 Similarly, because of the unity and indivisibility of the soul, the author rejected the existence of intelligible species. For him, these species may not be extracted from phantasmata since these have a corporeal constitution, while intelligible species are immaterial by definition; but our intellect is unable to generate a spiritual substance from a material one: God alone is endowed with such a power (AM: I.409). Almost a century after Pereira had formulated this argument, Descartes resorted to a very similar one to support his own rejection of intelligible species as well as of the possibility that ideas can be caused by bodies (see, for example, Descartes, Meditationes AT, p. 41; about the historical precedents of Descartes’ theory see Spruit 1995, vol. II, pp. 379–386: unfortunately, Spruit did not have access to the Antoniana, so he could not introduce Pereira among the possible influences that Descartes received from earlier philosophy). For the Spanish doctor it was then much more efficient to explain the intellectual process on the basis of considering that all cognitive activity, whether sensory or intelligible, not only depends on the soul but, in fact, identifies with it.