s the most rigid
moralist to temper in some degree the rigidity of his system in practice,
although he will yield nothing in theory; it obliges him, in order to
insure the welfare of the human race, which would be ill protected by a
virtue subjected to chance, to have further recourse to two strong
anchors--those of religion and taste.

ON THE SUBLIME.

"Man is never obliged to say, I must--must," says the Jew Nathan
[Lessing's play, "Nathan the Wise," act i. scene 3.] to the dervish; and
this expression is true in a wider sense than man might be tempted to
suppose. The will is the specific character of man, and reason itself is
only the eternal rule of his will. All nature acts reasonably; all our
prerogative is to act reasonably, with consciousness and with will. All
other objects obey necessity; man is the being who wills.

It is exactly for this reason that there is nothing more inconsistent
with the dignity of man than to suffer violence, for violence effaces
him. He who does violence to us disputes nothing less than our humanity;
he who submits in a cowardly spirit to the violence abdicates his quality
of man. But this pretension to remain absolutely free from all that is
violence seems to imply a being in possession of a force sufficiently
great to keep off all other forces. But if this pretension is found in a
being who, in the order of forces, cannot claim the first rank, the
result is an unfortunate contradiction between his instinct and his
power.

Man is precisely in this case. Surrounded by numberless forces, which
are all superior to him and hold sway over him, he aspires by his nature
not to have to suffer any injury at their hands. It is true that by his
intelligence he adds artificially to his natural forces, and that up to a
certain point he actually succeeds in reigning physically over everything
that is physical. The proverb says, "there is a remedy for everything
except death;" but this exception, if it is one in the strictest
acceptation of the term, would suffice to entirely ruin the very idea of
our nature. Never will man be the cause that wills, if there is a case,
a single case, in which, with or without his consent, he is forced to
what he does not wish. This single terrible exception, to be or to do
what is necessary and not what he wishes, this idea will pursue him as a
phantom; and as we see in fact among the greater part of men, it will
give him up a prey to the blind terrors o