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VOLUME IV.

WORKS OF PLOTINOS.




    PLOTINOS
    Complete Works

    In Chronological Order, Grouped in Four Periods;

    With
    BIOGRAPHY by PORPHYRY, EUNAPIUS, & SUIDAS,
    COMMENTARY by PORPHYRY,
    ILLUSTRATIONS by JAMBLICHUS & AMMONIUS,
    STUDIES in Sources, Development, Influence;
    INDEX of Subjects, Thoughts and Words.

    by
    KENNETH SYLVAN GUTHRIE,

    Professor in Extension, University of the South, Sewanee;
    A.M., Sewanee, and Harvard; Ph.D., Tulane, and Columbia.
    M.D., Medico-Chirurgical College, Philadelphia.

    VOL. IV

    Eustochian Books, 46-54; Comment.

    COMPARATIVE LITERATURE PRESS

    P.O. Box 42, ALPINE, N.J., U.S.A.




    Copyright, 1918, by Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie.
    All Rights, including that of Translation, Reserved.

    Entered at Stationers' Hall, by
    George Bell and Sons, Portugal Street, Lincoln's Inn, London.




FIRST ENNEAD, BOOK FOUR.

Whether Animals May Be Termed Happy.[1]


DEFINITIONS OF HAPPINESS.

1. The (Aristotelian) ideal of living well and happiness are
(practically) identical. Should we, on that account, grant even to
animals the privilege of achieving happiness? Why might we not say
that they live well, if it be granted them, in their lives, to follow
the course of nature, without obstacles? For if to live well consist
either in pleasure (pleasant passions, as the Epicureans taught), or in
realizing one's own individual aim (the Stoic ideal), then this living
well is, in either case, possible for animals, who can both enjoy
pleasure, and accomplish their peculiar aim. Thus singing birds live a
life desirable for them, if they enjoy pleasure, and sing conformably
to their nature. If further we should define happiness as achieving
the supreme purpose towards which nature aspires (the Stoic ideal), we
should, even in this case, admit that animals share in happiness when
they accomplish this supreme purpose. Then nature arouses in them no
further desires, because their whole career is completed, and their
life is filled from beginning to end.


WHETHER PLANTS MAY BE TERMED HAPPY.

There are no doubt some who may object to our admitting to happiness
living beings other than man. They might even point out that on this
basis happiness could not be refused to even the lowest beings, such
as plants: for they also live, their life also has a purpose, by
which they seek to fulfil their development. However, it would seem
rather unreasonable to say, that living beings other than humans
cannot possess happiness by this mere reason that to us they seem
pitiable. Besides, it would be quite possible to deny to plants what
may be predicated of other living beings, on the grounds that plants
lack emotion. Some might hold they are capable of happiness, on the
strength of their possessing life, for a being that lives can live
well or badly; and in this way we could say that they possess or
lack well-being, and bear, or do not bear fruits. If (as Aristippus
thought), pleasure is the goal of man, and if to live well is
constituted by enjoying it, it would be absurd to claim that no living
beings other than man could live well. The same argument applies if we
define happiness as (a state of imperturbable tranquility, by Epicurus
called) ataraxy;[2] or as (the Stoic ideal,[3] of) living conformably
to nature.


LIVING WELL NEED NOT BE EXTENDED EVEN TO ALL ANIMALS.

2. Those who deny the privilege of living well to plants, because these
lack sensation, are not on that account obliged to grant it to all
animals. For, if sensation consist in the knowledge of the experienced
affection, this affection must already be good before the occurrence of
the knowledge. For instance, the being must be in a state conformable
to nature even though ignorant thereof. He must fulfil his proper
function even when he does not know it. He must possess pleasure before
perceiving it. Thus if, by the possession of this pleasure, the being
already possesses the