A Guide for the Religious Instruction of Jewish Youth | Page 3

deficiencies,
to adorn those naked propositions, to provide them with evidence

deduced from the sacred text, to enlarge them with appropriate
applications, to illustrate them with examples, in fine, to reduce the
whole into such a catechistic form as will suit a sound system of
instruction--such is the task which remains entrusted to your
intelligence, and to your zeal. By employing the proffered materials
with that discretion which is peculiar to your ministry, with that method
which the tender minds of your pupils require, and with the love
inspired by the sublimity and importance of the subject, yours will be
the merit of having propagated the seeds of truth that will bring forth
charity and universal edification; to me suffices the happiness of having,
in some degree, contributed to so noble a work.

A GUIDE FOR THE RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION OF JEWISH
YOUTH.
CHAPTER I.
I. WHOEVER directs his mind to the contemplation of the objects that
surround him, the aggregate of which is called the universe, will soon
perceive, that the parts of which it is composed undergo continually
various modifications and successive changes, every one of them
exercising some influence on the others, and receiving from them some
alteration. This state of mutual dependence, in which the parts of the
universe stand in relation to each other, leads us necessarily to conclude,
that none of them has within itself the reason or cause of its existence,
but that all of them together depend upon a cause which is out of
themselves, and through which they began to exist; the universe, then,
has had a cause, an Author.
II. This Author of the universe, if he had not in himself the reason of
his existence, must also have it in others, and these again in others.
Consequently, we must either suppose an endless progression of causes
and effects, which is repugnant to reason, or arrive at last at a Being
existing by and of himself,--that is to say, one who owes not his
existence to others, and has caused all other things to exist;--and in that
case, the reason of his existence must be part of his own essence and

nature, and, consequently, inseparable from him and indestructible. The
Author of the universe is then a Being necessary and eternal; and as to
Him all things owe their existence, it follows that through Him they
began to exist, and He created them from nought.
III. He, who could create all from nought, has a power without limits,
and nothing is to Him impossible; He, who has given existence to all
things, has also ordained the laws to which they are subject; He, who
has ordained at His will the laws of nature, has also the power of
changing or suspending them at His will; and lastly, He, who caused all
things to exist, can alone keep them in existence, governing and
directing them with ceaseless providence; and such continual action
implies, of necessity, that He should know everything, that nothing
should be hidden from Him, and that in Him error should be impossible.
The Author of the universe is then omnipotent, free, all-provident,
omniscient, and infallible.
IV. Again, whoever attentively contemplates the universe cannot help
discovering, with admiration, in every part of it a stupendous art, a
constant order, a systematic correspondence of means to ends, which
demonstrate that all has been arranged on a predetermined plan and for
a fixed purpose, to which all the particular dispositions developed in
the course of the natural phenomena are exquisitely adapted. This order
and this harmony--which manifest themselves, also, in all the
progressive courses of nature--indicate a self-developing excellence,
and a tendency to an ever-increasing perfectibility, such as can only
emanate from a cause infinitely intelligent and good; and as such
qualities cannot be attributed to a being corporeal, because limited and
subject to changes, it follows that the Author of the universe is all-wise
and good, pure and immutable.
V. Now, this Being, necessary and eternal, whom the contemplation of
the universe alone reveals to us as the Author of everything, as
omnipotent, free, all-provident, omniscient, infallible, pure, immutable,
all-wise, and good, is He whom we call GOD.
VI. But our conviction of the existence of God need not be derived
exclusively from the wonders of the universe; for every man can find in

himself the evident proof of the existence of that supreme cause. In fact,
man feels within himself that he thinks; and if he were even to doubt it,
he could not deny that at least he doubts; and the doubt itself is already
a thought. Admitting that he possesses the faculty of thinking, he must
admit that there is within himself a substance, a being, a something
which thinks. But this being, who is conscious of his own thoughts,