16. For you know how we dwelt in the land of Egypt, and how we have passed through the midst of nations, and passing through them,
17. You have seen their abominations and filth, that is to say, their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which they worshipped.
18. Lest perhaps there should be among you a man or a woman, a family or a tribe, whose heart is turned away this day from the Lord our God, to go and serve the gods of those nations: and there should be among you a root bringing forth gall and bitterness.
19. And when he shall hear the words of this oath, he should bless himself in his heart saying: I shall have peace, and will walk on in the naughtiness of my heart: and the drunken may consume the thirsty,
20. And the Lord should not forgive him: but his wrath and jealousy against that man should be exceedingly enkindled at that time, and all the curses that are written in this volume should light upon him: and the Lord should blot out his name from under heaven,
21. And utterly destroy him out of all the tribes of Israel, according to the curses that are contained in the book of this law and covenant:
22. And the following generation shall say, and the children that shall be born hereafter, and the strangers that shall come from afar, seeing the plagues of that land and the evils wherewith the Lord hath afflicted it,
23. Burning it with brimstone, and the heat of salt, so that it cannot be sown any more, nor any green thing grow therein, after the example of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha, Adama and Seboim, which the Lord destroyed in his wrath and indignation:
24. And all the nations shall say: Why hath the Lord done thus to this land? what meaneth this exceeding great heat of his wrath?
25. And they shall answer: Because they forsook the covenant of the Lord, which he made with their fathers, when he brought them out of the land of Egypt:
26. And they have served strange gods, and adored them, whom they knew not, and for whom they had not been assigned: