The above statement is a truthful relation of facts, from which it can well be conceived that even in the Bible the physician finds something to inspire him with the idea of its divine inspiration, as the very history of medicine, with which it is connected, and with which he is familiar, only lends him further support in that direction. Most intelligent physicians are also lovers of philosophical history. None is more entertaining than Rawlinson, either in his "Seven Great Monarchies" or his "Ancient Egypt." In his "Ancient Religions," in his concluding remarks, he observes as follows, in regard to the Hebraic religion: "It seems impossible to trace back to any one fundamental conception, to any innate idea, or to any common experience or observation, the various religions which we have been considering. The veiled monotheism of Egypt, the dualism of Persia, the shamanism of Etruria, the pronounced polytheism of India are too contrariant to admit of any one explanation, or to be derivative of one single source.... It is clear that from none of the religions here treated of could the religion of the ancient Hebrews have originated. The Israelite people, at different periods of its history, came and remained for a considerable time under Egyptian, Babylonian, and Persian influence, and there have not been wanting persons of ability who have regarded Judaism as a mere offshoot of the religion of one or the other of these three peoples. But, with the knowledge that we have now obtained of the religions in question, such views have been regarded as untenable, if not henceforth impossible. Judaism stands out from all other ancient religions as a thing _sui generis_, offering the sharpest contrast to the systems prevalent in the rest of the East, and so entirely different from them in its essence that its origin could not but have been distinct and separate.... The sacred books of the Hebrews cannot possibly have been derived from the sacred writings of any of these nations. No contrast can be greater than that between the Pentateuch and the 'Ritual of the Dead,' unless it be that between the Pentateuch and the Zendavesta, or between the same work and the Vedas.... In most religions the monotheistic idea is most prominent _at the first_, and gradually becomes obscured, and gives way before a polytheistic corruption.... Altogether, the theory to which the facts appear on the whole to point is the existence of a primitive religion, communicated to man from without, whereof monotheism and expiatory sacrifice were parts, and the gradual clouding over of this principle everywhere, unless it were among the Hebrews."[51]