Argument: When we must speak carefully, there is most need of grammar. In theology, we must speak carefully. Therefore the Holy Spirit has his own grammar.
Response:The Holy Spirit has his own grammar. Grammar is useful everywhere, but when the subject is greater than can be comprehended by the rules of grammar and philosophy, it must be left behind. In grammar, analogy works very well: Christ is created. Therefore Christ is a creature. But in theology, nothing is more useless. Wherefore our eloquence must be restrained, and we must remain content with the patterns prescribed by the Holy Spirit. We do not depart [from grammar] without necessity, for the subject is ineffable and incomprehensible. A creature, in the old use of language, is that which the creator has created and distinguished from himself, but this meaning has no place in Christ the creature. There the creator and the creature are one and the same. Because there is an ambiguity in the term and men hearing it immediately think of a creature separate from the creator, they therefore fear to use it, but it may be sparingly used as a new term, as once Augustine spoke, moved by the greatest joy: "Is this not a marvelous mystery? He who is the Creator, wished to be a creature." This is to be forgiven the holy Father, who was moved by surpassing joy to speak thus. He speaks, however, of the unity, not of a separation, as the grammar implies, and yet, as I have said, this kind of speech is to be used sparingly, and our joy must be restrained, lest it give birth to errors. And the Fathers are to be forgiven, because they spoke thus because of surpassing joy, wondering that the Creator was a creature. It is not permissible to use such words among the weak, because they are easily offended, but among the learned and those firmly rooted in this article, it does not matter how you speak, and I am not harmed if you say: Christ is thirst, humanity, captivity, creature.
