But such superficial estimates were not concurred in by every one. The Jews had as many friends as detractors. Their gravity and good morals, and the simplicity of their religion, were attractive to many persons, who recognised in them something superior. A vast monotheistic and Mosaic propaganda was organized,[16.41] as it were a powerful vortex around this singular race. The poor Jew peddler of the Transteverine,[16.42] setting out in the morning with his basket of small wares, often returned at evening enriched with alms from some pious hand.[16.43] Women in particular were attracted towards these ragged missionaries.[16.44] Juvenal enumerates their leaning towards the Jewish religion as one of the vices of the ladies of his time.[16.45] Those who were converted, gloried in the treasure they had found and the happiness they enjoyed.[16.46] The old Greek and Roman mind resisted stoutly; contempt and hatred of Jews were the sure emotions of cultivated intellects, such as Cicero, Horace, Seneca, Juvenal, Tacitus, Quintilian, and Suetonius.[16.47] On the other side, the enormous mass of mingled populations which had become subject to the empire and to whom the old Roman intellect and Greek learning were foreign or indifferent, gladly and spontaneously welcomed a community where they observed such touching examples of concord, charity, and mutual aid,[16.48] of content, industry,[16.49] and proud poverty. The institution of mendicity, which afterwards became entirely Christian, was at that time Jewish. The mendicant by profession, "formed to it by his mother," presented himself to the minds of the poets of the day as a Jew.[16.50]