Matter is the principle of potentiality and Form is the principle of Actuality. What the Rationalist is able to reason is what is. Reality is logically put together. It is universal and unchanging. Surface matters change but not reality.
Epistemological activity is directed toward a fixed ontological object.
What we are trying to know is existentially permanent and unchanging and logically ordered and regulated. Thus reality itself is a logical system of ideas and things. The mind has a natural tendency to know. It can take hold or intuit truth. The Neo-Thomist believes that God reveals Himself to us through the intellect.