  How does this conclusion accord with Avicenna's theory that intentio de re precedes intentio de esse? Essence exists in the measure in which it participates in divine being. There are nevertheless two possible interpretations of the concept of participation. In the first, essence is a kind of potential substratum that is filled by existence at the moment of its actualization. In this sense, essence would be in potency to being as matter is to form. However, as Henry often stresses in his debate with Giles, this is a “far-fetched image” (phantastica imaginatio), since likening physical generation to creation seriously compromises the idea of creation from nothing. In generation, form is not educed from nothing, but from pre-existing matter. Similarly, if essence were a potential substratum, being would not be created from nothing, but from essence itself. The second interpretation makes essence the object (that is, the term or result), not the subject of creation: essence is constituted as such in virtue of its relation of participation with the Creator.