DIANA, ANTONIO. - Theatine, born at Palermo in 1585, died at Rome on 20 July 1663. He is among the best-known moral theologians, although inclined toward laxism (s. Alfonso, Theologia moralis, VI, 257: ed. L. Gaudé, III, Roma 1909, p. 242). He lived chiefly in Rome, where he was examiner of bishops under three popes.
His principal work is the Resolutiones morales (Lione 1629-59), very disordered; rearranged under the title of A. D. coordinatus, they were published at Lione (1667). They treated 28,000 questions, reduced in subsequent editions down to the brief compendia known as Summariens summae Dianae (Venezia 1648 etc.).
Another work: De primatus solius b. Petri (Roma 1647). In posthumous apologies an attempt was made to exonerate him from laxism (anon., Antonius D., dogmaticus, Napoli 1697, con apologia), but evidence to the contrary includes, among other things, his relations with Caramuel (Bibl. Vaticana, Cod. Vat. lat. 10446, ff.227-232).