| CHAPTER 2 OF
THE KINDS OF IDOLATRIES USED BY THE INDIANS Idolatry, says the sage, and through him the Holy Spirit,1 is the cause and beginning and end of all evils, and it is for this reason that the enemy of men has multiplied so many kinds and manners of idolatry that to try to recount them in detail would be a never-ending task. But if we reduce idolatry to headings, there are two kinds of it: one has to do with natural things and the other with things imagined or fabricated by human ingenuity. The first of these is divided into two: whether the thing worshiped is general, such as the sun, moon, fire, earth, and elements, or particular, such as a specific river, fountain, tree, or hill, and when these things are worshiped not for their kind but in particular. It was this kind of idolatry that was used in Peru in great excess and is specifically called huaca.2The second kind of idolatry, which is owed to human invention or imagination, also has two further differences: one consists in pure human art or invention, such as worshiping idols or a wooden or stone or gold statue like those of Mercury or Pallas, which are nothing and never were anything but a mere painting or statue; the other difference is of that which really was and is something, but not what the idolater who worships it pretends, like the dead or things belonging to them, which men worship out of vanity and a desire to flatter. So, in all, we can count four kinds of idolatry that the heathen use, and it behooves us to say something about all of them. 1.
Deuteronomy 32:15 Editor's Note The Bible says that it is the LOVE of money that is the root of all evil and NOT idolatry:
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