Our intention in this study is to demonstrate that the soul, as soon as is its act, is vital principle of the body and that the soul is united to the body for the constitution of the substance, reason why the soul is firstly act of the body, vital principle and principle of the unit of the species in which such body participates; and to the body the function of being is incumbent on the material principle, by which it is (...) conferred to the all compound numerical unit. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to explain the influence that Dionysius's doctrine of God's incommunicability has on Thomistic thought in De divinis nominibus, chapter II. lec. 2 and 3.