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During the 20th century, one of the most debated issues regarding Aquinas's theory of knowledge was the process of abstraction. Attention was mainly focused on the role of abstraction in the definition of objects of speculative sciences. Leaving aside the particular features (and disparities) of this debate, this paper aims to focus on the analysis of a very peculiar text in which abstraction -still considered as the cause of the distinction of mathematical objects-does not seem to designate some sort of intellectual operation. On the contrary, abstraction there appears as a property of the very mathematical essences or forms. The consequences of this could lead to the revision of some established ideas in Thomistic Epistemology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]