Wisdom has been represented as a wife, and here she is called a sister. As Didymus says (in _Catenâ,_ p. 104), "Wisdom is called a mother, a sister, and a wife." She is a mother, because, through her, we are children of Christ; she is a wife, because, by union with her, we ourselves become parents of that which is good; she is our sister, because our love to her is chaste and holy, and because she, as well as ourselves, is the offspring of God. Such is the love of Christ, who is the true Wisdom, and who is all in all to the soul. Compare His own words, applied to every faithful and obedient soul: "The same is my brother, and my sister, and mother" (Mark iii. 35). "Do thou love the true faith with sisterly love, it shall keep thee from the impure love of the strange women of false doctrine" (Bede).--_Wordsworth._ Holiness is positive. Sin is negative. The one is to love God, and also our neighbour. The other is not to love God or our neighbour. The one shows itself in a positive delight in the abstract holiness; the other not in a positive delight in the opposite, viz., in an abstract sin, but a delight in women, a delight in money, a delight in praise, a delight in everything except moral purity, and therefore a delight in things which are innocent when in limits, and that are only guilty when the soul is let in upon them without curb of superior affection. If a man calls Wisdom his kinswoman, then he may love wine or love without moral danger.--_Miller._ _MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.--Verses_ 5-27. A PICTURE DRAWN FROM LIFE. The woman depicted here has been before us twice before. (See on chap. ii. 16-19 and vi. 24.) We will therefore confine ourselves in this chapter to the picture of her dupe. He fully justifies his right to the title here given to him, viz., "a young man void of understanding." +I. Because he did not wait for temptation to seek him, but went where he knew it would meet him.+ Those who carry gunpowder upon their persons ought never to go into a blacksmith's forge, ought never even to approach the door lest some sparks fall upon them. How much more foolish is he who, knowing that there is a tendency to sin within him, seeks out the place where the spark will be fanned into a flame. This young man is found "near the corner" of the house of his temptress, "he went the way to her house."