Cause Principle Unity

Fourth dialogue
some ways divisible and differentiated – a division and a differentiation
which are incomprehensible if there is not some underlying matter. And,
although I claim that all this multiplicity comes together in a single indivisible
being which is beyond any kind of dimension, I still assert that this
being is the matter in which so many forms are united. Before it was conceived
as being varied and multiform, it was conceived uniformly, and
before being conceived as formed, it was conceived as unformed.
DICSONO. You have briefly set out many strong arguments enabling
you to conclude that there is a single matter, a single potency, by which
everything that exists does so in act. You also show that this applies equally
to both corporeal and incorporeal substances, since the former have their
being through their capacity to be, in the same way that the latter, through
their capacity to be, have their being: all of which you have demonstrated
by other strong arguments to those who ponder them deeply and fully
grasp them. Even so, I would like you to spell out (if not for the sake of perfecting
the doctrine, then at least for clarification) how there can be anything
unformed and indeterminate in those most excellent beings which
are the incorporeal things. How can they share in the same matter, without
the advent of form and act resulting in bodies? How, when there is no mutation,
generation, or corruption, can you say there is matter, when matter
has never been posited for any other ends? How can we say that the intelligible
nature is simple, and yet claim that matter and act are in it? I do not
ask these questions on my own behalf, for whom the truth is clear; I ask,
perhaps, for others who may be reluctant and difficult, like masters
Poliinnio and Gervasio, for example.
POLIINNIO. Cedo [I concur].
GERVASIO. I approve, and thank you, Dicsono, for considering the
needs of those who dare not ask, in keeping with the etiquette of transalpine
meals, which forbids those who occupy the lesser seats at table to stick a finger
outside the range of their own plates. There you must wait until a
morsel is handed to you, and you cannot take a single bite without first
having to pay for it with a ‘thank you’.
TEOFILO. To resolve the whole question: just as a man, according to his
specific human nature, is different from a lion, according to his particular
nature, but both are indistinct and identical in their common animal
nature, corporeal substance and other similar determinations, just so,
according to its proper essence, the matter of corporeal things is different
from that of incorporeal things. All that you say, then, concerning the fact
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