Plotinus is considered to be the founder of Neoplatonism.

Taking his
lead from his reading of Plato, Plotinus developed a complex spiritual
cosmology involving three foundational elements: the One, the
Intelligence, and the Soul. It is from the productive unity of these three
Beings that all existence emanates, according to Plotinus. The principal
of emanation is not simply causal, but also contemplative. In his system,
Plotinus raises intellectual contemplation to the status of a productive
principle; and it is by virtue of contemplation that all existents are said
to be united as a single, all-pervasive reality. In this sense, Plotinus is
not a strict pantheist, yet his system does not permit the notion of
creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothingness). In addition to his
cosmology, Plotinus also developed a unique theory of sense-perception
and knowledge, based on the idea that the mind plays an active role in
shaping or ordering the objects of its perception, rather than passively
receiving the data of sense experience (in this sense, Plotinus may be
said to have anticipated the phenomenological theories of Husserl).
Plotinus' doctrine that the soul is composed of a higher and a lower part
-- the higher part being unchangeable and divine (and aloof from the
lower part, yet providing the lower part with life), while the lower part is
the seat of the personality (and hence the passions and vices) -- led him
to neglect an ethics of the individual human being in favor of a mystical
or soteric doctrine of the soul's ascent to union with its higher part. The
philosophy of Plotinus is represented in the complete collection of his
treatises, collected and edited by his student Porphyry into six books of
nine treatises each. For this reason they have come down to us under the
title of the Enneads.
1. Life and Work
Plotinus was born in 204 C.E. in Egypt, the exact location of which is
unknown. In his mid-twenties Plotinus gravitated to Alexandria, where
he attended the lectures of various philosophers, not finding satisfaction
with any until he discovered the teacher Ammonius Saccas. He
remained with Ammonius until 242, at which time he joined up with the
Emperor Gordian on an expedition to Persia, for the purpose, it seems,
of engaging the famed philosophers of that country in the pursuit of
wisdom. The expedition never met its destination, for the Emperor was
assassinated in Mesopotamia, and Plotinus returned to Rome to set up a

school of philosophy. By this time, Plotinus had reached his fortieth

year. He taught in Rome for twenty years before the arrival of Porphyry,
who was destined to become his most famous pupil, as well as his
biographer and editor. It was at this time that Plotinus, urged by
Porphyry, began to collect his treatises into systematic form, and to
compose new ones. These treatises were most likely composed from the
material gathered from Plotinus' lectures and debates with his students.
The students and attendants of Plotinus' lectures must have varied
greatly in philosophical outlook and doctrine, for the Enneads are filled
with refutations and corrections of the positions of Peripatetics, Stoics,
Epicureans, Gnostics, and Astrologers. Although Plotinus appealed to
Plato as the ultimate authority on all things philosophical, he was known
to have criticized the master himself (cf. Ennead IV.8.1). We should not
make the mistake of interpreting Plotinus as nothing more than a
commentator on Plato, albeit a brilliant one. He was an original and
profound thinker in his own right, who borrowed and re-worked all that
he found useful from earlier thinkers, and even from his opponents, in
order to construct the grand dialectical system presented (although in
not quite systematic form) in his treatises. The great thinker died in
solitude at Campania in 270 C.E.
The Enneads are the complete treatises of Plotinus, edited by his
student, Porphyry. Plotinus wrote these treatises in a crabbed and
difficult Greek, and his failing eyesight rendered his penmanship
oftentimes barely intelligible. We owe a great debt to Porphyry, for
persisting in the patient and careful preservation of these writings.
Porphyry divided the treatises of his master into six books of nine
treatises each, sometimes arbitrarily dividing a longer work into several
separate works in order to fulfill his numerical plan. The standard
citation of the Enneads follows Porphyry's division into book, treatise,
and chapter. Hence 'IV.8.1' refers to book (or Ennead) four, treatise
eight, chapter one.
2. Metaphysics and Cosmology
Plotinus is not a metaphysical thinker in the strict sense of the term. He
is often referred to as a 'mystical' thinker, but even this designation fails
to express the philosophical rigor of his thought. Jacques Derrida has
remarked that the system of Plotinus represents the "closure of
metaphysics" as well as the "transgression" of metaphysical thought

itself (1973: p. 128 note). The cause for such a remark is that, in order to
maintain the strict unity of his cosmology (which must be understood in
the 'spiritual' or noetic sense, in addition to the traditional physical sense
of 'cosmos') Plotinus emphasizes the displacement or deferral of
presence, refusing to locate either the beginning (arkhe) or the end
(telos) of existents at any determinate point in the 'chain of emanations' - the One, the Intelligence, and the Soul -- that is the expression of his
cosmological theory; for to predicate presence of his highest principle
would imply, for Plotinus, that this principle is but another being among
beings, even if it is superior to all beings by virtue of its status as their
'begetter'. Plotinus demands that the highest principle or existent be
supremely self-sufficient, disinterested, impassive, etc. However, this
highest principle must still, somehow, have a part in the generation of
the Cosmos. It is this tension between Plotinus' somewhat religious
demand that pure unity and self-presence be the highest form of
existence in his cosmology, and the philosophical necessity of
accounting for the multiplicity among existents, that animates and lends
an excessive complexity and determined rigor to his thought.
Since Being and Life itself, for Plotinus, is characterized by a dialectical
return to origins, a process of overcoming the 'strictures' of multiplicity,
a theory of the primacy of contemplation (theoria) over against any
traditional theories of physically causal beginnings, like what is found in
the Pre-Socratic thinkers, and especially in Aristotle's notion of the
'prime mover,' becomes necessary. Plotinus proceeds by setting himself
in opposition to these earlier thinkers, and comes to align himself, more
or less, with the thought of Plato. However, Plotinus employs allegory
in his interpretation of Plato's Dialogues; and this leads him to a highly
personal reading of the creation myth in the Timaeus (27c ff.), which
serves to bolster his often excessively introspective philosophizing.
Plotinus maintains that the power of the Demiurge ('craftsman' of the
cosmos), in Plato's myth, is derived not from any inherent creative
capacity, but rather from the power of contemplation, and the creative
insight it provides (see Enneads IV.8.1-2; III.8.7-8). According to
Plotinus, the Demiurge does not actually create anything; what he does
is govern the purely passive nature of matter, which is pure passivity
itself, by imposing a sensible form (an image of the intelligible forms
contained as thoughts within the mind of the Demiurge) upon it. The
form (eidos) which is the arkhe or generative or productive principle of
all beings, establishes its presence in the physical or sensible realm not

through any act, but by virtue of the expressive contemplation of the

Demiurge, who is to be identified with the Intelligence or Mind (Nous)
in Plotinus' system. Yet this Intelligence cannot be referred to as the
primordial source of all existents (although it does hold the place, in
Plotinus' cosmology, of first principle), for it, itself, subsists only insofar
as it contemplates a prior -- this supreme prior is, according to Plotinus,
the One, which is neither being nor essence, but the source, or rather, the
possibility of all existence (see Ennead V.2.1). In this capacity, the One
is not even a beginning, nor even an end, for it is simply the
disinterested orientational 'stanchion' that permits all beings to recognize
themselves as somehow other than a supreme 'I'. Indeed, for Plotinus,
the Soul is the 'We' (Ennead I.1.7), that is, the separated yet
communicable likeness (homoiotai) of existents to the Mind or
Intelligence that contemplates the One. This highest level of
contemplation -- the Intelligence contemplating the One -- gives birth to
the forms (eide), which serve as the referential, contemplative basis of
all further existents. The simultaneous inexhaustibility of the One as a
generative power, coupled with its elusive and disinterested
transcendence, makes the positing of any determinate source or point of
origin of existence, in the context of Plotinus' thought, impossible. So
the transgression of metaphysical thought, in Plotinus' system, owes its
achievement to his grand concept of the One.
a. The One
The 'concept' of the One is not, properly speaking, a concept at all, since
it is never explicitly defined by Plotinus, yet it is nevertheless the
foundation and grandest expression of his philosophy. Plotinus does
make it clear that no words can do justice to the power of the One; even
the name, 'the One,' is inadequate, for naming already implies discursive
knowledge, and since discursive knowledge divides or separates its
objects in order to make them intelligible, the One cannot be known
through the process of discursive reasoning (Ennead VI.9.4).
Knowledge of the One is achieved through the experience of its 'power'
(dunamis) and its nature, which is to provide a 'foundation' (arkhe) and
location (topos) for all existents (VI.9.6). The 'power' of the One is not a
power in the sense of physical or even mental action; the power of the
One, as Plotinus speaks of it, is to be understood as the only adequate
description of the 'manifestation' of a supreme principle that, by its very
nature, transcends all predication and discursive understanding. This

'power,' then, is capable of being experienced, or known, only through

contemplation (theoria), or the purely intellectual 'vision' of the source
of all things. The One transcends all beings, and is not itself a being,
precisely because all beings owe their existence and subsistence to their
eternal contemplation of the dynamic manifestation(s) of the One. The
One can be said to be the 'source' of all existents only insofar as every
existent naturally and (therefore) imperfectly contemplates the various
aspects of the One, as they are extended throughout the cosmos, in the
form of either sensible or intelligible objects or existents. The perfect
contemplation of the One, however, must not be understood as a return
to a primal source; for the One is not, strictly speaking, a source or a
cause, but rather the eternally present possibility -- or active makingpossible -- of all existence, of Being (V.2.1). According to Plotinus, the
unmediated vision of the 'generative power' of the One, to which
existents are led by the Intelligence (V.9.2), results in an ecstatic dance
of inspiration, not in a satiated torpor (VI.9.8); for it is the nature of the
One to impart fecundity to existents -- that is to say: the One, in its
regal, indifferent capacity as undiminishable potentiality of Being,
permits both rapt contemplation and ecstatic, creative extension. These
twin poles, this 'stanchion,' is the manifested framework of existence
which the One produces, effortlessly (V.1.6). The One, itself, is best
understood as the center about which the 'stanchion,' the framework of
the cosmos, is erected (VI.9.8). This 'stanchion' or framework is the
result of the contemplative activity of the Intelligence.
i. Emanation and Multiplicity
The One cannot, strictly speaking, be referred to as a source or a cause,
since these terms imply movement or activity, and the One, being totally
self-sufficient, has no need of acting in a creative capacity (VI.9.8). Yet
Plotinus still maintains that the One somehow 'emanates' or 'radiates'
existents. This is accomplished because the One effortlessly "'overflows'
and its excess begets an other than itself" (V.2.1, tr. O'Brien 1964) -this 'other' is the Intelligence (Nous), the source of the realm of
multiplicity, of Being. However, the question immediately arises as to
why the One, being so perfect and self-sufficient, should have any need
or even any 'ability' to emanate or generate anything other than itself. In
attempting to answer this question, Plotinus finds it necessary to appeal,
not to reason, but to the non-discursive, intuitive faculty of the soul; this
he does by calling for a sort of prayer, an invocation of the deity, that

will permit the soul to lift itself up to the unmediated, direct, and
intimate contemplation of that which exceeds it (V.1.6). When the soul
is thus prepared for the acceptance of the revelation of the One, a very
simple truth manifests itself: that what, from our vantage-point, may
appear as an act of emanation on the part of the One, is really the effect,
the necessary life-giving supplement, of the disinterested selfsufficiency that both belongs to and is the One. "In turning toward itself
The One sees. It is this seeing that constitutes The Intelligence" (V.1.7,
tr. O'Brien). Therefore, since the One accomplishes the generation or
emanation of multiplicity, or Being, by simply persisting in its state of
eternal self-presence and impassivity, it cannot be properly called a 'first
principle,' since it is at once beyond number, and that which makes
possible all number or order (cf. V.1.5).
ii. Presence
Since the One is self-sufficient, isolated by virtue of its pure selfpresence, and completely impassive, it cannot properly be referred to as
an 'object' of contemplation -- not even for the Intelligence. What the
Intelligence contemplates is not, properly speaking, the One Itself, but
rather the generative power that emanates, effortlessly, from the One,
which is beyond all Being and Essence (epikeina tes ousias) (cf. V.2.1).
It has been stated above that the One cannot properly be referred to as a
first principle, since it has no need to divide itself or produce a
multiplicity in any manner whatsoever, since the One is purely selfcontained. This leads Plotinus to posit a secondary existent or emanation
of the One, the Intelligence or Mind (Nous) which is the result of the
One's direct 'vision' of itself (V.1.7). This allows Plotinus to maintain,
within his cosmological schema, a power of pure unity or presence -- the
One -- that is nevertheless never purely present, except as a trace in the
form of the power it manifests, which is known through contemplation.
Pure power and self-presence, for Plotinus, cannot reside in a being
capable of generative action, for it is a main tenet of Plotinus' system
that the truly perfect existent cannot create or generate anything, since
this would imply a lack on the part of that existent. Therefore, in order
to account for the generation of the cosmos, Plotinus had to locate his
first principle at some indeterminate point outside of the One and yet
firmly united with it; this first principle, of course, is the Intelligence,
which contains both unity and multiplicity, identity and difference -- in
other words, a self-presence that is capable of being divided into

manifestable and productive forms or 'intelligences' (logoi spermatikoi)

without, thereby, losing its unity. The reason that the Intelligence, which
is the truly productive 'first principle' (proton arkhon) in Plotinus'
system, can generate existents and yet remain fully present to itself and
at rest, is because the self-presence and nature of the Intelligence is
derived from the One, which gives of itself infinitely, and without
diminishing itself in any way. Furthermore, since every being or existent
within Plotinus' Cosmos owes its nature as existent to a power that is
prior to it, and which it contemplates, every existent owes its being to
that which stands over it, in the capacity of life-giving power. Keeping
this in mind, it is difficult, if not impossible, to speak of presence in the
context of Plotinus' philosophy; rather, we must speak of varying
degrees or grades of contemplation, all of which refer back to the pure
trace of infinite power that is the One.
b. The Intelligence
The Intelligence (Nous) is the true first principle -- the determinate,
referential 'foundation' (arkhe) -- of all existents; for it is not a selfsufficient entity like the One, but rather possesses the ability or capacity
to contemplate both the One, as its prior, as well as its own thoughts,
which Plotinus identifies with the Platonic Ideas or Forms (eide). The
purpose or act of the Intelligence is twofold: to contemplate the 'power'
(dunamis) of the One, which the Intelligence recognizes as its source,
and to meditate upon the thoughts that are eternally present to it, and
which constitute its very being. The Intelligence is distinct from the One
insofar as its act is not strictly its own (or an expression of selfsufficiency as the 'act' of self-reflection is for the One) but rather results
in the principle of order and relation that is Being -- for the Intelligence
and Being are identical (V.9.8). The Intelligence may be understood as
the storehouse of potential being(s), but only if every potential being is
also recognized as an eternal and unchangeable thought in the Divine
Mind (Nous). As Plotinus maintains, the Intelligence is an independent
existent, requiring nothing outside of itself for subsistence; invoking
Parmenides, Plotinus states that "to think and to be are one and the
same" (V.9.5; Parmenides, fragment 3). The being of the Intelligence is
its thought, and the thought of the Intelligence is Being. It is no accident
that Plotinus also refers to the Intelligence as God (theos) or the
Demiurge (I.1.8), for the Intelligence, by virtue of its primal duality -contemplating both the One and its own thought -- is capable of acting

as a determinate source and point of contemplative reference for all

beings. In this sense, the Intelligence may be said to produce creative or
constitutive action, which is the provenance of the Soul.
i. The Ideas and the 'Seminal Reasons'
Since the purpose or act of the Intelligence is twofold (as described
above), that which comprises the being or essence of the Intelligence
must be of a similar nature. That which the Intelligence contemplates,
and by virtue of which it maintains its existence, is the One in the
capacity of overflowing power or impassive source. This power or
effortless expression of the One, which is, in the strictest sense, the
Intelligence itself, is manifested as a coherency of thoughts or perfect
intellectual objects that the Intelligence contemplates eternally and fully,
and by virtue of which it persists in Being -- these are the Ideas (eide).
The Ideas reside in the Intelligence as objects of contemplation. Plotinus
states that: "No Idea is different from The Intelligence but is itself an
intelligence" (V.9.8, tr. O'Brien). Without in any way impairing the
unity of his concept of the Intelligence, Plotinus is able to locate both
permanence and eternality, and the necessary fecundity of Being, at the
level of Divinity. He accomplishes this by introducing the notion that
the self-identity of each Idea, its indistinguishability from Intelligence
itself, makes of each Idea at once a pure and complete existent, as well
as a potentiality or 'seed' capable of further extending itself into
actualization as an entity distinct from the Intelligence (cf. V.9.14).
Borrowing the Stoic term logos spermatikos or 'seminal reason,' Plotinus
elaborates his theory that every determinate existent is produced or
generated through the contemplation by its prior of a higher source, as
we have seen that the One, in viewing itself, produces the Intelligence;
and so, through the contemplation of the One via the Ideas, the
Intelligence produces the logoi spermatikoi ('seminal reasons') that will
serve as the productive power or essence of the Soul, which is the active
or generative principle within Being (cf. V.9.6-7).
ii. Being and Life
Being, for Plotinus, is not some abstract, amorphous pseudo-concept
that is somehow pre-supposed by all thinking. In the context of Plotinus'
cosmological schema, Being is given a determined and prominent place,

even if it is not given, explicitly, a definition; though he does relate it to

the One, by saying that the One is not Being, but "being's begetter"
(V.2.1). Although Being does not, for Plotinus, pre-suppose thought, it
does pre-suppose and make possible all 're-active' or causal generation.
Being is necessarily fecund -- that is to say, it generates or actualizes all
beings, insofar as all beings are contained, as potentialities, in the
'rational seeds' which are the results of the thought or contemplation of
the Intelligence. Being differentiates the unified thought of the
Intelligence -- that is, makes it repeatable and meaningful for those
existents which must proceed from the Intelligence as the Intelligence
proceeds from the One. Being is the principle of relation and
distinguishability amongst the Ideas, or rather, it is that rational
principle which makes them logoi spermatikoi. However, Being is not
simply the productive capacity of Difference; it is also the source of
independence and self-sameness of all existents proceeding from the
Intelligence; the productive unity accomplished through the rational or
dialectical synthesis of the Dyad -- of the Same (tauton) and the
Different (heteron) (cf. V.1.4-5). We may best understand Being, in the
context of Plotinus' thought, by saying that it differentiates and makes
indeterminate the Ideas belonging to the Intelligence, only in order to
return these divided or differentiated ideas, now logoi spermatikoi, to
Sameness or Unity. It is the process of returning the divided and
differentiated ideas to their original place in the chain of emanation that
constitutes Life or temporal existence. The existence thus produced by
or through Being, and called Life, is a mode of intellectual existence
characterized by discursive thought, or that manner of thinking which
divides the objects of thought in order to categorize them and make
them knowable through the relational process of categorization or
'orderly differentiation'. The existents that owe their life to the process
of Being are capable of knowing individual existents only as they relate
to one another, and not as they relate to themselves (in the capacity of
'self-sameness'). This is discursive knowledge, and is an imperfect
image of the pure knowledge of the Intelligence, which knows all beings
in their essence or 'self-sameness' -- that is, as they are purely present to
the Mind, without the articulative mediation of Difference.
c. The Soul
The power of the One, as explained above, is to provide a foundation
(arkhe) and location (topos) for all existents (VI.9.6). The foundation

provided by the One is the Intelligence. The location in which the

cosmos takes objective shape and determinate, physical form, is the
Soul (cf. IV.3.9). Since the Intelligence, through its contemplation of the
One and reflection on its own contents, the Ideas (eide), is both one and
many, the Soul is both contemplative and active: it contemplates the
Intelligence, its prior in the 'chain of existents,' and also extends itself,
through acting upon or actualizing its own thoughts (the logoi
spermatikoi), into the darkness or indeterminacy of multiplicity or
Difference (which is to be identified in this sense with Matter); and by
so doing, the Soul comes to generate a separate, material cosmos that is
the living image of the spiritual or noetic Cosmos contained as a unified
thought within the Intelligence (cp. Plato, Timaeus 37d). The Soul, like
the Intelligence, is a unified existent, in spite of its dual capacity as
contemplator and actor. The purely contemplative part of the Soul,
which remains in constant contact with the Intelligence, is referred to by
Plotinus as the 'higher part' of the Soul, while that part which actively
descends into the changeable (or sensible) realm in order to govern and
directly craft the Cosmos, is the 'lower part,' which assumes a state of
division as it enters, out of necessity, material bodies. It is at the level of
the Soul that the drama of existence unfolds; the Soul, through coming
into contact with its inferior, that is, matter or pure passivity, is
temporarily corrupted, and forgets the fact that it is one of the
Intelligibles, owing its existence to the Intelligence, as its prior, and
ultimately, to the power of the One. It may be said that the Soul is the
'shepherd' or 'cultivator' of the logoi spermatikoi, insofar as the Soul's
task is to conduct the differentiated ideas from the state of fecund
multiplicity that is Being, through the drama of Life, and at last, to
return these ideas to their primal state or divine status as thoughts within
the Intelligence. Plotinus, holding to his principle that one cannot act
without being affected by that which one acts upon, declares that the
Soul, in its lower part, undergoes the drama of existence, suffers,
forgets, falls into vice, etc., while the higher part remains unaffected,
and persists in governing, without flaw, the Cosmos, while ensuring that
all individual, embodied souls return, eventually, to their divine and true
state within the Intelligible Realm. Moreover, since every embodied
soul forgets, to some extent, its origin in the Divine Realm, the drama of
return consists of three distinct steps: the cultivation of Virtue, which
reminds the soul of the divine Beauty; the practice of Dialectic, which
instructs or informs the soul concerning its priors and the true nature of

existence; and finally, Contemplation, which is the proper act and mode
of existence of the soul.
i. Virtue
The Soul, in its highest part, remains essentially and eternally a being in
the Divine, Intelligible Realm. Yet the lower (or active), governing part
of the Soul, while remaining, in its essence, a divine being and identical
to the Highest Soul, nevertheless, through its act, falls into forgetfulness
of its prior, and comes to attach itself to the phenomena of the realm of
change, that is, of Matter. This level at which the Soul becomes
fragmented into individual, embodied souls, is Nature (phusis). Since
the purpose of the soul is to maintain order in the material realm, and
since the essence of the soul is one with the Highest Soul, there will
necessarily persist in the material realm a type of order (doxa) that is a
pale reflection of the Order (logos) persisting in the Intelligible Realm.
It is this secondary or derived order (doxa) that gives rise to what
Plotinus calls the "civic virtues" (aretas politikas) (I.2.1). The "civic
virtues" may also be called the 'natural virtues' (aretas phusikas) (I.3.6),
since they are attainable and recognizable by reflection upon human
nature, without any explicit reference to the Divine. These 'lesser'
virtues are possible, and attainable, even by the soul that has forgotten
its origin within the Divine, for they are merely the result of the
imitation of virtuous men -- that is, the imitation of the Nature of the
Divine Soul, as it is actualized in living existents, yet not realizing that it
is such. There is nothing wrong, Plotinus tells us, with imitating noble
men, but only if this imitation is understood for what it is: a preparation
for the attainment of the true Virtue that is "likeness to God as far as
possible" (cf. I.1.2; and Plato, Theaetetus 176b). Plotinus makes it clear
that the one who possesses the civic virtues does not necessarily possess
the Divine Virtue, but the one who possesses the latter will necessarily
possess the former (I.2.7). Those who imitate virtuous men, for
example, the heroes of old, like Achilles, and take pride in this virtue,
run the risk of mistaking the merely human for the Divine, and therefore
committing the sin of hubris. Furthermore, the one who mistakes the
human for the Divine virtue remains firmly fixed in the realm of opinion
(doxa), and is unable to rise to true knowledge of the Intelligible Realm,
which is also knowledge of one's true self. The exercise of the civic
virtues makes one just, courageous, well-tempered, etc. -- that is, the
civic virtues result in sophrosune, or a well-ordered and cultivated mind.

It is easy to see, however, that this virtue is simply the ability to remain,
to an extent, unaffected by the negative intrusions upon the soul of the
affections of material existence. The highest Virtue consists, on the
other hand, not in a rearguard defense, as it were, against the attack of
violent emotions and disruptive desires, but rather in a positively active
and engaged effort to regain one's forgotten divinity (I.2.6). The highest
virtue, then, is the preparation for the exercise of Dialectic, which is the
tool of divine ordering wielded by the individual soul.
ii. Dialectic
Dialectic is the tool wielded by the individual soul as it seeks to attain
the unifying knowledge of the Divinity; but dialectic is not, for that
matter, simply a tool. It is also the most valuable part of philosophy
(I.3.5), for it places all things in an intelligible order, by and through
which they may be known as they are, without the contaminating
diversity characteristic of the sensible realm, which is the result of the
necessary manifestation of discursive knowledge -- language. We may
best understand dialectic, as Plotinus conceives it, as the process of
gradual extraction, from the ordered multiplicity of language, of a
unifying principle conducive to contemplation. The soul accomplishes
this by alternating "between synthesis and analysis until it has gone
through the entire domain of the intelligible and has arrived at the
principle" (I.3.4, tr. O'Brien). This is to say, on the one hand, that
dialectic dissolves the tension of differentiation that makes each existent
a separate entity, and therefore something existing apart from the
Intelligence; and, on the other hand, that dialectic is the final flourish of
discursive reasoning, which, by 'analyzing the synthesis,' comes to a full
realization of itself as the principle of order among all that exists -- that
is, a recognition of the essential unity of the Soul (cf. IV.1). The
individual soul accomplishes this ultimate act by placing itself in the
space of thinking that is "beyond being" (epekeina tou ontos) (I.3.5). At
this point, the soul is truly capable of living a life as a being that is "at
one and the same time ... debtor to what is above and ... benefactor to
what is below" (IV.8.7, tr. O'Brien). This the soul accomplishes through
the purely intellectual 'act' of Contemplation.

iii. Contemplation
Once the individual soul has, through its own act of will -- externalized
through dialectic -- freed itself from the influence of Being, and has
arrived at a knowledge of itself as the ordering principle of the cosmos,
it has united its act and its thought in one supreme ordering principle
(logos) which derives its power from Contemplation (theoria). In one
sense, contemplation is simply a vision of the things that are -- a
viewing of existence. However, for Plotinus, contemplation is the single
'thread' uniting all existents, for contemplation, on the part of any given
individual existent, is at the same time knowledge of self, of
subordinate, and of prior. Contemplation is the 'power' uniting the One,
the Intelligence, and the Soul in a single all-productive intellectual force
to which all existents owe their life. 'Vision' (theoria), for Plotinus,
whether intellectual or physical, implies not simply possession of the
viewed object in or by the mind, but also an empowerment, given by the
object of vision to the one who has viewed it. Therefore, through the
'act' of contemplation the soul becomes capable of simultaneously
knowing its prior (the source of its power, the Intelligence) and, of
course, of ordering or imparting life to that which falls below the soul in
the order of existence. The extent to which Plotinus identifies
contemplation with a creative or vivifying act is expressed most
forcefully in his comment that: "since the supreme realities devote
themselves to contemplation, all other beings must aspire to it, too,
because the origin of all things is their end as well" (III.8.7, tr. O'Brien).
This means that even brute action is a form of contemplation, for even
the most vulgar or base act has, at its base and as its cause, the impulse
to contemplate the greater. Since Plotinus recognizes no strict principle
of cause and effect in his cosmology, he is forced, as it were, to posit a
strictly intellectual process -- contemplation -- as a force capable of
producing the necessary tension amongst beings in order for there to be
at once a sort of hierarchy and, also, a unity within the cosmos. The
tension, of course, is always between knower and known, and manifests
itself in the form of a 'fall' that is also a forgetting of source, which
requires remedy. The remedy is, as we have seen, the exercise of virtue
and dialectic (also, see above). For once the soul has walked the ways of
discursive knowledge, and accomplished, via dialectic, the necessary
unification, it (the soul) becomes the sole principle of order within the
realm of changeable entities, and, through the fragile synthesis of
differentiation and unity accomplished by dialectic, and actualized in

contemplation, holds the cosmos together in a bond of purely

intellectual dependence, as of thinker to thought. The tension that makes
all of this possible is the simple presence of the pure passivity that is
Matter.
d. Matter
Matter, for Plotinus, may be understood as an eternally receptive
substratum (hupokeimenon), in and by which all determinate existents
receive their form (cf. II.4.4). Since Matter is completely passive, it is
capable of receiving any and all forms, and is therefore the principle of
differentiation among existents. According to Plotinus, there are two
types of Matter -- the intelligible and the sensible. The intelligible type
is identified as the palette upon which the various colors and hues of
intelligible Being are made visible or presented, while the sensible type
is the 'space of the possible,' the excessively fecund 'darkness' or depth
of indeterminacy into which the soul shines its vivifying light. Matter,
then, is the ground or fundament of Being, insofar as the entities within
the Intelligence (the logoi spermatikoi) depend upon this defining or
delimiting principle for their articulation or actualization into
determinate and independent intelligences; and even in the sensible
realm, where the soul achieves its ultimate end in the 'exhaustion' that is
brute activity -- the final and lowest form of contemplation (cf. III.8.2) - Matter is that which receives and, in a passive sense, 'gives form to' the
act. Since every existent, as Plotinus tells us, must produce another, in a
succession of dependence and derivation (IV.8.6) which finally ends,
simultaneously, in the passivity and formlessness of Matter, and the
desperation of the physical act, as opposed to purely intellectual
contemplation (although, it must be noted, even brute activity is a form
of contemplation, as described above), Matter, and the result of its
reception of action, is not inherently evil, but is only so in relation to the
soul, and the extent to which the soul becomes bound to Matter through
its act (I.8.14). Plotinus also maintains, in keeping with Platonic
doctrine, that any sensible thing is an image of its true and eternal
counterpart in the Intelligible Realm. Therefore, the sensible matter in
the cosmos is but an image of the purely intellectual Matter existing or
persisting, as noetic substratum, within the Intelligence (nous). Since
this is the case, the confusion into which the soul is thrown by its
contact with pure passivity is not eternal or irremediable, but rather a
necessary and final step in the drama of Life, for once the soul has

experienced the 'chaotic passivity' of material existence, it will yearn

ever more intensely for union with its prior, and the pure contemplation
that constitutes its true existence (IV.8.5).
i. Evil
The Soul's act, as we have seen (above), is dual -- it both contemplates
its prior, and acts, in a generative or, more properly, a governing
capacity. For the soul that remains in contact with its prior, that is, with
the highest part of the Soul, the ordering of material existence is
accomplished through an effortless governing of indeterminacy, which
Plotinus likens to a light shining into and illuminating a dark space (cf.
I.8.14); however, for the soul that becomes sundered, through
forgetfulness, from its prior, there is no longer an ordering act, but a
generative or productive act -- this is the beginning of physical
existence, which Plotinus recognizes as nothing more than a misplaced
desire for the Good (cf. III.5.1). The soul that finds its fulfillment in
physical generation is the soul that has lost its power to govern its
inferior while remaining in touch with the source of its power, through
the act of contemplation. But that is not all: the soul that seeks its end in
the means of generation and production is also the soul that becomes
affected by what it has produced -- this is the source of unhappiness, of
hatred, indeed, of Evil (kakon). For when the soul is devoid of any
referential or orientational source -- any claim to rulership over matter -it becomes the slave to that over which it should rule, by divine right, as
it were. And since Matter is pure impassivity, the depth or darkness
capable of receiving all form and of being illuminated by the light of the
soul, of reason (logos), when the soul comes under the sway of Matter,
through its tragic forgetting of its source, it becomes like this substratum
-- it is affected by any and every emotion or event that comes its way,
and all but loses its divinity. Evil, then, is at once a subjective or
'psychic' event, and an ontological condition, insofar as the soul is the
only existent capable of experiencing evil, and is also, in its highest
form, the ruler or ordering principle of the material cosmos. In spite of
all this, however, Evil is not, for Plotinus, a meaningless plague upon
the soul. He makes it clear that the soul, insofar as it must rule over
Matter, must also take on certain characteristics of that Matter in order
to subdue it (I.8.8). The onto-theological problem of the source of Evil,
and any theodicy required by placing the source of Evil within the
godhead, is avoided by Plotinus, for he makes it clear that Evil affects

only the soul, as it carries out its ordering activity within the realm of
change and decay that is the countenance of Matter. Since the soul is,
necessarily, both contemplative and active, it is also capable of falling,
through weakness or the 'contradiction' of its dual functions, into
entrapment or confusion amidst the chaos of pure passivity that is
Matter. Evil, however, is not irremediable, since it is merely the result of
privation (the soul's privation, through forgetfulness, of its prior); and so
Evil is remedied by the soul's experience of Love.
ii. Love and Happiness
Plotinus speaks of Love in a manner that is more 'cosmic' than what we
normally associate with that term. Love (eros), for Plotinus, is an
ontological condition, experienced by the soul that has forgotten its true
status as divine governor of the material realm and now longs for its true
condition. Drawing on Plato, Plotinus reminds us that Love (Eros) is the
child of Poverty (Penia) and Possession (Poros) (cf. Plato, Symposium
203b-c), since the soul that has become too intimately engaged with the
material realm, and has forgotten its source, is experiencing a sort of
'poverty of being,' and longs to possess that which it has 'lost'. This
amounts to a spiritual desire, an 'existential longing,' although the result
of this desire is not always the 'instant salvation' or turnabout that
Plotinus recognizes as the ideal (the epistrophe described in Ennead
IV.8.4, for example); oftentimes the soul expresses its desire through
physical generation or reproduction. This is, for Plotinus, but a pale and
inadequate reflection or imitation of the generative power available to
the soul through contemplation. Now Plotinus does not state that human
affection or even carnal love is an evil in itself -- it is only an evil when
the soul recognizes it as the only expression or end (telos) of its desire
(III.5.1). The true or noble desire or love is for pure beauty, i.e., the
intelligible Beauty (noetos kalon) made known by contemplation
(theoria). Since this Beauty is unchangeable, and the source of all
earthly or material, i.e., mutable, beauty, the soul will find true
happiness (eudaimonia) when it attains an unmediated vision (theoria)
of Beauty. Once the soul attains not only perception of this beauty
(which comes to it only through the senses) but true knowledge of the
source of Beauty, it will recognize itself as identical with the highest
Soul, and will discover that its embodiment and contact with matter was
a necessary expression of the Being of the Intelligence, since, as
Plotinus clearly states, as long as there is a possibility for the existence

and engendering of further beings, the Soul must continue to act and
bring forth existents (cf. IV.8.3-4) -- even if this means a temporary
lapse into evil on the part of the individual or 'fragmented' souls that
actively shape and govern matter. However, it must be kept in mind that
even the soul's return to recognition of its true state, and the resultant
happiness it experiences, are not merely episodes in the inner life of an
individual existent, but rather cosmic events in themselves, insofar as
the activities and experiences of the souls in the material realm
contribute directly to the maintenance of the cosmos. It is the individual
soul's capacity to align itself with material existence, and through its
experiences to shape and provide an image of eternity for this purely
passive substance, that constitutes Nature (phusis). The soul's turnabout
or epistrophe, while being the occasion of its happiness, reached
through the desire that is Love, is not to be understood as an
apokatastasis or 'restoration' of a fragmented cosmos. Rather, we must
understand this process of the Soul's fragmentation into individual souls,
its resultant experiences of evil and love, and its eventual attainment of
happiness, as a necessary and eternal movement taking place at the final
point of emanation of the power that is the One, manifested in the
Intelligence, and activated, generatively, at the level of Soul.
iii. A Note on Nature (phusis)
One final statement must be made, before we exit this section on
Plotinus' Metaphysics and Cosmology, concerning the status of Nature
in this schema. Nature, for Plotinus, is not a separate power or principle
of Life that may be understood independently of the Soul and its relation
to Matter. Also, since the reader of this article may find it odd that I
would choose to discuss 'Love and Happiness' in the context of a general
metaphysics, let it be stated clearly that the Highest Soul, and all the
individual souls, form a single, indivisible entity, The Soul (psuche)
(IV.1.1), and that all which affects the individual souls in the material
realm is a direct and necessary outgrowth of the Being of the Intelligible
Cosmos (I.1.8). Therefore, it follows that Nature, in Plotinus' system, is
only correctly understood when it is viewed as the result of the
collective experience of each and every individual soul, which Plotinus
refers to as the 'We' (emeis) (I.1.7) -- an experience, moreover, which is
the direct result of the souls fragmentation into bodies in order to govern
and shape Matter. For Matter, as Plotinus tells us, is such that the divine
Soul cannot enter into contact with it without taking on certain of its

qualities; and since it is of the nature of the Highest Soul to remain in

contemplative contact with the Intelligence, it cannot descend, as a
whole, into the depths of material differentiation. So the Soul divides
itself, as it were, between pure contemplation and generative or
governing act -- it is the movement or moment of the soul's act that
results in the differentiation of the active part of Soul into bodies. It
must be understood, however, that this differentiation does not
constitute a separate Soul, for as we have already seen, the nature and
essence of all intelligible beings deriving from the One is twofold -- for
the Intelligence, it is the ability to know or contemplate the power of the
One, and to reflect upon that knowledge; for the Soul it is to
contemplate the Intelligence, and to give active form to the ideas
derived from that contemplation. The second part of the Soul's nature or
essence involves governing Matter, and therefore becoming an entity at
once contemplative and unified, and active and divided. So when
Plotinus speaks of the 'lower soul,' he is not speaking of Nature, but
rather of that ability or capacity of the Soul to be affected by its actions.
Since contemplation, for Plotinus, can be both purely noetic and
accomplished in repose, and 'physical' and carried out in a state of
external effort, so reflection can be both noetic and physical or affective.
Nature, then, is to be understood as the Soul reflecting upon the active
or physical part of its eternal contemplation. The discussion of Plotinus'
psychological and epistemological theories, which now follows, must be
read as a reflection upon the experiences of the Soul, in its capacity or
state as fragmented and active unity.
3. Psychology and Epistemology
Plotinus' contributions to the philosophical understanding of the
individual psyche, of personality and sense-perception, and the essential
question of how we come to know what we know, cannot be properly
understood or appreciated apart from his cosmological and metaphysical
theories. However, the Enneads do contain more than a few treatises and
passages that deal explicitly with what we today would refer to as
psychology and epistemology. Plotinus is usually spurred on in such
investigations by three over-arching questions and difficulties: (1) how
the immaterial soul comes to be united with a material body, (2) whether
all souls are one, and (3) whether the higher part of the soul is to be held
responsible for the misdeeds of the lower part. Plotinus responds to the
first difficulty by employing a metaphor. The Soul, he tells us, is like an

eternal and pure light whose single ray comes to be refracted through a
prism; this prism is matter. The result of this refraction is that the single
ray is 'fragmented' into various and multi-colored rays, which give the
appearance of being unique and separate rays of light, but yet owe their
source to the single pure ray of light that has come to illumine the
formerly dark 'prism' of matter.
If the single ray of light were to remain the same, or rather, if it were to
refuse to illuminate matter, its power would be limited. Although
Plotinus insists that all souls are one by virtue of owing their being to a
single source, they do become divided amongst bodies out of necessity - for that which is pure and perfectly impassive cannot unite with pure
passivity (matter) and still remain itself. Therefore, the Higher Soul
agrees, as it were, to illuminate matter, which has everything to gain and
nothing to lose by the union, being wholly incapable of engendering
anything on its own. Yet it must be remembered that for Plotinus the
Higher Soul is capable of giving its light to matter without in any way
becoming diminished, since the Soul owes its own being to the
Intelligence which it contemplates eternally and effortlessly. The
individual souls -- the 'fragmented rays of light' -- though their source is
purely impassive, and hence not responsible for any misdeeds they may
perform, or any misfortunes that may befalls them in their incarnation,
must, themselves, take on certain characteristics of matter in order to
illuminate it, or as Plotinus also says, to govern it. One of these
characteristics is a certain level of passivity, or the ability to be affected
by the turbulence of matter as it groans and labors under the vivifying
power of the soul, as though in the pangs of childbirth (cf. Plato, Letter
II. 313a). This is the beginning of the individual soul's personality, for it
is at this point that the soul is capable of experiencing such emotions
like anger, fear, passion, love, etc. This individual soul now comes to be
spoken of by Plotinus as if it were a separate entity by. However, it must
be remembered that even the individual and unique soul, in its
community (koinon) with a material body, never becomes fully divided
from its eternal and unchanging source. This union of a unique,
individual soul (which owes its being to its eternal source) with a
material body is called by Plotinus the living being (zoon). The living
being remains, always, a contemplative being, for it owes its existence
to a prior, intelligible principle; but the mode of contemplation on the
part of the living being is divided into three distinct stages, rising from a
lesser to a greater level of intelligible ordering. These stages are: (1)

pathos, or the immediate disturbance undergone by the soul through the

vicissitudes of its union with matter, (2) the moment at which the
disturbance becomes an object of intelligible apprehension (antilepsis),
and (3) the moment at which the intelligible object (tupon) becomes
perceived through the reasoning faculty (dianoia) of the soul, and duly
ordered or judged (krinein). Plotinus call this three-fold structure, in its
unity, sense- perception (aisthesis).
We may best understand Plotinus' theory of perception by describing it
as a 'creation' of intelligible objects, or forms, from the raw material
(hule) provided by the corporeal realm of sensation. The individual
souls then use these created objects as tools by which to order or govern
the turbulent realm of vivified matter. The problem arises when the soul
is forced to think 'through' or with the aid of these constructed images of
the forms (eide), these 'types' (tupoi). This is the manner of discursive
reasoning that Plotinus calls dianoia, and which consists in an act of
understanding that owes its knowledge (episteme) to objects external to
the mind, which the mind, through sense-perception, has come to 'grasp'
(lepsis). Now since the objects which the mind comes to 'grasp' are the
product of a soul that has mingled, to a certain extent, with matter, or
passivity, the knowledge gained by dianoia can only be opinion (doxa).
The opinion may indeed be a correct one, but if it is not subject to the
judgment of the higher part of the soul, it cannot properly be called true
knowledge (alethes gnosis). Furthermore, the reliance on the products of
sense-perception and on dianoia may lead the soul to error and to
forgetfulness of its true status as one with its source, the Higher Soul.
And although even the soul that falls the furthest into error and
forgetfulness is still, potentially, one with the Higher Soul, it will be
subject to judgment and punishment after death, which takes the form,
for Plotinus, of reincarnation. The soul's salvation consists of bringing
its mind back into line with the reasoning power (logos) of its source,
which it also is -- the Soul. All order in the physical cosmos proceeds
from the power of the Soul, and the existence of individual souls is
simply the manner in which the Soul exercises its governing power over
the realm of passive nature. When the individual soul forgets this primal
reality or truth -- that it is the principle of order and reason in the
cosmos -- it will look to the products of sense-perception for its
knowledge, and will ultimately allow itself to be shaped by its
experiences, instead of using its experiences as tools for shaping the
cosmos.

a. The Living Being

What Plotinus calls the "living being" (zoon) is what we would refer to,
roughly, as the human-being, or the individual possessed of a distinct
personality. This being is the product of the union of the lower or active
part of the soul with a corporeal body, which is in turn presided over by
the Higher Soul, in its capacity as reasoning power, imparted to all
individual souls through their ceaseless contemplation of their source
(I.1.5-7). The "living being," then, may be understood as a dual nature
comprising a lower or physically receptive part, which is responsible for
transferring to the perceptive faculty the sensations produced in the
lower or 'irrational' part of the soul through its contact with matter (the
body), and a higher or 'rational' part which perceives these sensations
and passes judgment on them, as it were, thereby producing that lower
form of knowledge called episteme in Greek, that is contrasted with the
higher knowledge, gnosis, which is the sole possession of the Higher
Soul. Plotinus also refers to this dual nature as the 'We' (emeis), for
although the individual souls are in a sense divided and differentiated
through their prismatic fragmentation (cf. I.1.8, IV.3.4, and IV.9.5), they
remain in contact by virtue of their communal contemplation of their
prior -- this is the source of their unity. One must keep in mind,
however, that the individual souls and the Higher Soul are not two
separate orders or types of soul, nor is the "living being" a third entity
derived from them. These terms are employed by Plotinus for the sole
purpose of making clear the various aspects of the Soul's governing
action, which is the final stage of emanation proceeding from the
Intelligence's contemplation of the power of the One. The "living being"
occupies the lowest level of rational, contemplative existence. It is the
purpose of the "living being" to govern the fluctuating nature of matter
by receiving its impressions, and turning them into intelligible forms for
the mind of the soul to contemplate, and make use of, in its ordering of
the cosmos. Now in order to receive the impressions or sensations from
material existence, the soul must take on certain characteristics of matter
(I.8.8-9) -- the foremost characteristic being that of passivity, or the
ability to undergo disruptions in one's being, and remain affected by
these disturbances. Therefore, a part of the "living being" will, of
necessity, descend too far into the material or changeable realm, and
will come to unite with its opposite (that is, pure passivity) to the point
that it falls away from the vivifying power of the Soul, or the reasoning
principle of the 'We.' In order to understand how this occurs, how it is

remedied, and what are the consequences for the Soul and the cosmos
that it governs, a few words must be said concerning sense-perception
and memory.
b. Sense-Perception and Memory
Sense-perception, as Plotinus conceives it, may be described as the
production and cultivation of images (of the forms residing in the
Intelligence, and contemplated by the Soul). These images aid the soul
in its act of governing the passive, and for that reason disorderly, realm
of matter. The soul's experience of bodily sensation (pathos) is an
experience of something alien to it, for the soul remains always what it
is: an intellectual being. However, as has already been stated, in order
for the soul to govern matter, it must take on certain of matter's
characteristics. The soul accomplishes this by 'translating' the immediate
disturbances of the body -- i.e., physical pain, emotional disturbances,
even physical love or lust -- into intelligible realties (noeta) (cf. I.1.7).
These intelligible realities are then contemplated by the soul as 'types'
(tupoi) of the true images (eidolon) 'produced' through the Soul's eternal
contemplation of the Intelligence, by virtue of which the cosmos persists
and subsists as a living image of the eternal Cosmos that is the
Intelligible Realm. The individual souls order or govern the material
realm by bringing these 'types' before the Higher Soul in an act of
judgment (krinein), which completes the movement or moment of
sense-perception (aisthesis). This perception, then, is not a passive
imprinting or 'stamping' of a sensible image upon a receptive soul;
rather, it is an action of the soul, indicative of the soul's natural,
productive power (cf. IV.6.3). This 'power' is indistinguishable from
memory (mnemes), for it involves, as it were, a recollection, on the part
of the lower soul, of certain 'innate' ideas, by which it is able to perceive
what it perceives -- and most importantly, by virtue of which it is able to
know what it knows. The soul falls into error only when it 'falls in love'
with the 'types' of the true images it already contains, in its higher part,
and mistakes these 'types' for realities. When this occurs, the soul will
make judgments independently of its higher part, and will fall into 'sin'
(hamartia), that is, it will 'miss the mark' of right governance, which is
its proper nature. Since such a 'fallen' soul is almost a separate being (for
it has ceased to fully contemplate its 'prior,' or higher part), it will be
subject to the 'judgment' of the Higher Soul, and will be forced to endure
a chain of incarnations in various bodies, until it finally remembers its

'true self,' and turns its mind back to the contemplation of its higher part,
and returns to its natural state (cf. IV.8.4). This movement is necessary
for the maintenance of the cosmos, since, as Plotinus tells us, "the
totality of things cannot continue limited to the intelligible so long as a
succession of further existents is possible; although less perfect, they
necessarily are because the prior existent necessarily is" (IV.8.3, tr.
O'Brien). No soul can govern matter and remain unaffected by the
contact. However, Plotinus assures us that the Highest Soul remains
unaffected by the fluctuations and chaotic affections of matter, for it
never ceases to productively contemplate its prior -- which is to say: it
never leaves its proper place. It is for this reason that even the souls that
'fall' remain part of the unity of the 'We,' for despite any forgetfulness
that may occur on their part, they continue to owe their persistence in
being to the presence of their higher part -- the Soul (cf. IV.1 and IV.2,
"On the Essence of the Soul").
c. Individuality and Personality
The individual souls that are disseminated throughout the cosmos, and
the Soul that presides over the cosmos, are, according to Plotinus, an
essential unity. This is not to say that he denies the unique existence of
the individual soul, nor what we would call a personality. However,
personality, for Plotinus, is something accrued, an addition of alien
elements that come to be attached to the pure soul through its
assimilative contact with matter (cf. IV.7.10, and cp. Plato, Republic
611b-612a). In other words, we may say that the personality is, for
Plotinus, a by-product of the soul's governance of matter -- a governance
that requires a certain degree of affectivity between the vivifying soul
and its receptive substratum (hupokeimenon). The soul is not really
'acted upon' by matter, but rather receives from the matter it animates,
certain unavoidable impulses (horme) which come to limit or bind
(horos) the soul in such a way as to make of it a "particular being,"
possessing the illusory quality of being distinct from its source, the Soul.
Plotinus does, however, maintain that each "particular being" is the
product, as it were, of an intelligence (a logos spermatikos), and that the
essential quality of each 'psychic manifestation' is already inscribed as a
thought with the cosmic Mind (Nous); yet he makes it clear that it is
only the essence (ousia) of the individual soul that is of Intelligible
origin (V.7.1-3). The peculiar qualities of each individual, derived from
contact with matter, are discardable accruements that only serve to

distort the true nature of the soul. It is for this reason that the notion of
the 'autonomy of the individual' plays no part in the dialectical ontotheology of Plotinus. The sole purpose of the individual soul is to order
the fluctuating representations of the material realm, through the proper
exercise of sense-perception, and to remain, as far as is possible, in
imperturbable contact with its prior. The lower part of the soul, the seat
of the personality, is an unfortunate but necessary supplement to the
Soul's actualization of the ideas it contemplates. Through the soul's 'gift'
of determinate order to the pure passivity that is matter, this matter
comes to 'exist' in a state of ever-changing receptivity, of chaotic
malleability. This malleability is mirrored in and by the accrued
'personality' of the soul. When this personality is experienced as
something more than a conduit between pure sense-perception and the
act of judgment that makes the perception(s) intelligible, then the soul
has fallen into forgetfulness. At this stage, the personality serves as a
surrogate to the authentic existence provided by and through
contemplation of the Soul.
4. Ethics
The highest attainment of the individual soul is, for Plotinus, "likeness
to God as far as is possible" (I.2.1; cf. Plato, Theaetetus 176b). This
likeness is achieved through the soul's intimate state of contemplation of
its prior -- the Higher Soul -- which is, in fact, the individual soul in its
own purified state. Now since the Soul does not come into direct contact
with matter like the 'fragmented,' individual souls do, the purified soul
will remain aloof from the disturbances of the realm of sense (pathos)
and will no longer directly govern the cosmos, but leave the direct
governance to those souls that still remain enmeshed in matter (cf.
VI.9.7). The lower souls that descend too far into matter are those souls
which experience most forcefully the dissimilative, negative affectivity
of vivified matter. It is to these souls that the experience of Evil falls.
For this reason, Plotinus was unable to develop a rigorous ethical system
that would account for the responsibilities and moral codes of an
individual living a life amidst the fluctuating realm of the senses.
According to Plotinus, the soul that has descended too far into matter
needs to "merely think on essential being" in order to become reunited
with its higher part (IV.8.4). This seems to constitute Plotinus' answer to
any ethical questions that may have been posed to him. In fact, Plotinus
develops a radical stance vis-a-vis ethics, and the problem of human

suffering. In keeping with his doctrine that the higher part of the soul
remains wholly unaffected by the disturbances of the sense-realm,
Plotinus declares that only the lower part of the soul suffers, is subject to
passions, and vices, etc. In order to drive the point home, Plotinus
makes use of a striking illustration. Invoking the ancient torture device
known as the Bull of Phalaris (a hollow bronze bull in which a victim
was placed; the bull was then heated until it became red hot), he tells us
that only the lower part of the soul will feel the torture, while the higher
part remains in repose, in contemplation (I.4.13). Although Plotinus
does not explicitly say so, we may assume that the soul that has reunited
with its higher part will not feel the torture at all. Since the higher part
of the soul is (1) the source and true state of existence of all souls, (2)
cannot be affected in any way by sensible affections, and (3) since the
lower soul possesses of itself the ability to free itself from the bonds of
matter, all particular questions concerning ethics and morality are
subsumed, in Plotinus' system, by the single grand doctrine of the soul's
essential imperturbability. The problems plaguing the lower soul are not,
for Plotinus, serious issues for philosophy. His general attitude may be
summed up by a remark made in the course of one of his discussions of
'Providence':
"A gang of lads, morally neglected, and in that respect inferior to the
intermediate class, but in good physical training, attack and overthrow
another set, trained neither physically nor morally, and make off with
their food and their dainty clothes. What more is called for than a
laugh?" (III.2.8, tr. MacKenna).
Of course, Plotinus was no anarchist, nor was he an advocate of
violence or lawlessness. Rather, he was so concerned with the welfare
and the ultimate salvation of each individual soul, that he elevated
philosophy -- the highest pursuit of the soul -- to the level of a divine
act, capable of purifying each and every soul of the tainting accruements
of sensual existence. Plotinus' last words, recorded by Porphyry, more
than adequately summarize the goal of his philosophy: "Strive to bring
back the god in yourselves to the God in the All" (Life of Plotinus 2).
5. References and Further Reading

Elmer O'Brien, S. J. (1964) tr., The Essential Plotinus: Representative

Treatises From The Enneads (Hackett Publishing).

This fine translation of the more accessible, if not always most relevant,
treatises of Plotinus serves as a valuable introduction to the work of a
difficult and often obscure thinker. The Introduction by O'Brien is
invaluable.

Plotinus, The Enneads, tr. Stephen MacKenna, with Introduction and

Notes by John Dillon (Penguin Books: 1991).
Stephen MacKenna's rightly famous translation of Plotinus is more
interpretive than literal, and often less clear to a modern English reader
than what is to be found in O'Brien's translation. However, before
delving into the original Greek of Plotinus, one would do well to
familiarize oneself with the poetic lines of MacKenna. The Penguin
edition, although unfortunately abridged, contains an excellent
Introduction by John Dillon, as well as a fine article by Paul Henry, S.
J., "The Place of Plotinus in the History of Thought." Also included is
MacKenna's translation of Porphyry's Life of Plotinus.

Plotinus, The Enneads, tr. A. H. Armstrong, including the Greek, in 7

volumes (Loeb Classical Library, Harvard-London: 1966-1968).
This is a readily available edition of Plotinus' Greek text. Armstrong's
translation is quite literal, but for that reason, often less than helpful in
rendering the subtleties of Plotinus' thought. For the reader who is ready
to tackle Plotinus' difficult Greek, it is recommended that she make use
of the Loeb edition in conjunction with the translations of O'Brien and
MacKenna, relying only marginally on Armstrong for guidance.

Porphyry, Launching-Points to the Realm of Mind, tr. Kenneth Guthrie

(Phanes Press: 1988). [A translation of Pros ta noeta aphorismoi]
This little introduction to Plotinus' philosophy by his most famous
student is highly interesting, and quite valuable for an understanding of
Plotinus' influence on later Platonists. However, as an accurate
representation of Plotinus' thought, this treatise falls short. Porphyry
often develops his own unique interpretations and arguments under the
guise of a commentary on Plotinus. But that is as it should be. The
greatest student is often the most violently original interpreter of his
master's thought.

Frederick Copleston, S. J. A History of Philosophy: Volume 1, Greece

and Rome, Part II (Image Books: 1962).
This history of philosophy is considered something of a classic in the
field, and the section on Plotinus is well worth reading. However,
Copleston's analysis of Plotinus' system represents the orthodox
scholarly interpretation of Plotinus that has persisted up until the present
day, with all its virtues and flaws. The account in the history book is no
substitute for a careful study of Plotinus' text, although it does provide
useful pointers for the beginner.

Kathleen Freeman, Ancilla to the Pre-Socratic Philosophers (Harvard

University Press: 1970).
This is a complete English translation of the Fragments in Diels,
Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, the standard edition of the surviving
fragments of the Pre-Socratic philosophers. The study of these
fragments, especially Parmenides, Heraclitus, Empedocles, and
Anaxagoras, provides an essential background for the study of Plotinus.

Jacques Derrida, Speech and Phenomena, tr. David B. Allison

(Northwestern University Press: 1973).
The essay "Form and Meaning: A Note on the Phenomenology of
Language," in this edition, literally has Plotinus written all 'oeuvre' it.
To understand Plotinus in the fullest fashion, don't forget to familiarize
yourself with Plato's Symposium, Phaedrus, Phaedo, the Republic, and
the Letters (esp. II and VII), not to mention Aristotle, the Stoics and the
Epicureans, the Hellenistic Astrologers, the Gnostics, the Hermetic
Corpus, Philo and Origen.