Abstract

The paper explores the link between contemplation of the One and happiness in Plotinus and challenges the traditional interpretation according to which a contemplative or mystical experience of the One is by necessity brief and transitory, while the experience of Intellect can become a stable state in this life. Were it so, it would not serve as a ground for the good or happy life. In order to reconcile this point with Plotinus’s other claim about contemplation, his doctrine of the double activity of Intellect is invoked.