The earliest sacred places of the Jews were evidently sacred stones, or stone circles, succeeded in time by temples. These early rude stones, emblems of the Creator, were erected by the Israelites, which in no way differed from the erections of the Gentiles. It will be found that the Jews to commemorate a great victory, or to bear witness of the Lord, were all signified by stones: thus, Joshua erected a stone to bear witness; Jacob put up a stone to make a place sacred; Abel set up the same for a place of worship; Samuel erected a stone as a boundary, which was to be the token of an agreement made in the name of God. Even Maundrel in his travels names several that he saw in Palestine. It is curious that where a pillar was erected there, sometime after, a temple was put up in the same manner that the Round Towers of Ireland were,—always near a church, but never formed part of it. We find many instances in the Scriptures of the erection of a number of stones among the early Israelites, which would lead us to conclude that it was not at all unlikely that the early places of worship among them, were similar to the temples found in various parts of Great Britain and Ireland. It is written in Exodus xxiv. 4, that Moses rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel, were erected. It is also given out that when the children of Israel should pass over the Jordan, unto the land which the Lord giveth them, they should set up great stones, and plaster them with plaster, and also the words of the law were to be written thereon. In many other places stones were ordered to be set up in the name of the Lord, and repeated instances are given that the stones should be twelve in number and unhewn. Stone temples seem to have been erected in all countries of the world, and even in America, where, among the early American races are to be found customs, superstitions, and religious objects of veneration, similar to the Phœnicians. An American writer says:—“There is sufficient evidence that the religious customs of the Mexicans, Peruvians and other American races, are nearly identical with those of the ancient Phœnicians.... We moreover discover that many of their religious terms have, etymologically, the same origin.” Payne Knight, in his Worship of Priapus, devotes much of his work to show that the temples erected at Stonehenge and other places, were of a Phœnician origin, which was simply a temple of the god Bacchus. STONEHENGE A TEMPLE OF BACCHUS