1. And if you sit with companions, do not
Relate to them a story you find weary,

2. Until you make it eloquent and strengthen its ideas,
So you explain it like one who has mastered it.

3. What blessings have you been given and granted
From the grace of your Lord, that envelope you?

4. Seek increase in what you have been given,
And gratitude to the Giver completes that.

5. Leave off accompanying the wretched, and leave them -
Like leaving an affliction that spreads its harm.

6. Leave off contending with the stubborn, and do not be
Among companions a babbler spreading nonsense.

7. And if you reproach a person in private,
And you see him humbled when it reaches him,

8. Beware of falling once into the like of it,
So he spreads about you its outpouring and folds.