It was probable that this new religion would combine many elements from the preceding rituals in one cult. In connection with the fine temples and elaborate services of Isis and Cybele and Mithra there was growing up a powerful priesthood; Franz Cumont (1) speaks of "the learned priests of the Asiatic cults" as building up, on the foundations of old fetichism and superstition, a complete religious philosophy--just as the Brahmins had built the monism of the Vedanta on the "monstrous idolatries of Hinduism." And it was likely that a similar process would evolve the new religion expected. Toutain again calls attention to the patronage accorded to all these cults by the Roman Emperors, as favoring a new combination and synthesis:--"Hadrien, Commode, Septime Sévère, Julia Domna, Elagabal, Alexandre Sévère, en particulier ont contribué personnellement a la popularité et au succes des cultes qui se celebraient en l'honneur de Serapis et d'Isis, des divinités syriennes et de Mithra." (2) (1) See Cumont, Religions Orientales dans le Paganisme Romain (Paris, 1906), p. 253. (2) Cultes paiens dans l'Empire Romain (2 vols., 1911), vol. ii, p. 263. It was also probable that this new Religion would show (as indicated in the last chapter) a reaction against mere sex-indulgence; and, as regards its standard of Morality generally, that, among so many conflicting peoples with their various civic and local customs, it could not well identify itself with any ONE of these but would evolve an inner inspiration of its own which in its best form would be love of the neighbor, regardless of the race, creed or customs of the neighbor, and whose sanction would not reside in any of the external authorities thus conflicting with each other, but in the sense of the soul's direct responsibility to God.