He
spoke earnestly, with fatherly concern: "You are growing, David.
You are a boy no longer. You are getting to be a man. This is just
the time when one should be on his guard against Satan."
I sat, looking down, my brain in a daze of embarrassment
"Remember, David, 'He who looks even at the little finger of a
woman is as guilty as though he looked at a woman that is wholly
naked.'" He quoted the Talmudic maxim in a tone of passionate
sternness, beating the desk with his snuff-box at each word
As to his own conduct, he was one of three or four men at the
synagogue of whom it was said that they never looked at women,
and, to a very considerable extent, his reputation was not
unjustified
"You must never tire fighting Satan, David," he proceeded. "Fight
him with might and main."
As I listened I was tingling with a mute vow to be good. Yet, at the
same time, the vision of "a woman that is wholly naked" was
vividly before me
He caused me to bring a certain ancient work, one not included in
the Talmud, in which he made me read the following: "Rabbi
Mathia, the son of Chovosh, had never set eyes on a woman.
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