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Free yourself like a gazelle from the hunter,
    or like a bird from the hand of the fowler.

The Ant and the Sluggard at Harvest

[a]Go to the ant,(A) O sluggard,
    study her ways and learn wisdom;
For though she has no chief,
    no commander or ruler,

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Footnotes

  1. 6:6–11 The sluggard or lazybones is a type in Proverbs, like the righteous and the wicked. Sometimes the opposite type to the sluggard is the diligent person. Other extended passages on the sluggard are 24:30–34 and 26:13–16. The malice of the type is not low physical energy but the refusal to act. To describe human types, Proverbs often uses comparisons from the animal world, e.g., 27:8 (bird); 28:1, 15 (lion); 30:18–19 (eagle, snake); 30:24–28 (ant, badger, locust, lizard).