In concluding these reflections, I may not conceal from myself or from others that the objection to the function of exemplariness, if sustained, affects at the root both the theology and the ethics of the past. If no individual can be in the strict sense an example to others, neither can an individual Deity be an example to be copied by men, neither can Christ be the perfect exemplar to be imitated. There can be no single perfect exemplar. Virtues that bear the same name are not therefore the same virtues. Often it is only the name that is the same, not the substance; and where they are in a broad way the same, yet there remains a difference of accent. The natures of men are unlike. Their moral destiny is to work out the unlikeness of each in harmony with that of the others. The moral equivalence of men, rather than their moral equality, is for me the expression of the fundamental moral relation.[10] At the early stage of my career to which I am still adverting it was urgently put to me that with all the changes that had taken place in my inner life, I need not separate myself from the religion of the Fathers, nay, that I might remain a servant and teacher of religion within the Jewish fold, gradually weaning away from the beliefs which they held those whom I might contrive to influence, and drawing them up—such was the phrase used—to my own “higher level.” But this advice was repelled by every inmost fibre of my being, and could not but be utterly rejected. I was to publicly represent a certain belief with the purpose of undermining it. I was to trade upon the simplicity of my hearers in order to rob them of what they, crudely and mistakenly perhaps, considered their most sacred truth, by feigning provisionally, until I could alter their views, to be in agreement with them. Would this be fair to them or to myself? Was I to act a lie in order to teach the truth? There was especially one passage in the Sabbath service which brought me to the point of resolution: I mean the words spoken by the officiating minister as he holds up the Pentateuch scroll, “And this is the Law which Moses set before the people of Israel.” I had lately returned from abroad where I had had a fairly thorough course in Biblical exegesis, and had become convinced that the Mosaic religion is so to speak a religious mosaic, and that there is hardly a single stone in it which can with certainty be traced to the authorship of Moses. Was I to repeat these words? It was impossible. I was certain that they would stick in my throat. On these grounds the separation was decided on by me, and became irremediable. FOOTNOTES: