w little we ought to reckon upon
the steadfastness of our best principles; if with this conviction of
human fragility we bear in mind that each of the infractions of the moral
law attacks the edifice of nature, if we recall all these considerations
to our memory, it would be assuredly the most criminal boldness to place
the interests of the entire world at the mercy of the uncertainty of our
virtue. Let us rather draw from it the following conclusion, that it is
for us an obligation to satisfy at the very least the physical order by
the object of our acts, even when we do not satisfy the exigencies of the
moral order by the form of these acts; to pay, at least, as perfect
instruments the aims of nature, that which we owe as imperfect persons to
reason, in order not to appear shamefaced before both tribunals. For if
we refused to make any effort to conform our acts to it because simple
legality is without moral merit, the order of the world might in the
meanwhile be dissolved, and before we had succeeded in establishing our
principles all the links of society might be broken. No, the more our
morality is subjected to chance, the more is it necessary to take
measures in order to assure its legality; to neglect, either from levity
or pride, this legality is a fault for which we shall have to answer
before morality. When a maniac believes himself threatened with a fit of
madness, he leaves no knife within reach of his hands, and he puts
himself under constraint, in order to avoid responsibility in a state of
sanity for the crimes which his troubled brain might lead him to commit.
In a similar manner it is an obligation for us to seek the salutary bonds
which religion and the aesthetic laws present to us, in order that during
the crisis when our passion is dominant it shall not injure the physical
order.

It is not unintentionally that I have placed religion and taste in one
and the same class; the reason is that both one and the other have the
merit, similar in effect, although dissimilar in principle and in value,
to take the place of virtue properly so called, and to assure legality
where there is no possibility to hope for morality. Doubtless that would
hold an incontestably higher rank in the order of pure spirits, as they
would need neither the attraction of the beautiful nor the perspective of
eternal life, to conform on every occasion to the demands of reason; but
we know man is short-sighted, and his feebleness force