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Endymion. But for a living being, if we eliminate action, and a
fortiori creative action, what remains save contemplation? It follows that the
activity of God, which is transcendent in blessedness, is the activity of contemplation;
and therefore among human activities that which is most akin to the divine activity of
contemplation will be the greatest source of happiness.
[8]
A further confirmation is that the lower animals cannot partake of happiness, because
they are completely devoid of the contemplative activity. The whole of the life of the
gods is blessed, and that of man is so in so far as it contains some likeness to the
divine activity; but none of the other animals possess happiness, because they are
entirely incapable of contemplation. Happiness therefore is co-extensive in its range with
contemplation: the more a class of beings possesses the faculty of contemplation, the more
it enjoys happiness, not as an accidental concomitant of contemplation but as inherent in
it, since contemplation is valuable in itself. It follows that happiness is some form of
contemplation.
[9]
But the philosopher being a man will also need external well—being, since man's
nature is not self—sufficient for the activity of contemplation, but he must
also have bodily health and a supply of food and other requirements.