Thus the learned _Lud. Vives_ on St. _Augustin C. D._ viii. 9. “The philosophy of the _Egyptians_ is very ancient, but for the most part deriv’d from the _Chaldeans_, especially from _Abraham_, tho’ they, as _Diodorus_ writes, refer it to _Isis_, _Osiris_, _Vulcan_, _Mercury_, and _Hercules_.” Further from _Joseph_’s administration, the _Egyptian_ learning commenc’d, for which they became so celebrated. He not only instructed the priests in religion and philosophy, but settled their colleges and possessions, as we read in _Gen._ xlvii. 22, 26. so that if _Moses_ was learned in the wisdom of the _Egyptians_, he deriv’d it only thro’ them from his own ancestors. Which note may be useful to give us a true notion of this matter, which some learned men exalt too high. And this at the same time shews idolatry commenc’d in _Egypt_, after his time. They consecrated _Joseph_ into the genius or intelligence of their first monarch _Osiris_, _Serapis_, &c. with the bushel on his head. But what I chiefly insist upon at present, is of _Hercules_ making these serpentine temples, which in his history is call’d overcoming serpents and the like. And hence the fable of his squeezing two serpents to death in his cradle; and the _Tyrian_ coins struck to his honour, some whereof I have exhibited. [Illustration: TAB. XXXVIII. _The alate Temple of the Druids at Barrow in Lincolnshire, on the banks of the humber._ _W. Stukeley delin. 25 July 1724_] [Illustration: I. _A coin in_ Vaillant’s colonies II. p. 148, 218, 340, 351. Of the city of _Tyre_, an olive-tree with a snake between two stones, petræ ambrosiæ. An altar; and a conch, meaning _Tyre_. II. _A coin_ in Vaillant’s colony coins II. p. 314, _struck at_ Ptolemais _or_ Acon. A great and rude stone altar without any mouldings or carvings, between two serpents, a _Caduceus_ which is truly the _ophio-cyclo-pterygomorph_ on a staff meaning in the hieroglyphick doctrine, the power of the deity. These imperial coins of colonies intended to preserve the memory of their antiquities, and this probably regards the old serpentine temple in the foundation of their city _Acon_ or _Ptolemais_. III. _A coin in_ Vaillant’s colonies II. p. 111, _struck at_ Berytus. _They all regard_ Hercules’s _building serpentine temples_.] Of his building our Druid temples in general, of these great stones, the two coins of _Gordian_ in _Stonehenge_ page 50, are a further evidence. The _Ambrosiæ Petræ_ are a work of this sort, when he began or assisted in building the city _Tyre_. And I gather he was a great builder of serpentine temples in particular, such as we have been describing, call’d _Dracontia_. What he did of this sort in _Britain_ I have no foundation for discovering; but in ancient history still left us, there are sufficient traces that shew he did it, in the more eastern parts of the world.