A Guide for the Religious Instruction of Jewish Youth | Page 7

desires beyond
every limit, and so much strain and invigorate them as to succumb
under their influence. Therefore reason, whether from its tardy
development, or from the unlimited ascendancy of sensuality, holds the
reins of its power always with uncertainty, and is not ever certain of
being obeyed.
XXV. Another obstacle is to be traced in the want of opportunity and
time, or, in other words, in the little time that man can spare to devote
to reflection, in the presence of the multifarious cravings of his body.
These cravings, increased, no doubt, by luxury and an inclination, to
superfluities, demand daily and hourly to be satisfied. He is, then,
obliged to work unceasingly to earn or procure the means of satisfying
his own physical wants, as well as, not unfrequently, those of a whole
family. Aliment, clothing, habitation, comfort, recreation, and other
innumerable cares, real or artificial, require so much labour and
exertion, that little or no time remains for the great majority of mankind
to devote to the assiduous reflections and researches necessary to

determine what duties reason imposes upon them to fulfil, and what
actions to perform.
XXVI. A third obstacle to the development of the moral force in man is
the very social life which, by his own nature, he is called to enter. The
safety of the social fabric demands that the property of each individual
be distinct and acknowledged, and establishes a diversity of ranks,
offices, honours, and positions, which ill agree with human cupidity.
Hence a conflict of desires, a collision of ambitions, a contest of
interests, which at all times generate among men discords,
machinations, frauds, usurpations, treachery, violence, and rapine. Add
the consequences of the pride and ambition, which each more or less
entertains, to reach or surpass some others in power, wealth, or fame,
whence many causes of disappointments and heartburnings, of hatreds
and jealousies, of persecutions and calumnies, of acts of vengeance and
injustice of every form, and it will be easily conceived how little, under
the influence of so many evil passions occasioned by social life, could
populations, in the course of time, be disposed to submit willingly to
the severe and exclusive regimen of reason.
XXVII. Independently of these external impediments, there exists a
kind of internal anarchy in man, arising from the want of a force
exercising the functions of an arbitrator between the mind and the heart,
and inclining the latter to shape its decisions on the motives of the
former. The truths, which he is frequently able to discover, satisfy his
intellect without affecting his will, minister food to the mind, but
operate not on the heart; in short, they establish a theory, but command
not practice. Hence it often happens that man sees right, approves it,
and yet adheres to wrong. Even after having gathered an abundant
harvest from long studies and profound meditations, he still feels the
need of a guide to direct his steps--of a means, available at all times,
and competent to enable him to subordinate the appetitive to the
intellectual faculties, and to cause the will to follow the judgments of
the mind rather than those of the heart.
XXVIII. The inadequacy of natural religion alone becomes still more
manifest, when we consider the weakness and limited extent of the

human understanding. To meditate assiduously on an abstract object,
which does not fall under the perception of the senses, is given only to
a few individuals endowed with uncommon penetration. But by far the
greater part of men, disinclined to submit to long and arduous
researches, concerning what they ought or ought not to believe and to
do, prefer living thoughtlessly; and when they even try to enter upon
spiritual meditations, they soon feel discouraged, and, often distrusting
their own powers, throw up the difficult task half way, to resume the
course of a reckless mode of life.
XXIX. But even the few privileged beings, who believe themselves
equal to the task, and plunge earnestly into spiritual researches, must
confess to the insufficiency of the intellectual powers, and admit, that
beside some few principles which they have succeeded in establishing,
many doubts remain to be cleared, many questions to be solved, many
objections to be overcome; and they must ultimately conclude, that
reason by itself is unable to answer on all that interests man to admit or
to deny, to seek or to avoid, to believe and to do, to hope and to fear.
There is not, in this wide range of spiritual subjects, a proposition held
by one as true, which has not been discarded by another as an error; and
there is not a paradox or an absurdity that has not found some
supporters, who maintained it as a truth. Doubt and error, in abstract
and metaphysical questions, are