The great sickness and the grievous evil consist in this: that all the things that man finds written in books, he presumes to think of as true-and all the more so if the books are old.
It is hard for a woman with whom an uncircumcised man has had sexual intercourse to separate from him. In my opinion this is the strongest of the reasons for circumcision.
The soul is subject to health and disease, just as is the body. The health and disease of both, undoubtedly depend upon beliefs and customs, which are peculiar to mankind.
The knowledge of God, the formation of ideas, the mastery of desire and passion, the distinction between that which is to be chosen and that which is to be rejected, all these man owes to his form.
The second class of evils comprises such evils as people cause to each other, when, e.g. , some of them use their strength against others. These evils are more numerous than those of the first kind. They likewise originate in ourselves, though the sufferer himself cannot avert them.
