This seems forbidden (Lev. 26 v. 1): “You shall not make for yourselves an idol, nor a graven image, nor set up titles [pillars], nor place a notable stone in your land [to adore it].” But those stones were “titles” [tituli, pillars]. For the Translator [Vulgate] is wont to call these by the name of “titles”: Gen. 28 v. 18 & 22; Gen. 31 v. 45; Gen. 35 v. 14 & 20; Exod. 24; Num. 33 v. 52; 2 Kings [Sam] 18:18; 4 Kings [2 Kgs] 23:17; Isa.—
(col. 486 — right column; printed “493”)
—[Isa.] 19:19; Ezek. 39:15; 1 Macc. 14:27 — which the Hebrews name matseboth [מצבות, “pillars”], and the Greeks either λίθους [lithous, “stones,” as Exod. 24] or στήλας [stēlas, “steles, pillars”] — [pillars] which [occur] also in Herodotus (bk. 2, in [the account of] Sesostris) and in Strabo (bk. 17). Since — Festus [being] the authority — they are tituli, as it were tutuli, because [a pillar] guards [tuetur] the memory of some thing. And this name — [so] that [it] might be kept in the Greek too — pleased St. John the Evangelist (ch. 19 v. 19 & 20), calling [it] τὸν τίτλον [ton titlon, “the title”]. And he signified a stele or such a titulus who said in Lucan (bk. 8):
“Meanwhile let us mark the shore with a small stone”
—namely, [so] that the tomb of Pompey be marked. But if we should suppose in these stones some carving and writing, they could also be called “notable stones,” or “marked and polished [stones].” How, then, was it lawful for Joshua to set them up? [There] is a twofold answer. One: that of Abulensis (q. 12) — simply, indeed, on account of that precept, [it was] not lawful; but on account of the divine dispensation, privilege, and command, [it was] lawful. The other: that of itself [it] was lawful, and that that divine law forbade it to no one; because only those “titles” and marked stones were forbidden by that law which were adored — or [which were made] lest they be made to be adored, as certain [ones were] adored as it were [as] gods. For the idols of the Gentiles [were] sometimes rude, even shapeless, and plainly such as [is] the Terminus described by Naso [Ovid] (bk. 2 of the Fasti), and, in the Poet [Virgil], “the immovable rock of the Capitol.” But that explanation of the law is drawn from that very place of Leviticus. For to the cited words [is] added: “that you may adore it.” If you say the Hebrew has “for adoring,” or “that you may adore upon it” — [it] must be known [that] the particle על [‘al] does not always mean “upon,” but also other [things], and indeed sometimes “before” [coram]; so that here [it] is forbidden [that] anyone bow himself before the stones, which is to adore them. [This] is confirmed not only from our Latin version, but also from their own Greek [version] of the Seventy, who clearly say προσκυνῆσαι αὐτῷ [proskynēsai autō, “to bow down / worship to it”]. Nay, even the enemies of sacred images themselves translated this place thus. For in Calvin [it] is: “You shall not set up for yourselves a statue, nor place a polished stone in your land, that you may bow before it.” And Junius [says]: “A graven image, or a statue, do not set up for yourselves, nor place a figured stone in your land, that you may bow before it.” [There] is added [the point] that the setting-up of every altar whatsoever — upon which sacrifice would be made even to God — would [thereby] be forbidden [which is absurd]. See Tertullian (bk. 2 against Marcion ch. 21). Did not, moreover, Jacob set up stones of this kind — which were not adored, but preserved some deed from oblivion — three times of old (Gen. 28 & 35)? Did not the lawgiver Moses himself [do so] (Exod. 24)? Abulensis indeed answers [that] those [patriarchs] did this before the law [was] here given; but — although concerning Moses [that] is somewhat doubtful — [even] that being granted, behold, after the law not only our Joshua set up stones of this kind, but (according to Abulensis himself, 2 Kings [Sam] ch. 18) David also [did]; his son Absalom (2 Kings [Sam] 18:18); those who cared for the tomb of the holy Prophet (4 Kings [2 Kgs] 23 v. 17); the Maccabees themselves (1 Macc. 14:27). And yet none of these is anywhere reproved by Scripture under this head. But to Joshua, David, and the Maccabees a privilege [was] given by God, because in them [there] was no danger lest they adore the stones, or be thought to adore [them]. So indeed Abulensis; and yet he does not [thereby] extricate himself. For once those stones had been set up, [it] could [happen] in others—
(col. 487 — left column; printed “494”)
—[in others there be] danger lest they adore [them]. And so the privilege, which would so greatly harm others, would not have had to be given [i.e., no privilege was needed]. Since, therefore, [the matter] is to be concluded by the more received and more celebrated opinion — [namely] that [it] was in every way lawful for Joshua, even if the Lord had not commanded [it], to fix and set up those rocks, which would have not adoration but [would] guard the perpetual memory of so great a deed, and proclaim God’s glory before all. Hence Masius rightly gathers two [things]. One: [that] God’s goodness is deservedly to be admired and continually praised, because he not only continually attends us with the highest benefits, but of his own accord even supplies and prescribes aids for remembering them. The other: [that] usefully, in the Catholic Church, images, feast-days, and the other instruments of piety are frequented. His words [are] worth reading. “From the same cause,” he says (fol. 70), “[it] is to be thought to have proceeded, that our most sacred and most lovable mother the Church has set before us — whether in anniversary feasts, or in images and statues and likenesses of JESUS CHRIST and the monuments of the rest of the most holy men — namely, that, recalling with assiduous and grateful mind the [things] which he both did and suffered for our salvation, we may be inflamed more and more with love of him, and may adore [him as] the one author of our salvation; and [that], observing the [things] which each of the saints performed through virtue and faith in CHRIST, we may order and compose our life to their example.” Wherefore I certainly reckon [it] is to be put among wicked crimes, that certain [men] — not religiously but rabidly, not piously and holily but petulantly and insolently — not only remove these monuments of sacred things from the sacred buildings, but cast [them] out with insult and mockery. How great a licence in morals, impiety toward God, and rebellion against the Magistrate — and, to say [it] once [for all], a deformation of the Commonwealth in every kind — this deed brings on: [this] is not only, by experience itself, bitter and sad, but even in the [very] thought [of it] mournful to the pious and to men of ancient probity. And these [things] are so much the truer against our Iconoclasts, as [they are what] the holy Fathers of old already admonished so many years before (at Nicaea II, act. 4); and how much more truly [is it that], as we saw above, the Innovators themselves concede [that] the setting-up, carving, and painting of stones of this kind [is] to be avoided [only] so far [as] that they be not adored. Of this matter [it] has been said in [my commentary on] Exodus; and also lately, in the preface prefixed to certain books On Adoration published by our Vasquez and reprinted here at Mainz. Whence I will transcribe a few [things] here — both because [they are] fitting for [my] purpose, and because, having been rather faultily [printed] there, they can be corrected. In no way [is it] against the words or the sense of the law to have statues and images, and to render to them the worship which the Catholic Church teaches. That this may appear, we recite the law itself — and indeed in those very words in which Calvin reported it in bk. [ch.] 8, §. 17 of his Institutes: “You shall not make for yourself a graven image, nor any likeness of the [things] which are in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the waters which are under the earth. You shall not adore [them], nor worship [them].” Now the same Calvin sets up two parts here: one, by which he forbids a graven image or any likeness to be made; the other, by which [he forbids that] it be worshipped. We too assent. But in the former [part] either we sin not at all, or the Calvinist himself also sins. For — to say nothing of natural images, to the making of which they [the Calvinists] will [have] everyone bound by the divine [command], as it were, “Increase and multiply” — [whether] the likenesses of the [things] which are in heaven, earth, and water—
(col. 488 — right column; printed “495”)
—do they not themselves make very many [likenesses]? Do they not paint the Sun, Moon, Venus, and the other stars in the orbs of the heavens? Not [also] the [things] which were sometimes deities to certain Gentiles — mountains, trees, rivers, oxen, dogs, birds, and fishes of every kind? The text says [that] no likeness is to be made of the [things] which exist in the heavens, on the earth, [or] in the waters. But all [the things] which I have just said are some likeness of them. Do they not, then, contravene the very express words of the precept? So too, in their own Bibles, they set forth chorographic maps, and the very images of Pontiffs and of Cherubim; in [their] household [decorations] and books, sometimes Ovidian Metamorphoses, or at least Gentile Scipios or Alexanders. What? Do they not scrape together gold and silver coins from every quarter, and most gladly embrace [them], and somewhere mint [them] — on which, however, that [image] of Christ the Lord too may have [its] place, “whose is this image and superscription”? Are not all their own books a kind of image? For — the Philosopher [Aristotle] being author — the words [of speech] are [symbols] of the notions of the mind, and the writing of words [is] itself [their symbol]: σύμβολα [symbola, “symbols”], μνημεῖα καὶ ὁμοιώματα [mnēmeia kai homoiōmata, “memorials and likenesses”]. But most of all — [those things] which they so greatly vend, and read in their temples, and set forth to be read by the common [people]: the German, French, Scottish, and English Bibles — nay, even the Latin — by their own opinion are not Bibles, but only a semblance and image of Bibles. For the Calvinist Whitaker teaches, in [his] book against Bellarmine, [that] that only is the word of God which is written in the language in which God first said or dictated it. But [it] happened, a few months ago, that I fell in with one of those Innovators — of whom, among not a few, on account of [his] skill in certain languages, [there] was no small opinion. He said [that] among Christians [there] is one sacred image — namely, the Sacrament of the Eucharist — in exactly the manner in which the old Iconoclasts [said so] at the second Synod of Nicaea. More liberal [is] Calvin, who (bk. 1 Instit. ch. 11 §. 10) gives two: “It seems to me unworthy,” he says, “of the sanctity of the temples, that they should receive images other than those living and iconic ones which God has consecrated by his own word — I mean Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.” Yet the same [Calvin] gladly saw his own seal and little medallion carried by his [followers] even on the very neck. Nay, [I] have heard for certain [that] his disciple Beza too gave to certain [followers] images of his [own] countenance and beard — [so] worthy of immortality! To this [point] indeed [it] has now come: that those who thrust out the images of Christ the Lord, of the Blessed Virgin, and of the other heaven-dwellers, [now] strive to obtrude their own in rivalry. Of the Lutherans — in some of whose temples Luther and Melanchthon are painted just now — I say nothing. [Do] not, in the Calvinist temples, the statues not only of princes but even of baser men come to be seen? [Do] we not see [that], if any Preacher, Professor, or man of letters [is] now [become] somewhat more learned, or bolder and more turbulent, his images are straightway fashioned and cast? Are not the effigies of the Innovators — themselves greatly disagreeing among one another — set out for sale at the Frankfurt and other fairs? Are they not also committed to type and books, and carried about with great eulogies — one of which Beza himself even wrote?