In all ages celibacy has been a religious and mystical ideal, and for two principal reasons. The first is that although the soul born into the world is led further astray by every fresh experience in life, nevertheless it is sex passion that causes the greatest delusion of all. The myth of Adam and Eve illustrates this truth; for whether it was a means taken by God or by Satan, it was at the hands of Eve that Adam ate the forbidden fruit, and not through any direct command or prompting that he himself received. And since man's final goal is the attainment of spiritual life, his life here on earth having been all in vain if he fails to achieve it, every effort has been made by religion to draw him away from that passion of sex towards which he is led by nature, and thus away from the greatest peril that his soul can encounter on its earthly journey.