Jossel of Klezk proposed nothing less than to hasten the advent of the Messiah. To this end he performed strict penance, fasted, rolled himself in snow, undertook night-watches and similar severities. By all sorts of such operations he believed that he was able to accomplish the overthrow of a legion of evil spirits, who kept guard on the Messiah, and threw obstacles in the way of his coming.[42] To these exercises he added at last many Cabbalistic fooleries--fumigations, conjurations, and similar practices--till at length he lost his wits on the subject, believed that he really saw spirits with his eyes open, calling each of them by name. He would then beat about him, smash windows and stoves under the idea that these were his foes, the evil spirits, somewhat after the manner of his forerunner Don Quixote. At last he lay down in complete exhaustion, from which he was with great difficulty restored, by the physician of Prince Radzivil. Unfortunately I could never get further in pious exercises of this sort, than to abstain for a considerable while from everything that comes from a living being; and during the Days of Atonement I have sometimes fasted three days together. I once resolved indeed on undertaking the _T'shubath Hakana_; but this project, like others of the same sort, remained unfulfilled, after I had adopted the opinions of Maimonides, who was no friend of fanaticism or pietism. It is remarkable, that at the time when I still observed the rabbinical regulations with the utmost strictness, I yet would not observe certain ceremonies which have something comical about them. Of this kind, for example, was the _Malketh_ (Beating) before the Great Day of Atonement, in which every Jew lays himself on his face in the synagogue, while another with a narrow strip of leather gives him thirty-nine lashes. Of the same sort is _Haphorath Nedarim_, or the act of setting free from vows on New Year's Eve. In this three men are seated, while another appears before them, and addresses to them a certain form, the general drift of which is as follows:--"Sirs, I know what a heinous sin it is, not to fulfil vows; and inasmuch as I have doubtless this year made some vows which I have not fulfilled, and which I can no longer recollect, I beg of you that you will set me free from the same. I do not indeed repent of the good resolutions to which I have bound myself by these vows; I repent merely of the fact, that in making such resolutions I did not add, that they were not to have the force of a vow," etc., etc. Thereupon he withdraws from the judgment-seat, pulls off his shoes, and sits down on the bare ground, by which he is supposed to banish himself till his vows are dissolved. After he has sat for some time, and said a prayer by himself, the judges begin to call aloud, "Thou art our brother! thou art our brother! thou art our brother! There is no vow, no oath, no banishment any longer, after thou hast submitted thyself to the judgment.