With regard to his second reason, we find nothing of the kind in Judaism subsequent to the Essenes, until we reach the Cabbalistic heroes of the Middle Ages. The third and the fourth have, on the other hand, had power generally in Jewish conduct. The fifth has had its influence, but only temporarily and temperately. Ascetic practices, based on national and religious calamity, have, for the most part, been prescribed only for certain dates in the calendar, but it must be confessed that an excessive addiction to fasting prevails among many Jews. But it is when we consider the first of Professor Oman's reasons for ascetic practices that we perceive how entirely the genius of Judaism is foreign to Hindu and most other forms of asceticism. To reach communion with God, the Jew goes along the road of happiness, not of austerity. He serves with joy, not with sadness. On this subject the reader may refer with great profit to the remarks made by the Reverend Morris Joseph, in "Judaism as Creed and Life," p. 247, onwards, and again the whole of chapter iv. of book iii. (p. 364). Self-development, not self-mortification, is the true principle; man's lower nature is not to be crushed by torture, but to be elevated by moderation, so as to bear its part with man's higher nature in the service of God. What leads some Jewish moralists to eulogize asceticism is that there is always a danger of the happiness theory leading to a materialistic view of life. This is what Mr. Joseph says, and says well, on the subject (p. 371): "And, therefore, though Judaism does not approve of the ascetic temper, it is far from encouraging the materialist's view of life. It has no place for monks or hermits, who think they can serve God best by renouncing the world; but, on the other hand, it sternly rebukes the worldliness that knows no ideal but sordid pleasures, no God but Self. It commends to us the golden mean--the safe line of conduct that lies midway between the rejection of earthly joys and the worship of them. If asceticism too often spurns the commonplace duties of life, excessive self-indulgence unfits us for them. In each case we lose some of our moral efficiency. But in the latter case there is added an inevitable degradation. The man who mortifies his body for his soul's sake has at least his motive to plead for him. But the sensualist has no such justification. He deliberately chooses the evil and rejects the good. Forfeiting his character as a son of God, he yields himself a slave to unworthy passions. "It is the same with the worldly man, who lives only for sordid ends, such as wealth and the pleasures it buys. He, too, utterly misses his vocation. His pursuit of riches may be moral in itself; he may be a perfectly honest man. But his life is unmoral all the same, for it aims at nothing higher than itself."