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Preface to the English Edition
Translator's Preface
Main Abbreviations
Porphyry: On the Life of Plotinus and the Order of His Books
Appendixes
A.
B.
C. Porphyry in Sicily and His Literary Activity There
First Ennead
I 1 [53]. What Is the Living Being, and What Is Man?
I 2 [19]. On Virtues
I 3 [20]. On Dialectic
Synopsis
1. Ascent and its target.
The two stages of ascent.
The musical man.
2. The lover.
3. The philosopher.
4. Dialectic: definition and description
5. Its principles.
Its relation to logic.
6. Its relation to natural philosophy and to ethics.
Practical wisdom as the perfection of the natural virtues.
I 4 [46]. On Well-Being
I 5 [36]. On Whether Well-Being Increases with Time
Synopsis
1. Well-being is of the present.
2. The propensity for life and actualization always concerns
the present.
3. The measure of well-being is not influenced by the prolongation of contemplation,
4. nor of pleasure,
5. nor of itself.
6. Ill-being may increase in time, but not so well-being.
7. Well-being transcends time.
8-9. Memory has no effect on it.
10. Virtuous actions are the result, not the cause, of well-being.
I 6 [1]. On Beauty
I 7 [54]. On the Primal Good and the Other Goods
I 8 [51]. On What Are and Whence Come Evils
I 9 [16]. On Going out of the Body
Synopsis
Theory: The soul must not be withdrawn violently, but must be allowed to divest itself of the body naturally.
Problems and solutions:
Violent suicide is not without passion.
Drugs are perhaps damaging to the soul.
Suicide deprives man of the possibility of progress.
Second Ennead
II 1 [40]. On Heaven
II 2 [14]. On the Movement of Heaven
II 3 [52]. On Whether the Stars Are Causes
II 4 [12]. On Matter
II 5 [25]. On What Exists Potentially and What Actually
II 6 [17]. On Substance, or on Quality
II 7 [37]. On Complete Transfusion
II 8 [35]. On Sight, or How Distant Objects Appear Small
II 9 [33]. Against the Gnostics
Third Ennead
III 1 [3]. On Destiny
III 2-3 [47-48]. On Providence, Books I-II
III 4 [15]. On Our Allotted Guardian Spirit
III 5 [50]. On Love
III 6 [26]. On the Impassibility of Things without Body
III 7 [45]. On Eternity and Time
III 8 [30]. On Nature and Contemplation and the One
III 9 [13]. Various Considerations
List of Variant Readings
Key to the Chronological Order of Plotinus' Treatises
Suggested Further Readings on Individual Treatises
Figures
Index of Passages Cited