[That they] are the same, Lyranus hands down in this place, and (on Matt. ch. 3) the Scholastic History, Albert the Great, St. Anselm, [and] St. Remigius — nay, Abulensis (q. 11) says [it] is the common opinion of the Doctors; and adds [that] it is very agreeable to reason. Because, he says, “John spoke these [words] standing by the Jordan, [to those] coming to him to be baptized there; and because these stones were notable, he would rather point out these than others.” Abulensis repeats the same (on Matt. ch. 3, before quest. 62), pressing the demonstrative pronoun, “these.” But Maldonatus (in the same place) says [it] is not necessary to believe this. For [it is] not necessary to restrict the general saying of St. John to those particular stones. For [it] was, as it were, a proverb, “to produce something from stones” — [that] which seemed difficult to do; or else he was pointing at any stones whatsoever which were before [his] feet. When, in the following chapter of St. Matthew, Satan said to the Lord, “If thou art the Son of God, say that these stones be made bread” (Matt. 4 v. 3), was he pointing out those same Joshuan stones? And yet neither was [Satan] far off, and if he could show him all the kingdoms of the world, he could surely [show] those stones too. Nor do Abulensis’s reasons effect anything. Grant [that] St. John was at the Jordan. Were [there] not plenty of other stones there? These were notable — nay, [they] lay hidden in the bed of the river; and, that they might be in some part visible outside [the water], why would he point his finger at these rather than at others, which were wholly visible, wholly set before the eyes, [and] trodden almost by [his] very feet? And the tempter too used the demonstrative pronoun, [in] “these stones.” At last, in [his commentary on] Matthew, Abulensis himself confesses [that there] is nothing certain in this matter. Yet [it] could be [that] those stones remained fixed and firm not only to Christ’s times, but even down to our own. For since the Jordan flows in the same channel, and has never afterward dried up, nor [has] anyone [ever] been read to have girded himself to dig up those stones, why should they not be able to remain still? For how many and how great ages hard stones bear [endure] in rivers, we see in the rocks of the sea, and in certain rocks of our Rhine. From the new—
(col. 452)
—[interpreters] certainly Junius (ch. 4 v. 9) interprets “unto this day” [as] “by an unmovable and perpetual decree,” or “forever,” as he repeats below (ch. 6 v. 17); and he cites St. Augustine (bk. 6 of the Locutions on Joshua). Not inelegantly, Baronius — [when] now about to die — writes, at the beginning of the twelfth volume of his Annals, [that], in the likeness of these 12 stones, he sets twelve volumes “of ancient memory” in the Church of God.