Note 395 — Chapter VIII · THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD IN HUMAN HISTORY.

"Palestine was from the beginning an isolated land, as Israel was an isolated people, and therefore for thousands of years both have been unintelligible to the world at large. No great highway led through Palestine from people to people; all passed by it, and not over it; all its coast was without favorable harbors. No one of the pagan states of antiquity could come into close geographical, mercantile, political, and religious relations with a people existing under the sway of Jehovah."—Ritter, "Geographical Studies," p. 43.