Note 39 — THE ESSENES.

Ҥ 2. There are three sects of philosophers among the Jews. The followers of the first are called Pharisees, of the second Sadducees, and of the third, who really seem to practise holiness, Essenes.39 Jews by birth, they love each other more than the others.40 They reject pleasure as an evil, and regard continence and not yielding to passions as virtues. They despise marriage, and adopt the children of others while still tender and susceptible of instruction,41 and regard them as their own relations, and train them in their practices. They do not, however, repudiate marriage, and its consequent, succession of the race in themselves; but they are afraid of the lasciviousness of women, and are persuaded that none of them preserve their fidelity to one man.42