Proverbs 30:15-31

New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised

¹⁵ The leech^[a] has two daughters;
    ‘Give, give,’ they cry.
Three things are never satisfied;
    four never say, ‘Enough’:
¹⁶ Sheol, the barren womb,
    the earth ever thirsty for water,
    and the fire that never says, ‘Enough.’^[b]

¹⁷ The eye that mocks a father
    and scorns to obey a mother
will be pecked out by the ravens of the valley
    and eaten by the vultures.

¹⁸ Three things are too wonderful for me;
    four I do not understand:
¹⁹ the way of an eagle in the sky,
    the way of a snake on a rock,
the way of a ship on the high seas,
    and the way of a man with a girl.

²⁰ This is the way of an adulteress:
    she eats, and wipes her mouth,
    and says, ‘I have done no wrong.’

²¹ Under three things the earth trembles;
    under four it cannot bear up:
²² a slave when he becomes king,
    and a fool when glutted with food;
²³ an unloved woman when she gets a husband,
    and a maid when she succeeds her mistress.

²⁴ Four things on earth are small,
    yet they are exceedingly wise:
²⁵ the ants are a people without strength,
    yet they provide their food in the summer;
²⁶ the badgers are a people without power,
    yet they make their homes in the rocks;
²⁷ the locusts have no king,
    yet all of them march in rank;
²⁸ the lizard^[c] can be grasped in the hand,
    yet it is found in kings’ palaces.

²⁹ Three things are stately in their stride;
    four are stately in their gait:
³⁰ the lion, which is mightiest among wild animals
    and does not turn back before any;
³¹ the strutting rooster,^[d] the he-goat,
    and a king striding before^[e] his people.