional wording are preserved; edition notes are separately identified. Conclusion: The closing teachings retain their unresolved limits without added outcome guarantees.
Lessons worth keeping
- 1The chapter’s statements remain attributed to its speaker.
- 2Exact images, future and conditional wording are preserved; edition notes are separately identified.
- 3The closing teachings retain their unresolved limits without added outcome guarantees.
Test your recall
Which images and requests does the speaker use, and what does the chapter leave unresolved?
Source edition and notes
Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.
Lines 69599–69600
Boast not for to morrow, for thou knowest not what the day to come may bring forth.
Lines 69613–69614
Better are the wounds of a friend, than the deceitful kisses of an enemy.
Lines 69647–69648
Iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.
Lines 69659–69660
As silver is tried in the fining-pot, and gold in the furnace: so a man is tried by the mouth of him that praiseth.
Lines 69667–69668
Be diligent to know the countenance of thy cattle, and consider thy own flocks:
