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Plotinus on the Inner Sense

ab
Sara Magrin
a
University of California, Berkeley
b
Université du Québec à Montréal
Published online: 02 Jun 2015.

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 British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 2015
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2015.1044888

A RTICLE

PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE1

Sara Magrin

Recently, there has been a growing interest in ancient views on

consciousness and particularly in their influence on medieval and
early modern philosophers. Here I suggest a new interpretation of
Plotinus’s account of consciousness which, if correct, may help us to
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reconsider his role in the history of the notion of the inner sense. I
argue that, while explaining how our divided soul can be a unitary
subject of the states and activities of its parts, Plotinus develops an
original account of consciousness that appeals to an inner sense. In
contrast to ‘the outer senses’, which perceive sensible things out there
in the world, this sense, for him, perceives the activities of the parts
of our soul, thus enabling us to be conscious of them as a single
subject. I suggest that Plotinus devises his account of this psychic
power in the light of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s interpretation of the
Aristotelian ‘common sense’. Since in Alexander the ‘common sense’
enables us to be conscious as a single subject of sensations from
different modalities, Plotinus uses it as a model to explain how we
can be the conscious subject of all the states and activities of our soul.

KEYWORDS: Plotinus; Alexander of Aphrodisias; common sense;

inner sense; consciousness

Consciousness, broadly conceived of as the awareness of our mental states

and activities, becomes a specific subject of study only in the eighteenth
century, but several issues that today are examined in relation to this topic
have been explored since antiquity. One such issue is that of what we may
call ‘the conscious subject’. I may see something white, think of a book,
1
I presented earlier versions of this paper in Uppsala, Notre Dame, Berkeley, and Harvard. I
would like to thank those audiences, and especially Gretchen Reydams-Schils, for their obser-
vations. Several people, including my anonymous referees, provided insightful comments,
and to them I owe the warmest thanks. Paul Kalligas and Stephen Menn read the first draft,
and Brian van den Broek read several drafts. Tony Long, with his generous written comments
on the last draft, saved me from several mistakes and enabled me to substantially improve my
argument.

© 2015 BSHP
 2 SARA MAGRIN

and desire something or other. Although these are distinct psychological

states and activities, any of which can occur without the others, I ascribe
all of them to myself as their single, common subject, and I am aware of
them as my own states and activities. The problem is to explain how I can
do this. My goal here is to examine how Plotinus (204–270 CE) tries to
solve this problem. I will show that, to explain how we can be the single,
conscious subject of all the states and activities of our soul, he develops
an elaborate account of human consciousness that rests on a special percep-
tual power. This is an inner sense that works analogously to our ordinary,
‘outer senses’ (e.g. touch, sight, and so on), but rather than perceiving sen-
sible things out there in the world perceives our ‘inner’ psychological states
and activities and makes us aware of them as our own.
To understand Plotinus’s account of the inner sense, however, we need to
examine some of the philosophical background against which he works.2 In
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the context of a larger argument that aims to show that knowledge is not sen-
sation, Plato, in the Theaetetus, observes that the senses (e.g. sight, hearing,
and so on) cannot be the things ‘with which’ (dative of agent) we perceive.
By appealing to the Trojan horse, he explains that, if we were to perceive
‘with’ the senses, we would be like a wooden horse with many warriors
sitting in it (184D 1–5). Like independent warriors, our senses would
engage in their own activities (sight would see colours, hearing would
hear sounds, and so on), and, like a wooden horse, we would be the mere
container, rather than the common subject, of the activities in which our
senses engage. To avoid this scenario, Plato argues that the senses ‘converge
upon some single form’ (eis mian tina idean … synteinei 184D 3–4), which
he identifies with the soul. Then he concludes that we perceive ‘with’ the
soul ‘through’ or ‘by means of’ (dia + gen.) the senses, thus implying that
the senses are tools or channels used by the soul in order to perceive,
rather than subjects of sensation. Having established that the soul perceives
‘through’ the senses, he argues that it also ‘thinks’ (dianoei 185A 4, episko-
pein 185E 2) ‘through’ itself (184D 7-E 1; 185E 1–2). Plato may or may not
be concerned with consciousness in the Theaetetus, but it is clear that, start-
ing from the analysis of sensation, he aims to show that the soul is the single,
common subject of sensations from different sensory modalities, and that it
is also the common subject of both sensations and thoughts.3
The view that sensations ‘converge upon a single form’ is later developed
by Aristotle in De anima 3.2. He starts by observing that our ability to dis-
criminate between sensible qualities from different modalities, for example,
to discriminate sweet from white, presupposes that our sensations ‘converge

2
The passages that I examine, with the exception of the Stoic material, are discussed as back-
ground for the analysis of the unity of self-awareness in the Neoplatonic commentators in
Sorabji, Philosophy of the Commentators, 145.
3
For Plato’s interest in consciousness here, see Burnyeat, ‘Plato on the Grammar of Perceiv-
ing’, 29–51.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 3

upon’ a single thing (426b 16–21). If this were not the case, he observes, it
would be as if I were to perceive sweet and you white (426b 19): each sen-
sation would have its own subject, and we would be unable to compare and
distinguish sensible qualities from different modalities. While Plato,
however, identifies the subject of sensations from different modalities with
the soul in general, Aristotle argues that it is a specific capacity of the
soul, that is, a sense (426b 16–21). In De anima 3.2, he does not explain
the nature of this sense, but his main Peripatetic commentator, Alexander
of Aphrodisias, takes it to be ‘the common sense’ (hê koinê aisthêsis),
which Aristotle examines in the Parva Naturalia.4 This is not a sense over
and above the special senses (sight, hearing, and so on), but a common
capacity in which they all share, and which makes them function as parts
of a system. By perceiving simultaneously qualities from different sensory
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modalities, it enables us to discriminate between those qualities, and to

bind them, namely to perceive them as belonging to one thing. By making
us ‘perceive that we perceive’, it makes us conscious of perceiving.5 In
the end, Aristotle holds, like Plato, that the soul is the ultimate subject of
both sensations and thoughts, but distinguishes the capacity by which the
soul becomes the subject of sensation, that is, the common sense, from
that by which it becomes the subject of thought. He is interested in con-
sciousness, but has an account only of perceptual consciousness. Nowhere
does he explicitly address the problem of explaining how we can be con-
scious as a single subject of both perceiving and thinking, and, in general,
of all the states and activities of our soul.
This problem seems to have been addressed for the first time by the Stoics.
Unlike Plato and Aristotle, they think that the soul is a body, and they argue
that sensations, thoughts, but also desires, and emotions, are ‘affections’
(pathê) of the soul. When these affections reach what they call ‘the govern-
ing part of us’ or ‘to hêgemonikon’ (LS 53 G = SVF 2.879, and 53 H = SVF
2.836 part) they become ‘representations’ (phantasiai). As they maintain
that in adult humans the hêgemonikon is rational, they conclude that
human representations are rational as well, in the sense that they involve con-
cepts and have propositional content. By subsuming all the activities and
states of our soul under ‘representation’, and by arguing that the
hêgemonikon is the subject of representation, the Stoics introduce the hêge-
monikon as the single subject of all our psychological states and activities.
However, since they hold that representations not only ‘reveal’ to us some
object or other, but also ‘reveal themselves’ together with that object (LS
4
See esp. De somn. 2, 455a 15–22. There are discrepancies between Aristotle’s account of sen-
sation in the De somno and in De an. 3.2. But most interpreters think that the two accounts are
at least compatible, see Caston, ‘Aristotle on Consciousness’, 763–8, and, more recently, Gre-
goric, Aristotle on the Common Sense, 183.
5
On the functions of the common sense, see Gregoric, Aristotle on the Common Sense, 207–9,
and on its ability to make us ‘perceive that we perceive’ in particular, see Caston, ‘Aristotle on
Consciousness’, 751–815.
 4 SARA MAGRIN

39B = SVF 2.54 part), we can conclude that for them the hêgemonikon is also
what enables us to be conscious of all our psychological states and
activities.6
There is little doubt that, for Plotinus, we have within our soul some kind
of ‘centre of consciousness’ that explains our ability to be aware of sen-
sations, thoughts, desires, and emotions.7 The problem is to understand
what exactly this centre is and how it functions. As most scholars today
think that consciousness in Plotinus depends on representation, or on both
representation and reason, they tend to suggest that this centre is our
power of representation and that this power, in some way or other, collabor-
ates with reason.8 But I think that Plotinus has a much more elaborate
account to offer that rests partly on the Stoic analysis of the hêgemonikon
and partly on Aristotle’s and Alexander’s account of the common sense.
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Like the hêgemonikon, his centre of consciousness enables us to become

conscious of all our psychological states and activities, including thoughts,
but, like the Aristotelian common sense, it is a sense, and thus it produces
consciousness not by producing representations that ‘reveal themselves’,
but by perceiving what goes on in our soul. I suggest that there are two
reasons why Plotinus does not simply appropriate the Stoic account of the
hêgemonikon, but transforms it in the light of the Aristotelian notion of
the common sense. On the one hand, he rejects the idea that the subject of
consciousness could be a body. This is why he finds in the Aristotelian
common sense a more congenial model, since the common sense, unlike
the hêgemonikon, is an incorporeal power of the soul. On the other hand,
for reasons that we will see, he takes the common sense to be able to
handle a problem that the Stoic hêgemonikon is not designed to handle.
This is a problem that Plotinus inherits from Plato: that of explaining how
we can be a single, conscious subject despite having a divided soul.9
I will build my argument in four stages. In the first part of this paper, I will
examine Plotinus’s psychology, and in particular his account of the divided
soul. In the second part, I will show how Plotinus revises the Stoic notion of
the hêgemonikon in the light of Alexander’s interpretation of the Aristotelian
common sense. In the third part, I will explain how Plotinus uses Alexan-
der’s interpretation of the common sense to arrive at his conception of the
conscious subject and build his inner sense account of consciousness.

6
See Long (Stoic Psychology, 570–6).
7
Remes (Plotinus on Self, 92) speaks of a ‘conscious center’.
8
The view that consciousness for Plotinus depends on representation goes back to Warren
(‘Consciousness in Plotinus’, 88), and can be found in Smith (‘Unconsciousness and Quasi-
consciousness in Plotinus’, 301 n. 18). It is developed in greater detail by Remes (Plotinus
on Self, 92–110, 122), who argues that Plotinus’s account of consciousness is mainly inspired
by the Stoics. All these scholars agree that for Plotinus reason collaborates with representation
in some way or other.
9
If we exclude the problematic case of Posidonius, the Stoics do speak of ‘parts of the soul’,
but these parts for them are merely qualities of one, single soul (LS 53K = SVF 2.826 part).
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 5

Finally, in the fourth part, I will go back to Plotinus’s psychology and

examine how his inner sense account of consciousness fits Plato’s analysis
of the divided the soul in Republic 4.

THE DIVIDED SOUL

In Republic 4, Plato argues that the soul has three ‘parts’ (merê):10 a rational
part that desires truth and wisdom, an appetitive part that wants food, drink,
and sex, and a spirited part that pursues honour and is prone to anger. Pace
Blumenthal, who argues that Plotinus rejects Plato’s tripartition of the soul,
Plotinus’s explicit references to parts of the soul, and especially his analysis
of what these parts amount to in Enn. 4.3.23, suggest that he does take tri-
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partition seriously.11 The reason why scholars tend to underestimate this

aspect of Plotinus’s psychology is that his account of the divided soul
does not depend directly on Plato, but on Galen’s analysis of Plato’s triparti-
tion in De placitis Hippocratis et Platonis (PHP).12 Starting from Plato’s
remarks in Republic 4, Galen argues that the soul has three distinct
‘powers’ (dynameis): appetitive, spirited, and rational, each of which has a
different ‘beginning’ (archê) in the body, meaning a distinct bodily location
(PHP 7.3.2–3).13 To find their correct location, he draws from the human
anatomy of the Timaeus (esp. 43A-47D, 69C 5-D 6, and 70E-72D), and
from his own knowledge of physiology. Since he thinks that the liver is
the organ that attracts food from the stomach in order to process it into
blood, he locates in it the appetitive power (cf. Tim. 70E–71C). On the
grounds of the correlation between the rhythm of the heartbeat and the
arousal of emotions, he makes the heart the seat of the spirited power (cf.
Tim. 70C). Since he takes the brain to control impulse, or voluntary
motion, and all the cognitive capacities of the animal soul – from the
‘lowest ones’, that is, ‘sensation’ (aisthêsis) and ‘representation’ (phanta-
sia), to the ‘highest one’, that is, ‘thought’ (noêsis) – he locates in it the
rational power (cf. Tim. 43 A–C, 44D 3–6, and 69C 5-D 6). Then he
argues that each power is constitutive of a distinct ‘part’ of the soul
(meros or morion), and he explains that, insofar as each part has its own sep-
arate bodily location, it amounts to a distinct and separate ‘substance’ (ousia)
(PHP 6.3.7).
10
‘Parts’ (merê 442B 10, 442C 4, 444B 3; ‘kinds’ (eidê or genê) 435C 1, 435C 5, 435E 1,
439E 1, 441C 6, 443D 3.
11
Blumenthal, Plotinus’ Psychology, 21. Plotinus speaks of ‘parts of the soul’ in Enn.
4.3.23.35–45; 5.3.3.26; 5.1.12.9–10. In Enn. 4.4.28.65–76 he introduces ‘a division’ (diair-
esis) of the embodied soul into an appetitive part and a spirited part. See also D’Ancona,
‘Plotino e le “Parti” dell’Anima’.
12
See Tieleman, ‘Plotinus on the Seat of the Soul’, 308–9. My references to PHP are based on
De Lacy, Galen, on the Doctrines of Hippocrates and Plato.
13
See Schiefsky, ‘Galen and the Tripartite Soul’, 334–5.
 6 SARA MAGRIN

As this passage from Enn. 4.3.23 shows, Plotinus embraces Galen’s ence-
phalocentric reading of the human anatomy of the Timaeus:

When the ensouled body is illuminated by soul, one part (meros) of it comes to
participate in one way and one in another; and according to the aptitude of the
organ for the task, as soul gives the appropriate power for the task, so the
power in the eyes is said to be ‘the visual power’, that in the ears ‘the auditory
power’, and ‘the power of taste’ is said to be in the tongue, ‘the olfactory one’
in the nostrils, and ‘the tactile power’ is said to be present in the whole body [
… ]. Since the organs of touch are in the first nerves, which also have the
power pertaining to the movement of the animal, as such a power makes
itself available there, and since the nerves begin from the brain (archomenôn
de apo enkephalou tôn neurôn), they [scil. Plato, cf. Tim. 44D] set there [scil.
in the brain] the beginning of sensation and impulse (tên tês aisthêseôs kai
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hormês archên) and in general of the whole living being [ … ]. But it

would be better to say that the beginning of the actualization (tên archên
tês energeias) of the power is there – for it was necessary that the power of
the craftsman which was suitable for the organ be fixed, so to say, there
whence the organ was going to be moved, or rather not the power, for the
power is everywhere, while the beginning of its actualization is there where
the beginning of the organ is.14
(Plot. Enn. 4.3.23.1–21)

Here Plotinus not only claims, like Galen, that the power of sensation, which
I will call ‘sensory power’, and that of impulse, that is, of voluntary motion,
operate in the brain, but even uses Galen’s technical terminology and says
that they have their ‘beginning’ (archê) in the brain. Yet, while clearly
endorsing some aspects of Galen’s anatomy, he also ‘corrects’ his psychol-
ogy. Taking from Aristotle the view that the soul has powers which are
actualized in the body, Plotinus points out that the powers of the soul are
everywhere in the body and that what begins in the brain and, in general,
in a bodily organ, is not the psychic power itself, but merely the ‘actualiza-
tion’ (energeia) of that power.15 Thus, in line with Galen, he argues that sen-
sation and impulse take place in the brain and in the sensory nerves, but
denies that the brain is the seat of the sensory power of the soul and of
that of impulse. Sensation and impulse take place in the brain and the
nerves, he says, not because their powers are there, but because these are
the only organs where their powers can be actualized. At the end of Enn.
4.3.23 he makes analogous remarks concerning two other powers of the
soul. These are ‘the appetitive power’ (to epithymêtikon), and ‘spirit’
(thymos). The former is actualized in the liver, which therefore becomes

14
All translations are mine; for the Enneads I draw, at times, from Armstrong, Plotinus.
15
In PHP 2.8.22, Galen distinguishes between the archê in the sense of ‘the beginning that
pertains to power’ (tên kata dynamin archên) from the archê in the sense of ‘the beginning
that pertains to the origin’ (tên kata genesin archên), that is, ‘the source’. Plotinus’s criticism
seems to blur this distinction, which, in fact, remains quite obscure throughout PHP.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 7

the seat of ‘the appetitive part’ (hê tou epithymêtikou moira) (Enn. 4.3.35–
40), the latter is actualized in the heart (Enn. 4.3.23.43). Plotinus does not
explicitly claim that ‘spirit’ is a part of the soul, but the context leaves
little doubt, I think, that this is what he intends to suggest.
Plotinus, then, develops a new account of the parts of the soul. This
account allows him to maintain that, in contrast to what Galen says, the
soul is one substance that has ‘parts’ only insofar as the body it animates
has parts. To grasp the point more clearly we can think of light, which, for
Plotinus, is another incorporeal substance like the soul (Enn. 2.1.7.26–
28).16 The light in a room is not divided into parts, Plotinus suggests, but
comes to be divided into parts when it illuminates a surface. Insofar as the
surface is extended and has extended parts, we say that a ‘part’ or
‘portion’ of the light shines on this or that part or portion of the surface.
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In the same way, the soul is not divided into parts, but comes to be
divided into parts insofar as the body it animates is extended and has
extended parts. Thus, when the nutritive power is actualized in the liver
and enables the latter to attract food from the stomach, the soul comes to
be divided into the appetitive part, and when spirit enables the heart to
beat, the soul comes to be divided into the spirited part (see also Enn.
4.4.28.64–76).17 But we need to examine more closely the powers that are
actualized in the brain.
As the last passage quoted above shows, Plotinus thinks that at least two
powers of the soul are actualized in the brain: the sensory power and that of
impulse. But he mentions a third power, that of ‘representation’ (phantasia),
in the passage below, which comes immediately after the passage quoted
above in the text:

Since, then, the power of perceiving, and that of impulse, which belong to the
soul in charge of sensation and representation (hê tou aisthanesthai dynamis
kai hê tou hormân psychês ousa18aisthêtikês kai phantastikês), had (eiche)19
reason (ton logon) above themselves, as a nature (hôs an <physis>)20 neigh-
bouring what was below from above, there was where it [scil. reason] was
placed by the ancients [cf. Plat. Tim. 69C 5-D 6] at the top of the whole

16
At the beginning of Enn. 4.3.23, in the passage quoted above, Plotinus assimilates the
ensoulment of the body to an illumination (see Enn. 4.3.22), and, inspired by Parm. 130E-
131C, he tends to use the simile of the light to explain any kind of participation of bodies
in the intelligible, see Enn. 6.5.7.
17
Plotinus follows Galen also in ascribing the appetitive and the spirited parts to what he calls
‘to phytikon’. For this aspect of Galen’s psychology, see von Staden, ‘Body, Soul, and the
Nerves’, 109–10. For Plotinus’s account of how to phytikon operates in the body, see
Noble, ‘How Plotinus’ Soul Animates Its Body’, 249–79.
18
I read ousa following Theiler. The MSS have ousês.
19
In this passage, Plotinus seems to treat the power of sensation and that of impulse as aspects
of a single power, hence the third person singular here, but he distinguishes these powers in ll.
27–33.
20
I transpose physis following Igal.
 8 SARA MAGRIN

living being, at the head, not as something that was in the brain, but as some-
thing in this sensitive <part of the soul> (hôs en toutôi tôi aisthêtikôi), which
had been situated in the brain in the way described above.
(Plot. Enn. 4.3.23.21–27)

Plotinus here refers to Tim. 69C 5-D 6, where Plato explains how the
young gods began to create a human being by fashioning a head and
putting the rational soul in it. This is one of the passages that inspire
Galen to conclude that the rational part of the soul must be located in
the brain. But Plotinus suggests a different reading. Following Galen,
he grants that for Plato the brain is the seat of sensation, representation,
and impulse, but, in contrast to Galen, he does not conclude from this
that these abilities belong to the rational soul, which here he identifies
with ‘reason’ (logos). Rather, he argues that the rational soul is ‘above’
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the brain by being ‘in the head’, as the Timaeus says, only insofar as it
is somehow present in what he calls ‘the sensitive part of the soul’ (to
aisthêtikon). This is the part of the soul that, with its powers of sensation,
representation, and impulse, is active in the brain.21 Since all its powers
are actualized in the same part of the body, it counts as one part of the
soul rather than many.
On the grounds of Enn. 4.3.23 we can conclude that Plotinus builds his
account of the parts the soul starting from Galen’s analysis of tripartition,
which is mostly based on the anatomy of the Timaeus. While he draws
from Galen’s knowledge of physiology, however, he departs from his psy-
chology. Since, in his view, the soul is divided into parts only when it
actualizes some of its powers in parts of the body, and since the power
of reason, for him, is never actualized in the brain, he argues that the
rational soul is not a part of the soul, and he replaces it with what he
calls ‘the sensitive part of the soul’ (cf. Tim. 43A–B).22 Thus he concludes
that the soul has three parts: the appetitive part, located in the liver, the
spirited part, located in the heart, and the sensitive part, located in the
brain. All of them are non-rational and have the rational soul ‘above’
them.

21
However, ‘to aisthêtikon’ in Plotinus is not a technical term for the sensitive part of the soul,
for he uses it also to refer to the sensory power in the brain, which is merely one of the powers
of the sensitive part.
22
This might seem to contradict what Plotinus says in Enn. 4.3.19, where he claims that the
soul is ‘a whole of parts’, and he lists four parts: ‘the sensitive part’ (to aisthêtikon), ‘the vege-
tative part’ (to phytikon), ‘reason’ (logos), and ‘intellect’ (nous); but there is no contradiction.
In Enn. 4.3.19 Plotinus does not deal with the tripartition of the soul but with Plato’s account
of the genesis of the soul at Tim. 35A 1-3, and he uses the word ‘parts’ to refer not to the deri-
vatively extended parts of the soul that animate the body, as in Enn. 4.3.23, but to the non-
extended constituents of the soul mixed together by the Demiurge in order to create the
world soul.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 9

THE COMMON SENSE

In Enn. 4.3.23, Plotinus does not explain how the non-rational parts of the
soul communicate with each other. He does say, however, that the rational
soul communicates with the sensitive part in the brain in virtue of the
sensory power and that of representation, which are somehow capable of
‘listening to it’ by apprehending what comes from it (Enn. 4.3.23.27–33).
I wish to argue that he offers a more detailed account of this communication
in Enn. 4.7.6.
In Enn. 4.7.6, Plotinus argues against the Stoics that, if the soul were a
body, as they maintain, sensation would be impossible. Of interest to us
are the grounds on which he arrives to this conclusion. He begins with the
following remarks:
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If anything is going to perceive anything, it must itself be one (hen) and appre-
hend (antilambanesthai) everything with the same thing, both if through a
number of sense-organs several things come in or several qualities belonging
to one thing, and if through one <sense-organ> something complex <comes
in>, for instance a face. For it is not the case that one thing perceives the
nose and another the eyes, but the same thing perceives them all together.
And if one <percept comes in> through the eyes and another through the
ear, there must be some one thing to which they both <go>. Or how
could <that which perceives> say that these are different, if the percepts
(tôn aisthêmatôn) did not come to the same <place> all together (homou)?
This, then, must be like a centre, and, like lines converging from the
circumference of a circle, the sensations <starting> from all quarters must
end in it; and that which apprehends (to antilambanomenon) must be of this
kind, really one.
(Plot. Enn. 4.7.6.3–15)

Plotinus says that, for sensation to be possible, the thing that perceives within
the soul must be able to discriminate between qualities from the same or from
different sensory modalities. He also observes that, to be able to discriminate
between sensible qualities, the thing that perceives must apprehend them all
together, meaning at the same time. To apprehend different sensible qualities
all together, he argues, this thing must be one and be like the centre of a
circle, on which sensations converge as if they were many radii. In this
passage, then, Plotinus discusses the correct way of conceiving the subject
of sensation. What he says after the passage quoted above shows that his
goal is to argue that the Stoic hêgemonikon cannot be this subject.23 As I
have said, for the Stoics the hêgemonikon is a body, and it is the subject
of all our psychological states and activities including sensations. When it
perceives something or other, it apprehends several sensible qualities at
the same time, and it produces a representation which has propositional

23
See Emilsson, ‘Plotinus on Soul-Body Dualism’.
 10 SARA MAGRIN

content and involves concepts.24 After the passage quoted above, Plotinus
argues against the Stoics that, if the thing that perceives were a body, it
would be extended, and if it were extended, it would receive sensations
from different modalities in different parts of itself (ll.15–19). Thus he con-
cludes that, were the Stoic hêgemonikon the subject of sensation, we would
perceive one quality with one part of it and one with another, which, he says,
would be ‘as if I perceived one thing and you another’ (ll. 18–19). This last
observation is inspired by Aristotle’s De an. 3.2, 4126b 19, where, in the
attempt to show that the senses ‘converge upon’ a sense, Aristotle remarks
that, were this not the case, it would be as if I perceived sweet and you
white. At the same time, however, via De anima 3.2, Plotinus’s observation
also points to the larger context in which he frames his discussion of the
subject of sensation: the account of the senses as ‘converging upon’ the
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soul that Plato provides in the Theaetetus. In the end, then, Plotinus
argues that, were the Stoic hêgemonikon the subject of sensation, there
would be not one but many subjects of sensation in us, namely one for
each sensory modality, so that we would be like a wooden horse with
many warriors sitting in it.
If we now take a second look at the passage quoted above from Enn. 4.7.6,
we can see that, in building his argument against the Stoics, Plotinus uses
Aristotelian or, more broadly, Peripatetic material. Not only does he
ascribe to the subject of sensation functions that Aristotle and Alexander
ascribe to the common sense, he even follows Alexander in likening this
subject to the centre of a circle. In his De anima (63.9–14), Alexander
suggests that the common sense is related to the senses as the centre of a
circle to its radii, and here Plotinus uses precisely this simile to illustrate
how the subject of sensation relates to sensations from different modalities.25
His use of this simile suggests that he conceives of the subject of sensation
on the model of the common sense. To be sure, neither here nor elsewhere
does he use the expression ‘hê koinê aisthêsis’ to refer to it;26 but ‘hê
koinê aisthêsis’, in contrast to what is sometimes suggested, is not the
only expression by means of which one can refer to the common sense by

24
I say that the hêgemonikon apprehends several sensible qualities at the same time on the
grounds of Diog. Laert. 7.49-51 (=LS 39A), where Chrysippus remarks against Cleanthes
that representations must be alterations of such a kind that the hêgemonikon may have new
ones without loss of the old ones. This dispute suggests that the Stoics viewed the hêgemoni-
kon as capable of representing many things, and therefore also many sensible qualities, at the
same time.
25
See Henry, ‘Une comparaison chez Aristote’, 429–44. Cf. Aristot. De an. 3.2, 427a 10–15.
Note that while Alexander uses the simile to illustrate the relation between the common sense
and the senses, Plotinus uses it to illustrate the relation of the subject of sensation to the activi-
ties of the senses, that is, to sensations from different modalities. I explain this difference
below, section three, p. 14.
26
This is remarked by Emilsson, ‘Plotinus on Soul-Body Dualism’, 148–65. His conclusion
that Plotinus here does not identify the subject of sensation with the common sense rests in
part on this remark.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 11

his time. In fact, if we look at Alexander’s commentary on the De sensu, we

can see that he often refers to the common sense by calling it ‘that which
apprehends’, to antilambanomenon, and ‘that which perceives’, to aisthano-
menon (In Sens. 36.11–17; 163.4–11; 164.17–19; 165.8–9; cf. 159.9–13).
These are exactly the expressions that Plotinus uses in Enn. 4.7.6 to refer
to the subject of sensation. He uses the former in the passage quoted
above, and the latter in l. 38.27
The reason why Plotinus does not call the subject of sensation ‘hê koinê
aisthêsis’, but refers to it by means of more general expressions, such as
‘to aisthanomenon’, is to signal that, though modelled on the Aristotelian
common sense, that subject differs from the latter in some crucial respects.
This emerges from another passage of Enn. 4.7.6:
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And if the percept (to aisthêma) was one, a face for instance, either it will be
gathered together into one – which is clearly what happens; for it is gathered
together even in the pupils themselves (or how could the largest things be seen
through this [scil. the pupil]?); and so even more, by reaching the part that
governs <us> (eis to hêgemonoun ionta), it becomes like partless thoughts
(amerê noêmata) – and this <one thing> will be partless; or it will be
divided up together with its size, so that a different part <of ourselves>
<would be aware> of a different <part of it>, and none of us would apprehend
the sensible thing as a whole (mêdena hêmôn holou tou aisthêtou tên antilêp-
sin ischein).
(Plot. Enn. 4.7.6.19–26)

Plotinus observes that, for us to perceive a complex thing, for example, a

face, as one whole, the percept of that thing must be one. He suggests that
this percept is gathered together to some extent already in the sense-organ,
for example, in the pupil, but he points out that it actually becomes one in
‘the part that governs us’ (to hêgemonoun), where it is processed into ‘part-
less thoughts’. Since, just a few lines before this passage, he has argued that
what unifies a complex percept such as that of a face is the common sense,
and since the common sense cannot be located at the level of a specific sense-
organ such as the pupil, we can conclude that what he calls here ‘the part that
governs us’ is the common sense. Since for him only the rational soul is
capable of ‘governing us’ (see Enn. 4.4.18.10–15), however, we can also
conclude that this sense, in his view, is rational rather than non-rational,
as it is in Aristotle and Alexander.
By reading together the two passages quoted above from Enn. 4.7.6, we
can draw the following conclusions. Plotinus criticizes the Stoics’ view
that the subject of sensation is the hêgemonikon by arguing that a body
cannot fulfil this role. He observes, against the Stoics, that this subject
should be incorporeal, and he conceives of it on the model of the Aristotelian
27
Tou aisthanomenou in l. 38 is the subject and not, as Armstrong’s translation suggests, the
object of sensation.
 12 SARA MAGRIN

common sense. Yet he does not reject in toto the Stoics’ account. He accepts
their view that sensations are some kind of thoughts with propositional
content, and therefore, like them, he suggests that we have within our soul
a ‘governing part’ which is rational and which, being rational, is the
common subject of both sensations and thoughts. To accommodate this con-
ception of the subject of sensation, he transforms the Aristotelian common
sense. Aristotle’s common sense is merely a non-rational power that the
senses share in common, but Plotinus ‘lifts it up’ to the level of the rational
soul and turns it into a rational power that is ‘over and above’ the senses.
Being rational, this power has access to rational resources, such as previous
reasoning and concepts, which is why it can process our sensations into
‘thoughts’ (noêmata). In these thoughts percepts from the same or from
different modalities are ‘gathered together’ to produce a judgement about
a sensible thing of the form ‘This is sweet and yellow’ or ‘This is a face.’28
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Plotinus’s account of the subject of sensation, then, combines Stoic and Peri-
patetic elements. But what holds these distinct elements together is a genuinely
Platonic view, namely the view introduced by Plato in the Theaetetus that the
soul is the subject of both sensations and thoughts. To be sure, Plato there
does not ascribe sensations and thoughts to a special power of the soul nor
does he mention a common sense, but Plotinus ‘updates’ his remarks by
taking into consideration new philosophical developments. He is probably
encouraged in this by Plato’s own mention of an aisthanomenon at 185C
8. After having argued that we perceive ‘with’ the soul ‘through’ the senses,
at Theaet. 185C 4–8 Plato asks ‘through what’ (dia + gen.) ‘that which per-
ceives’ (to aisthanomenon) within ourselves perceives the features that sensible
things have in common (the so-called koina), such as the fact that they ‘are’ or
‘are not’ or that they are ‘different’. Since Plato does not think that these features
are themselves sensible things, this remark is puzzling, but Plotinus can solve
the puzzle by invoking his rational common sense. For this sense, in his
view, is a thing that perceives (an aisthanomenon in Alexander’s sense of a
common sense), and which, in perceiving, uses concepts such as ‘being’ and
‘different’ to formulate judgements about sensible things.

FROM COMMON SENSE TO INNER SENSE

Plotinus’s account of the subject of sensation is key to his account of con-

sciousness. To see how he develops the latter, however, we need to look
28
That sensations for Plotinus are judgements of this form has been shown by Emilsson, Plo-
tinus on Sense-Perception, 122. Although I agree with him that such judgements do not rest on
inference (124), in contrast to him, I think that the lack of inference does not rule out the invol-
vement of the rational soul. I suggest that, to tell whether something is sweet or bitter or a face,
for Plotinus we need to have access to rational resources such as previous reasoning and con-
cepts. On how we can do this without using inference, see Lorenz, Brute Within, 88–93.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 13

at some aspects of his epistemology. Knowledge for Plotinus is knowledge

of Forms, and we reach it by accessing Nous. This is a constantly thinking
intellect, the thoughts of which are the Forms themselves. Since he holds
that Nous is always present and active in our rational soul, Plotinus needs
to explain both how some intellectual activities can go on in our soul
without us being aware of them, and how we can become aware of them
so as to access the Forms and acquire knowledge of them. It is in this
context that we discover that the rational common sense, for him, is not
just the subject of sensation and thought, but is the subject of all the states
and activities of the soul. It is also in this context that he develops what I
think is an original account of consciousness based on an inner sense. The
most relevant passage is in Enn. 5.1.12, which I divide in three parts:
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1) How is it then that, though we have such great things [scil. Nous, but here
also the One and the Soul], we do not apprehend them (ouk antilambano-
metha), but for the most part are not engaged in such activities (argoumen
tais toiautais energeiais), and some of us are not active at all? [ … ] 2) For
not everything that is in the soul is immediately perceptible (aisthêton), but
it reaches us when it reaches perception (erchetai eis hêmâs, hotan eis aisthê-
sin iêi), but when a particular active part does not transmit <its activity> to that
which perceives (tôi aisthanomenôi), <that activity> has not yet come through
the whole soul (di’ holês psychês). So we do not yet know it because we are
together with the thing that is capable of perceiving and are not a part of the
soul (morion psychês) but the whole soul (hê hapasa psychê). And further-
more each living being in the soul (hekaston tôn psychikôn zôiôn)29 always
exercises (aei energei), always by itself (kath’ hauto), its own function, but
the knowledge <of this> (to de gnôrizein) comes about when there is trans-
mission (metadosis) and apprehension (antilêpsis). 3) Thus, if there is to be
apprehension (antilêpsis) of what is present in the soul in this way, one
must turn that which apprehends (to antilambanomenon) inwards and make
it pay attention (tên prosochên echein) there.
(Plot. Enn. 5.1.12.1–15)

In Part 1, Plotinus says that ordinarily we neither apprehend, nor are engaged
in, the activity of Nous in our soul. To explain how Nous can be active
without us knowing that it is, he invokes the activities of the parts of our
soul – the sensitive part, the appetitive part, and the spirited part – with
which, in ordinary life, we are familiar. In Part 2, Plotinus suggests that
Nous behaves analogously to the parts of our soul, and, by likening them
to distinct living beings, he explains that the parts of our soul act indepen-
dently of each other. From this observation he draws a first conclusion:
since we are not a part of the soul but ‘the whole soul’, he says, the fact
that a part is active does not imply that we are active with it, which is

29
I follow the MSS and read psychikôn zôiôn rather than adopting Ficino’s conjecture psychi-
kôn zôn. I see no compelling reason to emend the text.
 14 SARA MAGRIN

why we might ignore what a part does. To explain how we apprehend, and
become engaged in, the activities of our psychic parts, Plotinus introduces a
power that he calls ‘to aisthanomenon’. He suggests that, whenever the
activity of a part reaches to aisthanomenon, it goes ‘through the whole
soul’. Since he says that we are ‘the whole soul’, this means that it ceases
to be the activity of a part of our soul and becomes our own activity. In
Part 3, Plotinus applies these remarks to the case of Nous. Now he calls to
aisthanomenon ‘to antilambanomenon’, and he suggests that to make our
own the activity of Nous, and know that we are engaged in it, we need to
make to antilambanomenon pay attention to it.
Let us take a bird’s-eye view of this passage. To aisthanomenon here
seems to be the same power introduced in Enn. 4.7.6, meaning a rational
common sense. Not only is it called in the same way, namely ‘to aisthano-
menon’ and ‘to antilambanomenon’, it is also explicitly described as percep-
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tual.30 Its role, however, is expanded. Now it is not merely the subject of
sensation and ordinary thought, it is also the subject of our appetites, our
emotions, and our thoughts of the Forms; it is the subject of all the activities
of our soul. But its role is expanded also in another way. In Enn. 4.7.6 Plo-
tinus says that the rational common sense is capable of ‘apprehending’
(antilambanesthai) the information coming from the senses (see above
p. 10).31 But here he says, more precisely, that to aisthanomenon ‘appre-
hends’ the activities of our soul. This ‘apprehension’ is a higher-order appre-
hension, and precisely because it is a grasp of the inner states and activities of
our soul, rather than of intelligible or sensible things outside the soul, it cor-
responds to what today we call ‘consciousness’. Therefore to aisthanomenon
in Enn. 5.1.12 is not only the subject of all the activities of our soul, but is
also the subject which is conscious of those activities. When it perceives the
activities of our psychic parts, it turns our divided soul from a collection of
distinct living beings into a whole that engages in all its activities as single
‘I’. It is to this whole that we refer when we say that ‘we perceive’ or that ‘we
desire’, and so on. At the same time, however, to aisthanomenon also makes
this ‘I’ conscious of perceiving, desiring, and so on, by producing a form of
self-consciousness.32 By this I do not mean a form of awareness that has our

30
Atkinson (Plotinus, 246) thinks that to aisthanomenon here is the power of representation,
but this can hardly be the case, since the power of representation is not a perceptual power. Cf.
Enn. 1.4.10.6–19, where Plotinus says that, to become aware of Nous’ thoughts, we must
‘know as if perceptually’ their representations (or ‘images’). Please note that from now on I
will translate the term ‘aisthêsis’ by ‘sensation’ when it is used to refer to the grasp of a sen-
sible thing, and by ‘perception’ when it refers to the grasp of a state or activity of the soul.
31
For the meaning of ‘antilambanesthai’ and its history, see Kalligas, ‘Plotinus Against the
Corporealists on the Soul’, 101.
32
Aquila (‘Plotinus and the “Togetherness” of Consciousness’, 7–32) and Remes (Plotinus on
Self, 114) speak of consciousness in Plotinus as producing a whole. I depart from them insofar
as I connect the idea of the ‘whole’ produced by consciousness to the attempt to overcome the
division of the soul.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 15

self as its object, but rather one in which we relate the activities of our soul to
us, so as to become conscious of them as our own activities. This conscious-
ness requires attention, and, since it is produced by a rational power, it is
exclusively human.33
But – and this is the point I want to stress – if to aisthanomenon is a sense,
distinct from the senses and ‘above’ them, that attends to what goes on inside
the soul and makes us conscious of its activities by perceiving them, it seems
reasonable to conclude that it acts like an inner sense. While the ‘outer
senses’, that is, the special senses, perceive sensible things out there in the
world, this inner sense, by working analogously to them, targets the inner
activities of the soul and perceives those.34 We would like Plotinus to
signal the originality of his account of consciousness by coining a new
name for the perceptual power it rests on, but he prefers to use generic
expressions to refer to it, such as ‘to aisthanomenon’ or ‘to hêgemonoun’.
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Once, however, he does refer to it by using the expression ‘the inner

power of perception’. In Enn. 4.8.8, in an attempt to explain why we are
not always aware of Nous’ thoughts, he observes the following:

For that which is thought reaches us (erchetai eis hêmâs) when, by descend-
ing, it reaches perception (eis aisthêsin hêkêi); for we do not know everything
that comes about in any part (meros) of the soul, unless it reaches the whole
soul (eis holên tên psychên hêkêi) first; for instance, an appetite (epithymia) is
not known by us when it stays in the appetitive part (en tôi epithymêtikôi), but
when we apprehend it by the inner power of perception or else by the reason-
ing one or by both (hotan têi aisthêtikêi têi endon dynamei ê kai dianoêtikêi
antilabômetha ê amphô).
(Enn. 4.8.8.6–11)

In the first half of this passage, Plotinus says the same things he says in Enn.
5.1.12.1–15 (see above p. 14), namely that thought ‘reaches us’ when it
‘reaches perception’ and, through it, the whole soul. Then, again like in
Enn. 5.1.12.1–15, he uses as an example the activity of a part of the soul:
an appetite. But now he explains that an appetite is known by us only

33
On rational attention in Plotinus, see Brittain, ‘Attention Deficit in Plotinus and Augustine’,
237. Since it is a rational power, and the rational soul has direct access only to the sensitive
part, to aisthanomenon probably needs the collaboration of this part in order to attend to,
and perceive, the activities of the appetitive and spirited parts. I cannot enter into this
further issue here, but see Enn. 4.4.28.35–43.
34
Like any philosopher who maintains that the awareness of our mental states and activities
depends on a higher-order perception, Plotinus has to face the challenge of infinite regress.
He can adopt one of two strategies: he can either argue that the higher-order perception is
somehow intrinsic to the first-order activities it targets, by being an aspect of them, or maintain
that the regress stops at a higher-order activity to which awareness is intrinsic. I cannot enter
into this further issue here, but he never says that a further activity is required in order for us to
be conscious of our inner sense’s activity. This suggests that for him consciousness is intrinsic
to the activity of that power.
 16 SARA MAGRIN

when ‘we apprehend it by the inner power of perception (têi aisthêtikêi têi
endon dynamei) or else by the reasoning one or by both’. In the light of
Enn. 5.1.12.1–15, one would have expected him to say that an appetite is
known by us only when we become aware of it by to aisthanomenon. But
the similarity between the two passages leaves no doubt, I think, that ‘the
inner power of perception’ invoked here is the same thing as to aisthanome-
non.35 Here Plotinus grants some role in bringing about consciousness of an
appetite also to ‘reason’ (dianoia). Since he does not say, however, that
reason is always required for this task, we cannot conclude that the aware-
ness of our psychic activities, for him, rests on it. Rather his point seems
to be that inference may, sometimes, have a role to play in this context.
For instance, we can think of a case in which we are attending to a
problem and are not aware that we are hungry. The reason why we are not
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aware of being hungry, for Plotinus, is that our inner sense does not attend
to the activity of our appetitive part in the liver and the stomach. Since he
thinks that this sense is rational, he can argue that, by reflecting on the
fact that we have been sitting at the desk for hours, we may redirect its atten-
tion and become conscious of being hungry.
What we still need to understand is how exactly the inner sense turns the
activities of the soul into those of a single ‘I’ who is conscious of all of them.
Here is where Alexander’s interpretation of the common sense becomes
particularly relevant. In his commentary on the De sensu, while examining
Aristotle’s De sensu 7, 449a, Alexander says the following about the
common sense:

He [scil. Aristotle] shows both that the sensory power (hê aisthêtikê dynamis)
which apprehends (antilambanomenê) all that is sensible is one, and how it is
possible for it, being one, to perceive a number of different sensible things
simultaneously, reminding us of what was said about these things in the
books On the Soul. Since, then, the soul perceives sweet with one part and
one organ (allôi men merei te kai organôi), but <perceives> white with
another <part>, and with <another part> a different sensible thing, and it is
clear that <it does so> according to each of its different powers (kath’ hekas-
tên tôn diaphorôn dynameôn), he tries to find out whether there is some one
thing which both underlies these powers and uses them (chrômenon), and was
something whole (holon ti) <put together> out of these parts (ek tôn merôn
toutôn), or whether each power is apart <from the others>, and they have
no reference to some one thing [ … ]. To this he adds: ‘But it is necessary;
for the sensitive part is one.’
(Alex. In Sens. 162.16–163.4)

35
‘Inner’ here should not be understood as meaning ‘internal to the soul’ or ‘internal to the
soul-body compound’. ‘Inner’ here means ‘directed towards the inner activities of the soul’
(e.g. an appetite) as opposed to external, sensible objects. This is suggested both by what Plo-
tinus says in Enn. 5.1.12.1–15, on which 4.8.8 builds, and by his analogous remarks in Enn.
1.1.7.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 17

In this passage, Alexander introduces the special senses as ‘parts’ (merê) of

the sensory power of the soul (cf. Alex. De an. 40.4–110); the context shows
that this sensory power is the common sense. He explains that the soul does
not perceive ‘with the senses’ (dative of agent), but ‘according to the senses’
(kata + acc.). The soul perceives ‘according to the senses’, he says, in virtue
of a sensory power, meaning the common sense, that ‘uses’ them (chrôme-
non) and makes a ‘whole’ (holon) out of them. As these claims cannot be
found in Aristotle, they should be viewed as part of Alexander’s own contri-
bution to the analysis of the common sense. Alexander, however, seems to be
inspired by the Theaetetus. We may recall that Plato there introduces the soul
as the subject of sensation by arguing that we perceive ‘with the soul’ (dative
of agent) ‘through’ or ‘by means of’ the senses (dia + gen.), as if these were
tools or channels used by the soul in order to perceive (184C 5–9). Starting
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from these remarks, Alexander argues that, though the soul uses the senses,
the latter are parts ‘according to which’ (kata + acc.) the soul perceives,
rather than some kind of tools or channels ‘through which’ or ‘by means
of which’ (dia + gen.) it perceives. He grants that the soul is the subject of
sensation, but explains that it is such in virtue of the common sense. The
common sense uses the senses, he says, and, by using them, it makes a
whole out of them, meaning that it brings them together into one system.
In this way it enables the soul to perceive as one subject ‘according to’
each sense, so that the soul sees, for instance, according to sight, hears
according to hearing, and so on.
Now we can consider two passages, where, once again, Plotinus explains
how we become conscious of Nous’ thoughts. The first is from Enn. 1.1.11:

When we are children, it is what comes from the compound [scil. the soul-
body compound] that is active (energei) but little light shines on it from the
things above. But when it [scil. the light from above] is inactive on us
(hotan d’ argêi eis hêmâs), it acts in the direction of what is above; and it
acts on us (eis hêmâs de energei), when it reaches the middle (hotan mechri
tou mesou hêkêi). What then? Are ‘we’ not also before this <middle>?
Yes, but there must be apprehension (antilêpsin); for we do not always use
(chrômetha) all that we have (echomen), but <only> when we direct the
middle towards the things above or their opposites, or to what we actualize
(eis energeian agomen) from a power or a state.
(Plot. Enn. 1.1.11.1–9)

By taking as his starting point the case of children, who are too young to
engage in the activities of Nous ‘coming from above’, Plotinus introduces
a general observation. He remarks that, if we are to apprehend, meaning to
be conscious of, the activities of our soul, these activities must reach ‘the
middle’ (to meson), meaning the middle of our soul. This is because, to be
conscious of what goes on in our soul, we need ‘to use’ what we have
within the soul, and we use what we have within the soul by directing our
 18 SARA MAGRIN

‘middle’ to it. The passage is very similar in both language and content to
Enn. 5.1.12 (above p. 14), safe for one thing: rather than invoking an aistha-
nomenon, Plotinus now invokes a ‘middle’. The similarity between the two
passages, however, suggests that the latter is merely a new name for the
former, and that by ‘the middle’ here Plotinus means his inner sense. In
this passage, then, Plotinus tells us that the inner sense makes us conscious
of some activity of the soul or other by ‘using’ what we have in the soul. He
explains what he means by ‘using’ when he describes how we become con-
scious of Nous’ thoughts in Enn. 5.3.3.23–31:

But we shall not say that it belongs to the soul, but we shall say that it is our
Nous, being different from reason and standing above , but ours none the less,
even if we should not count it among the parts of the soul (tois meresi tês
psychês); or perhaps <we shall say> that it is ours and not ours; and this is
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why we use it and do not use it – while we always use reason – and it is
ours (hêmeteron) when we use it (chrômenôn), but not ours when we do
not use it (ou proschrômenôn). But what is this ‘using’ (to dê proschrêsthai
ti estin;)? Is it when we become it and speak like it? Rather, according to it
(kat’ ekeinon): for we are not Nous.
(Plot. Enn. 5.3.3.23–31)

Plotinus says that to make the activity of Nous our own, so as to consciously
engage in it, we need ‘to use’ Nous, and he points out that ‘to use’ Nous
means to act ‘according to it’ (kata + acc.). Then, a few lines after this
passage, he argues that, while the activities of Nous are ‘from above’,
those of the senses are ‘from below’, and we are ‘the dominant part’ (to
kyrion), a ‘middle’ (meson) between these two powers (ll. 35–38).
Plotinus’ remarks in the last two passages quoted above (from Enn. 1.1.11
and 5.3.3 respectively) are very obscure if we take them at face value. But if
we read them against the background of Alexander’s account of the common
sense in the commentary on the De sensu, then we can make good sense of
them. As we have seen (Enn. 5.1.12 above p. 14), for Plotinus we become
conscious of Nous’ activity in the same way in which we become conscious
of the activities of our psychic parts. Thus, if we become conscious of Nous’
thoughts when we ‘use’ Nous and act ‘according to’ it (kata + acc.), we also
become conscious of the activity of any part of the soul when we act ‘accord-
ing to’ that part. Since Alexander calls the senses ‘parts’ of the common
sense, and since he takes this sense to be able to make a whole out of
these parts, Plotinus uses his account to explain how the inner sense,
which he also calls ‘the middle’ or ‘the dominant part’, makes a whole out
of all the parts of the soul including Nous. He argues that, analogously to
Alexander’s common sense, the inner sense uses the parts of our soul and,
by using them, it makes the soul consciously engage in their activities as a
whole, though ‘according to each part’. This is why we are conscious of
Nous’ activity when we ‘use’ Nous and act ‘according to’ it, but the same
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 19

holds for any part of the soul. When the inner sense perceives the activity of
the sensitive part, we perceive and are conscious of perceiving, but we do so
according to the sensitive part; when it perceives the activity of the appetitive
part, we desire and are conscious of desiring, but we do so according to the
appetitive part, and so on.

THE DIVIDED SOUL OF REPUBLIC 4

If my remarks so far are correct, the Theaetetus is a key text for Plotinus’s
inner sense account of consciousness. Plotinus does not develop his
account on the basis of that dialogue nor does he offer a line by line analysis
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of what Plato says there about the subject of sensation and thought. His inner
sense account of consciousness is motivated by philosophical concerns, but
he uses the Theaetetus to find inspiration for how to examine and answer
those concerns. At the same time, by reading that dialogue in the light of
new philosophical insights, such as those of the Stoics and of Alexander,
he also ‘updates’ it, thus showing its relevance for the philosophical
debates of his time. This said, however, as Enn. 5.1.12 shows, Plotinus’s
account of the inner sense is mainly motivated by the need to explain how
a divided soul can be the conscious subject of all its activities, and it rests
on the idea that the soul can act as a whole ‘according to’ (kata + gen.) its
parts. Since in the Theaetetus there is no mention at all of parts of the
soul, it follows that that dialogue cannot be Plotinus’s only source of inspi-
ration. As we have seen, Plotinus develops his conception of the parts of the
soul starting from Galen’s analysis of tripartition in PHP. Like Galen, he
mostly draws from Plato’s anatomical remarks in the Timaeus, but, unlike
Galen, he never explicitly addresses Plato’s account of tripartition in Repub-
lic 4. We have no reason to think that he intends to reject that account. On the
contrary, precisely because he follows Galen, it is reasonable to infer that he
uses the Timaeus to explain, and expand on, what Plato says about triparti-
tion in Republic 4. What is notable is that, in Republic 4, Plato does use the
same kind of ‘according to’ formulae that Plotinus employs in his analysis of
the inner sense. We should therefore have a closer look at that book.
On most readings, in Republic 4 Plato introduces the parts of the soul as
some kind of ‘agent-like’ entities that are the subjects of distinct psychologi-
cal states and activities.36 At times, however, he says that it is ‘we’ who
think, desire, and so on (e.g. 436A 8-B 2), and he ascribes the states and
activities of the parts of the soul to the whole soul (e.g. 439D 4–8, 440A
11–13). This suggests that he views the soul as a whole, rather than its
parts, as the ultimate subject of all our psychological states and activities.
36
For this interpretation, see Irwin, Plato’s Ethics, 217–8; Bobonich, Plato’s Utopia Recast,
253–4; Lorenz, Brute Within, 27; and Brown, ‘Unity of the Soul in Plato’s Republic’, 62.
 20 SARA MAGRIN

The problem is that he never explains how this can be the case.37 He intro-
duces tripartition with the following question:

[Socrates] But now this is hard: do we do each of these things with the same
thing or, as there are three things, do we do one thing with one and one with
another? Do we learn with one <part of ourselves>, get angry with another
<part>, and with some third <part> desire the pleasures of food, drink, sex,
and all those that are closely akin to them? Or do we act with the whole of
our soul (holêi têi psychêi) in each of these cases, when we set out after some-
thing?
(Plat. Rep. 4, 436A 8-B 2)

To answer this question, he establishes a general principle, the so-called Prin-

ciple of Opposites, which says that the same thing cannot do or suffer oppo-
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sites ‘according to the same thing’ or ‘in the same respect’ (kata tauton), ‘in
relation to the same thing’ (pros tauton), and ‘at the same time’ (hama)
(436B 8–10). Then he applies this principle to the analysis of psychological
conflict. In cases of psychological conflict, the soul might seem to have both
a desire and an aversion for the same thing, according to the same thing, and
at the same time. But Plato argues that the Principle of Opposites bars this
conclusion, and he argues that the soul has three different parts, each of
which is a distinct source of motivation for action. Having divided the
soul into three parts, he concludes that we learn with the rational part, we
get angry with the spirited part, and we pursue the pleasures of drink,
food, and sex with the appetitive part. On what is generally considered the
standard reading, the division of the soul enables Plato to maintain that, in
case of conflict, the soul as a whole has a desire and an aversion in relation
to the same thing and at the same time but in different respects, namely ‘in
respect of’, or ‘according to’ (kata + acc.), a different ‘part’.38 Against this
reading, however, stands Plato’s insistence on the parts being distinct
‘agent-like’ subjects of their activities. How can the soul as a whole be the
subject that acts according to its different parts, one might ask, when these
parts are said to be the subjects of their own activities?39
As we have seen, Plotinus is committed to the view that the parts of the
soul are distinct, ‘agent-like’ subjects, since in Enn. 5.1.12 (above p. 14)
he even likens them to autonomous living beings, each of which is
engaged in its own activity. He devises his account of the inner sense pre-
cisely in the attempt to overcome the problem of explaining how the soul
can be the single subject of all its activities despite having ‘agent-like’
parts. Furthermore, he thinks that a key step towards the solution of this

37
As noted by Brown, ‘Unity of the Soul in Plato’s Republic’, 53, it is only recently that scho-
lars have begun to attend to this difficulty, see Bobonich, Plato’s Utopia Recast, 254–5;
Lorenz, Brute Within, 27–8; and Brown, ‘Unity of the Soul in Plato’s Republic’, 65–73.
38
See Irwin, Plato’s Ethics, 204.
39
See Lorenz, Brute Within, 24–8.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 21

problem consists in saying that, when the inner sense perceives the activity
of a part, the soul acts as a whole but ‘according to’ (kata + acc.) that part.
Although this suggestion can only be speculative, I think the evidence we
have suggests that Plotinus engages with Republic 4 when he develops his
account of the inner sense, and that his account aims, at least in part, to
explain how the divided soul of Republic 4 can be a single, conscious
subject of all its activities. For Plotinus can argue that the parts of the soul
can be both ‘agent-like’ subjects and respects ‘according to which’ the
soul acts. He can says that they behave like independent ‘agent-like’ subjects
when the inner sense does not attend to, and thus does not perceive, their
activities, while he can maintain, with the standard reading, that they are
respects ‘according to which’ the soul acts when the inner sense attends
to, and perceives, their activities.40 If this suggestion is on the right track,
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then we can conclude that Plotinus approaches Republic 4 in the same

way in which he approaches the Theaetetus. He reads Republic 4 to find
inspiration for solving a philosophical problem, but also in order to
‘update’ its interpretation in the light of new philosophical insights. The
new philosophical insight, in this case, is Alexander’s observation that the
soul can act ‘according to’ its parts, while remaining a single subject of its
activities. Alexander makes this observation in the context of the parts of
the sensory power, but as Plotinus expands the role of this power he
applies it to the larger context of the parts of the soul.
To conclude, Plotinus holds that the soul is one substance, but thinks that
this substance is complex. He maintains that the embodied soul has parts that
act like autonomous living beings, and he claims that the rational soul is
‘above’ them, and therefore, to some extent, separate from them. To
explain how the soul as a whole can be the subject of all the activities of
its parts, he looks at the most powerful account of the unity of our psychic
life available to him, that of the Stoics. He argues that the soul has within
itself something like a hêgemonikon, which enables it to be the conscious
subject of all its activities, but he explains the functions of this hêgemonikon
by taking as a model the Aristotelian common sense as interpreted by Alex-
ander.41 If in Alexander the senses ‘converge upon’ the common sense like
lines upon the centre of a circle, in Plotinus the activities of all the parts of the
soul ‘converge upon’ the inner sense, which is the centre the soul. By per-
ceiving the activities of the parts of the soul, this sense makes the soul as
a whole engaged in, and conscious of, them, thus turning it from a divided
entity into a single, conscious subject: an ‘I’.

40
We should note, however, that, for Plotinus, the ‘part’, if we may call it thus, ‘according to
which’ the soul learns is Nous rather than reason.
41
It is worth noting that, according to Aëtius (SVF 2.852), the Stoics called ‘koinê aisthêsis’
the ‘internal touch’ by which ‘we apprehend’ (antilambanomen) ourselves. This ‘internal
touch’ probably is, or belongs to, the hêgemonikon. This might have encouraged Plotinus
to develop the Stoic notion of ‘the governing part’ in the light of Aristotle’s common sense.
 22 SARA MAGRIN

In recent years there has been a growing interest in ancient accounts of

consciousness and their influence on medieval and early modern philoso-
phers.42 Several early modern accounts rest on the view that conscious-
ness depends on an inner perception of our mental states and activities.
The origin of this view, however, is still obscure, and especially
obscure is the history of inner sense theories of consciousness, such as,
on most readings, that of Locke (Essay 2.1.4 and 19). These theories
may have emerged, in part, as an attempt to simplify the complex medie-
val theory of the so-called inner senses, which was gradually abandoned,
starting from the sixteenth century, because untenable on anatomical
grounds. Their roots, however, are traditionally traced back to Augustine,
and, via Augustine, to Aristotle’s common sense.43 In contrast to this tra-
ditional interpretation, recent studies have shown that the origin of inner
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sense theories of consciousness is to be examined in the light of a

much larger context, which, in antiquity, includes not just Augustine
and Aristotle, but also the Stoics.44 Plotinus’ influence on early modern
accounts of consciousness is well known, and his mention of an ‘inner
power of perception’ in Enn. 4.4.8 has been noticed.45 Yet scholars
tend to exclude any connection between his views on consciousness and
the development of early modern inner sense theories.46 Of course I am
not suggesting here that Plotinus’ account of the inner sense is the ante-
cedent of early modern inner sense theories of consciousness; much more
should be said to justify that conclusion. But I hope that my remarks will
give us some reasons for reconsidering his role in their history. If they are
correct, in fact, they show that he develops a line of interpretation of the
Aristotelian common sense that so far has gone unnoticed, and that he
builds on it an elaborate account of human consciousness that, similarly
to most early modern inner sense accounts, rests on a higher-order
perception.

Submitted 5 July 2014; revised 20 November 2014 and 12 April 2015;

accepted 22 April 2015
University of California, Berkeley
Université du Québec à Montréal

42
For a summary, see the excursus on the inner sense(s) in Caston, ‘Aristotle on Conscious-
ness’, 801–4 and Thiel, Early Modern Subject, 5–18.
43
See Wolfson, ‘Internal Senses in Latin’, 128–9, and, more recently, Thiel, ‘Varieties of Inner
Sense’, 58.
44
This is shown by Caston, ‘Aristotle on Consciousness’, 801–4. For the medieval debates, see
Toivanen, ‘Perceptual Self-awareness in Seneca’, 355–82.
45
See, esp., Thiel, ‘Cudworth and Seventeenth-Century Theories of Consciousness’, 87.
46
Thus, albeit tentatively, Caston, ‘Aristotle on Consciousness’, 802. That Plotinus’ con-
ception of consciousness is broadly similar to that of Locke is suggested, in contrast, by
Lloyd, ‘Nosce Teipsum and Conscientia’, 188–200.
 PLOTINUS ON THE INNER SENSE 23

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