the guidance of nature, and we are resisting it; we listen to what she says to our senses, and we neglect what she says to our heart; the active being obeys, the passive commands.  Conscience is the voice of the soul, the passions are the voice of the body.  It is strange that these voices often contradict each other?  And then to which should we give heed?  Too often does reason deceive us; we have only too good a right to doubt her; but conscience never deceives us; she is the true guide of man; it is to the soul what instinct is to the body, [Footnote:  Modern philosophy, which only admits what it can understand, is careful not to admit this obscure power called instinct which seems to guide the animals to some end without any acquired experience.  Instinct, according to some of our wise philosophers, is only a secret habit of reflection, acquired by reflection; and from the way in which they explain this development one ought to suppose that children reflect more than grown-up people:  a paradox strange enough to be worth examining.  Without entering upon this discussion I must ask what name I shall give to the eagerness with which my dog makes war on the moles he does not eat, or to the patience with which he sometimes watches them for hours and the skill with which he seizes them, throws them to a distance from their earth as soon as they emerge, and then kills them and leaves them.  Yet no one has trained him to this sport, nor even told him there were such things as moles.  Again, I ask, and this is a more important question, why, when I threatened this same dog for the first time, why did he throw himself on the ground with his paws folded, in such a suppliant attitude .....calculated to touch me, a position which he would have maintained if, without being touched by it, I had continued to beat him in that position?  What!  Had my dog, little more than a puppy, acquired moral ideas?  Did he know the meaning of mercy and generosity?  By what acquired knowledge did he seek to appease my wrath by yielding to my discretion?  Every dog in the world does almost the same thing in similar circumstances, and I am asserting nothing but what any one can verify for himself.  Will the philosophers, who so scornfully reject instinct, kindly explain this fact by the mere play of sensations and experience which they assume we have acquired?  Let them give an account of it which will satisfy any sensible man; in that case I have nothing further to urge, and I will say no more of instinct.] he who obeys his conscience is following nature and he need not fear that he will go astray.  This is a matter of great importance, continued my benefactor, seeing that I was about to interrupt him; let me stop awhile to explain it more fully.