Psalms 135:15

Lastly, after all that arrangement and dispensation, the Spirit of God turns itself to reproaching and ridiculing those idols, which are now ridiculed by their very worshippers. "The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold" [Psalm 135:15]. As God made all these things, who made whatever He would in heaven and earth, what can anything that man makes be, but an object of ridicule, not adoration? Was He perchance about to speak of "the idols of the Gentiles," that we might despise them all? Was He about to speak of the idols of the heathen, stones and wood, plaster and pottery? I say not these, they are mean materials. I speak of that which they specially love, that which they specially honour. "The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the work of men's hands." Surely it is gold, surely it is silver: because silver glitters, and gold glitters, have they therefore eyes, or do they see?

"I am the Lord your God. You shall not make for yourselves idols fashioned by the hand, neither set up a graven image. Nor shall you set up a remarkable stone in your land [to worship it]: I am the Lord your God." These words indeed were first spoken by the Lord by the lips of Moses, being applicable certainly to whomsoever the Lord God of Israel may lead forth in like manner from the Egypt of a most superstitious world and from the place of human slavery. But from the mouth of every prophet in succession sounds forth also utterances of the same God, augmenting the same law of his by a renewal of the same commands, and in the first place announcing no other duty in so special a manner as being on guard against all making and worshiping of idols; as when by the mouth of David he says, "The gods of the nations are silver and gold: they have eyes, and see not; they have ears, and hear not; they have a nose, and smell not; a mouth, and they speak not; hands, and they handle not; feet and they walk not. Like to them shall be they who make them and trust in them."

Therefore, who would not blush, if they had any humanity, to close the day without a number of psalms, when the birds themselves prance about in the sweetness of a psalter as their way of giving thanks? Who would not blush to fail to make his glory resound with the sweetness of verses, when the birds proclaim his praise with the song they sing? Therefore, brother, imitate the tiny birds by rendering thanks to the Maker morning and evening. And if you are more pious, imitate the nightingale; because the day alone does not suffice for speaking praises—it passes through the watches of the night in its all-night song! Therefore, you too overcome the day with your praises and add to your work the courses of the night, and comfort with a series of psalms the sleepless industry of the work you have undertaken! And because I have mentioned these birds which keep watch at night, I do not want you to imitate the owl; although it keeps watch at night, it is nonetheless lazy or blind during the day; with its big eyes it is content with the dark shadows and abhors the splendor of the sun. In a marvelous manner, it finds light in the darkness, but is blinded by the light. That animal is an example of the heretics and heathen. They embrace the shadows of the devil, abhor the light of the Savior, and with the big eyes of their arguments they discern empty matters but do not look towards eternal things. The Lord says about them: "They have eyes and yet do not see; they walk in darkness." Their eyes are keen when it comes to superstition, but are dim when it comes to divine matters; although they think that they fly away by their subtle discourses, nonetheless like true owls they are thrown into confusion by the splendor of the light.