The Rambam (Maimonides) once had a dispute with a philosopher as to whether instinct or behavioral training governs the behavior of an animal. The philosopher maintained that one of the main reasons for the difference in ability between man and animal is that man has been trained and animals have not. He held that an animal can be trained to do almost anything.
The Rambam argued against this.
To prove his point, the philosopher trained a number of cats to stand upright, balance trays on their paws and serve as waiters. He dressed them in white shirts with little black ties, and conducted a banquet with the cats as the waiters. As these feline waiters were serving the soup, the Rambam, who had been invited to the banquet, released a mouse. The banquet hall was turned into utter chaos as the cats, forgetting all their hours of training, let their trays crash to the ground, rushing about on all fours after the mouse.
Even though one can train a cat to act like a waiter, its natural inclinations cannot be changed. The only way one can change
one's habits, is through Torah and mitzvot.
A human being is different from the animals because he can perfect his character so that it controls his baser instincts. One who has not yet worked on perfecting his character will, like the trained cat, be able to put on a show of discipline for a time, but only so long as no “mice” are released in his path.
Only the Torah can bring one’s character to ultimate perfection.
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