Even if we reject the direct Messianic interpretation of this chapter, and understand Wisdom here to be only a poetical personification of an abstract attribute of God, it would be impossible, we think, for any minister of the New Testament to teach from it, and not find his way to Him who was "in the beginning with God" (John i. 2), to the Christ who is the "Wisdom of God" (1 Cor. i. 24), "in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Col. ii. 3). To say the least, the language is admirably adapted to set forth the Incarnate Son, the Saviour of the world. The introductory paragraph reveals _the intense desire of Wisdom to win disciples._ +I. From her taking the initiative.+ Wisdom addresses man first. When two persons have become estranged by the wrong-doing of one, he who is in the wrong will be slow to find his way back to the other to acknowledge his fault. Because he is in the wrong he may conclude, and in many cases would rightly conclude, that an advance on his side would be useless. But an advance from him who is in the right would be more likely to be successful; such a course of conduct on his part would carry with it a powerful magnetic force to draw the offender back, and would be a most convincing proof of the desire of him who had been rightly offended to effect a reconciliation. And if the offence had been committed, not once, but many times, the reluctance of the offender to face his offended friend would be increased in proportion to the number of times the act had been repeated, and if, notwithstanding these repeated offences, advances should continue to be made from the other side, the desire for reconciliation would be made more and more manifest. Wisdom is here represented in this light, and God in Christ did take the initiative in "reconciling the world unto Himself" (1 Cor. v. 19). The Incarnate Wisdom _came_ to men because men would not, and could not, by reason of their moral inability, come to Him first. In proportion to the distance men wander from God do they feel the impossibility of returning to Him unless they can receive from Him some encouragement to do so. This encouragement they have in the fact that "the Son of Man came to seek and save that which was lost" (Matt. xviii. 11), that, "while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom. v. 8).