252 ANIMAL AUTOMATISM. 



ignore his sacerdotal pretensions, and to tell him, as one 

 would tell a mere common, unconsecrated layman : that 

 it is not necessary for any man to occupy himself with 

 problems of this kind unless he so choose ; life is filled 

 full enough by the performance of its ordinary and obvi- 

 ous duties. But that, if a man elect to become a judge 

 of these grave questions ; still more, if he assume the 

 responsibility of attaching praise or blame to his fellow- 

 men for the conclusions at which they arrive touch- 

 ing them, he will commit a sin more grievous than most 

 breaches of the Decalogue, unless he avoid a lazy reli- 

 ance upon the information that is gathered by prejudice 

 and filtered through passion, unless he go back to the 

 prime sources of knowledge the facts of nature, and 

 the thoughts of those wise men who for generations 

 past have been her best interpreters. 



