J. B. S. Haldane counts fanaticism among the only four really important inventions made between 3000 B. C and 1400 A. D. It was a Judaic-Christian invention. And it is strange to think that in receiving this malady of the soul the world also received a miraculous instrument for raising societies and nations from the dead—an instrument of resurrection.

Section 125, Ch.18 Good and Bad Mass Movements, citing Haldane's The Inequality of Man (1938) - The True Believer (1951) - Part Four: Beginning and End