"It is the glory of the Semitic race to have given to the world, in a compact and luminous form, that monotheism which the philosophers of Greece and Rome only vaguely apprehended, and which has become the heritage of the Christian and Mohammedan alike. Of the Semitic race, however, one small branch, Jewdom, preserved and communicated the idea. Every other branch of that race _sank into_ polytheism (_vide supra_).... It is at first sight inexplicable that Jewish monotheism, which was in time to exercise such a prodigious influence over men's minds, should have so long remained the peculiar property of an insignificant people. But every religious idea has its season, and the thoughts of men have their avatars.... It was apparently necessary that mankind should be given full scope for unfettered development, that they should feel in all directions after God, if haply they might find Him, in _order that_ the foundations of _inductive philosophy might be laid_, that the religious idea might run itself out through polytheistic channels _for the development of art_. Certainly Jewish monotheism remained in a state of congelation till the religious thought of antiquity _had exhausted its own vitality_, and _had worked out every other problem of theodicy_; then suddenly thawing, it poured over the world its fertilising streams" (p. 259).[123] [123] Mr B. Gould also says, p. 104--"The Semitic divine names bear _indelibly on their front the stamp of their origin_, and the language itself testifies against the insulation and abstraction of these names from polytheism. The Aryan's tongue bore no such testimony to him. The spirit of his language _led him away from monotheism_, whilst that of the Shemite was an ever-present monitor, directing him to a God, sole and undivided. 'The glory of the Semitic race is this,' says M. Renan, 'that from _its earliest days_ it grasped that notion of the Deity which all other people have had to adopt from its example, and on the faith of its declaration.'"