ss
and power of the Hellenic race when he says: "What was it, then, that
preserved in their hearts (the Greeks), in spite even of the feuds of
tribes and the jealousies of states, the deep feeling of that ideal
unity which constitutes a people? It was their primitive religion; it
was a dim recollection of the common allegiance they owed from time
immemorial to the great father of gods and men; it was their belief in
the old Zeus of Dodona in the Pan-Hellenic Zeus."[155] "There is, in
truth, but one," says Sophocles, "one only God, who made both heaven and
long-extended earth and bright-faced swell of seas and force of winds."
Xenophanes says: "'Mongst gods and men there is one mightiest God not
mortal or in form or thought. Entire he sees and understands, and
without labor governs all by mind." Aratus, whom Paul quotes,[156] says:
"With Zeus began we; let no mortal voice of men leave Zeus unpraised.
Zeus fills the heavens, the streets, the marts. Everywhere we live in
Zeus. Zeus fills the sea, the shores, the harbors. _We are his
offspring, too._" The reference made by Paul evidently implies that this
Zeus was a dim conception of the one true God.

That all branches of the Semitic race were monotheistic we may call not
only Ebrard and Mueller, but Renan, to witness. According to Renan,
evidences that the monotheism of the Semitic races was of a very early
origin, appears in the fact that all their names for deity--El, Elohim,
Ilu, Baal, Bel, Adonai, Shaddai, and Allah--denote one being and that
supreme. These names have resisted all changes, and doubtless extend as
far back as the Semitic language or the Semitic race. Max Mueller, in
speaking of the early faith of the Arabs, says: "Long before Mohammed
the primitive intuition of God made itself felt in Arabia;" and he
quotes this ancient Arabian prayer: "I dedicate myself to thy service, O
Allah. Thou hast no companion, except the companion of whom thou art
master absolute, and of whatever is his." The book of Job and the story
of Balaam indicate the prevalence of an early monotheism beyond the pale
of the Abrahamic church. In the records of the kings of Assyria and
Babylonia there is a conspicuous polytheism, yet it is significant that
each king worshipped _one God only_. And this fact suggests, as a wide
generalization, that political and dynastic jealousies had their
influence in multiplying the names and differentiating the attributes of
ancient deities. This was no