THE HISTORY OF MONOTHEISM. 32 1 



that the contradictions were the husk which pre- 

 served a kernel of substantial truth. 



For Monotheism cannot be esteemed a stable 

 or normal form of religion. It requires so perfect 

 a balance of conflicting considerations, so accurate 

 a retention of a very restricted standpoint, and, it 

 may be added, so pious a blindness to its latent 

 contradictions, that it has not hitherto succeeded 

 in permanently existing, except in Judaism and the 

 two great religions which are its direct descendants. 



The earliest religion of man is, as has been 

 stated (ch. i. § 6), animistic, and gradually passes into 

 polytheism, as the consciousness of the uniformity 

 of nature becomes more vivid. As the result of 

 this process, monotheism arises when the supreme 

 god absorbs all the minor deities, and degrades 

 them to the position of obedient ministers or angels. 

 But as the minor deities are generally deeply rooted 

 in the affections of the people, matters hardly ever 

 advance so far towards unification before the 

 thinkers have made religion the subject of their 

 speculations. Philosophy thus begins in the poly- 

 theistic stage, while the majority of men still be- 

 lieve in many personal spirits, and so, by an easily 

 intelligible reaction, the ultimate reality of the uni- 

 verse is conceived to be both one and impej^sonal. 



In other words, polytheism passes directly into 

 pantheism, without traversing any monotheistic 

 phase, and this process may be traced in the relig- 

 ionsr of Egypt, Greece, India, China, etc. Thus 

 the vulgar are permitted to retain their personal 

 gods, while the educated regard them as being all 

 manifestations or epithets of the One and All, of 

 Brahma, Isis, etc. 



Now the interesting point about Jewish mono- 



R. ofS. Y 



