‘The central place in the field of Old Testament religion’ says Hertzberg ‘is undoubtedly occupied by the prophets. It is therefore little wonder that research and investigation has concentrated ever more directly on this point: What are the prophets, and what is their significance for the spiritual development of men?’ For a generation now the most keenly discussed question in this connection has been that of ‘ecstasy,’ and the extent to which the prophets were subject to abnormal experiences. It has been held that ‘ecstasy’ is of the esse of prophecy, and that it provided a criterion without which neither the prophet nor his audience would be satisfied. Yet at best the ‘ecstatic theory’ could tell us only the How? rather than the What? of prophecy.

From his earliest days on this planet man has ever been conscious that he has been walking on dangerous ground; that he is far from being lord of all he surveys; that instead there are powers, apparently quite outside of himself or of his control, of which he need definitely be on his guard. Under certain circumstances they will work for him, aid him, make his life more secure; under others, they can and do bring about just the reverse. With the dawn of conscience, which latter in essence may be called the memory of burnt fingers and rapped knuckles, he became convinced that certain courses of action definitely did not pay; others did. Together with other forms of magic he speedily discovered — or thought that he did — that it paid very decidedly to give to these invisible but dreadfully real powers what they wanted. Thus he might very possibly escape their vengeance, might even gain their favor. Do ut des, perhaps even more frequently do ne des, became one of the earliest utterances of what anthropologists with marked charity have denominated homo sapiens. It would appear to me too obvious and well attested to require detailed proof that sacrifice was man's attempt to placate, avert the anger, satisfy, make friendly to him, powers which he might or might not know, but toward which he had come to have, by the only way in which he has ever learned anything, viz., experience, a very lively respect.

Sometimes it is said that it would not have mattered much whether Christianity had won or not, the result would have been much the same, for the spiritual background of the time was the same. I leave this opinion to be judged on its own merits and turn to a side of religion in which the difference between Paganism and Christianity is thought to be thoroughgoing, the cult. That is to say, the cult of the gods, for the similarities between the cult of the Saints and martyrs and that of the dead and heroes are striking and well known through the work of Lucius. Shrines were built for the Saints, votive offerings brought, and even animals slaughtered just as for the heroes, food was placed and drink poured out on their graves and banquets held on them just as on the graves of the pagan dead. This is mentioned in the epigrams attributed to Gregory of Nazianzen and was more frequent in the Western part of the Empire, but it must have been common in the East too, for the custom of holding meals in churchyards on the Psychosabbaton, the Saturday before Whitsunday, is widespread in the Greek Church to this day.

Among young Samuel Pepys's many acquaintances was Thomas Fuller, antiquary, historian, preacher, biographer and wit. Fuller died on August 16, 1661, but he had previously appeared more than once in the Diary. On May 17, 1660, Pepys had a rapturously busy time at court: “After that, going to see the Queen of Bohemia, I met with Dr. Fuller, whom I sent to a tavern with Mr. Edw. Pickering, while I and the rest went to see the Queen. …” Early the next year (January 5, 1661), “Several people came to me about business, among others the great Tom Fuller, who came to desire a kindness for a friend of his … which I promised to do.” Later in the month (January 22) “I met with Dr. Thomas Fuller and took him to the Dog, where he tells me of his last and great book that is coming out: that is, his History of all the Families in England; and could tell me more of my own, than I knew myself.” In the same conversation Fuller talked with great complacence and detail about his own feats of memory. Twice Pepys heard Fuller preach: the first time (February 3, 1661), he commended a point made by the speaker, but on May 12, 1661, he was forced to admit, “methought it was a poor dry sermon.” He heard of Fuller's death, “of a sort of fever” then prevalent, on the day it occurred, and called him “the famous Tom Fuller.”