Ask counsel of every man My son, associate with the that is wise, and despise not wise man, and thou wilt become any counsel that is profitable wise like him (ii. 12). (iv. 18). It is good to keep close the If thou hast heard a word let secret of a king, but to confess it die in thy heart, and reveal and reveal the works of God it to no man; lest it become a (xii. 7). hot coal in thy mouth and burn thee, and thou lay a blemish on thy soul, and be angered against God (ii. 2). There are other minor indications of the writer of Tobit having utilized the Achikar story, such as the unusual double description of the empire, “Assyria and Nineveh,” in the earliest recension of our book[381] (xiv. 4, 15, cp. i. 3), which occurs also in the Achikar story (i. 1); but the _data_ given are sufficient to show that the Achikar story is without doubt one of the sources of the Book of Tobit. The object which the writer had in introducing some of the Achikar story elements into his book was probably that it might be popularized thereby. The Achikar story must have been immensely popular when one remembers the manifold forms in which it has come down to us; and the Book of Tobit, by being in some sort connected with it, would have commended itself to Gentiles, as well as to Jews.