2. We are well aware that neither the speech
of men nor the analogy of human nature can give us a full insight into
the things of God. The ineffable cannot submit to the bounds and
limits of definition; that which is spiritual is distinct from every
class or instance of bodily things. Yet, since our subject is
that of heavenly natures, we must employ ordinary natures and ordinary
speech as our means of expressing what our mind apprehends; a means no
doubt unworthy of the majesty of God, but forced upon us by feebleness
of our intellect, which can use only our own circumstances and our own
words to convey to others our perceptions and our conclusions.
This truth has been enforced already in the first book § 19., but is now repeated in order that, in any
analogies from human affairs which we adduce, we may not be supposed to
think of God as resembling embodied natures, or to compare spiritual
Beings with our passible selves, but rather be regarded as advancing
the outward appearance of visible things as a clue to the inward
meaning of things invisible.