henceforth to run, laid down with such firmness as, in essential
matters, to be fixed and determined for this whole life. When I take up
the writings even of the best intellects of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, (more especially if I have been engaged in
Oriental studies), I am sometimes shocked to see how they are paralyzed
and hemmed in on all sides by Jewish ideas. How can anyone think out the
true philosophy when he is prepared like this?

_Demopheles_. Even if the true philosophy were to be discovered,
religion wouldn't disappear from the world, as you seem to think. There
can't be one system of metaphysics for everybody; that's rendered
impossible by the natural differences of intellectual power between man
and man, and the differences, too, which education makes. It is a
necessity for the great majority of mankind to engage in that severe
bodily labor which cannot be dispensed with if the ceaseless
requirements of the whole race are to be satisfied. Not only does this
leave the majority no time for education, for learning, for
contemplation; but by virtue of the hard and fast antagonism between
muscles and mind, the intelligence is blunted by so much exhausting
bodily labor, and becomes heavy, clumsy, awkward, and consequently
incapable of grasping any other than quite simple situations. At least
nine-tenths of the human race falls under this category. But still the
people require a system of metaphysics, that is, an account of the world
and our existence, because such an account belongs to the most natural
needs of mankind, they require a popular system; and to be popular it
must combine many rare qualities. It must be easily understood, and at
the same time possess, on the proper points, a certain amount of
obscurity, even of impenetrability; then a correct and satisfactory
system of morality must be bound up with its dogmas; above all, it must
afford inexhaustible consolation in suffering and death; the consequence