"You must not suppose," he continues, "that these mysteries are known to anybody completely. By no means. But sometimes the truth flashes upon us and it is day; and then again our natural constitution and habits shut them out, and we are again in darkness. The relative proportion of light and darkness which a person enjoys in these matters, makes the difference in the grade of perfection of great men and prophets. The greatest of the prophets had comparatively little if any darkness. With those who never see light at all, namely the masses of the people, we have nothing to do in this book." Finally he adjures the reader not to explain to anyone else the novel ideas found in his work, which are not contained in the writings of his predecessors. Heaven knows, he exclaims, I hesitated long before writing this book, because it contains unknown matters, never before treated by any Jewish writer in the "Galut." But I relied on two Rabbinic principles. One is that when it is a question of doing something for a great cause in a critical time, it is permitted to transgress a law. The other is the consciousness that my motives are pure and unselfish. In short, he concludes, I am the man who, when he finds himself in a critical position and cannot teach truth except by suiting one worthy person and scandalizing ten thousand fools, chooses to say the truth for the benefit of the one without regard for the abuse of the great majority. As we are not bound by Maimonides's principle of esoterism and mystery, nor are we in fear of being an offence and a stumbling block to the fools, we shall proceed more directly in our exposition of his philosophy; and shall begin with Maimonides's general ideas on the need of science for intelligent faith and the relation thereto of Jewish history and literature.