双语美文：我为何而活

伯兰特·罗素（1872年5月18日－1970年2月2日）是二十世纪最有影响力的哲学家、数学家和逻辑学家之一，同时也是活跃的政治活动家，并致力于哲学的大众化、普及化。无数人将罗素视为这个时代的先知，而与此同时罗素的许多政治立场却又是十分有争议性的。1950年，罗素获得诺贝尔文学奖。

What I Have Lived For我为什么而活--- The Prologue¹ to Bertrand Russell's Autobiography² 伯兰特·罗素自传序言Three passion simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing³ for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable⁴ pity for the suffering of mankind. These passion like great wind have blown me hither and thither⁵, in a wayward course, over a great ocean of anguish⁶, reaching to the very verge⁷ of despair.

三种单纯而强烈的感情支配了我的一生：对爱情的渴望，对知识的追求，对人类苦难不可遏制的同情。这些感情如阵阵巨风，吹拂我动荡不定的生涯，吹过那深沉痛苦的海洋，直抵绝望的边缘。

I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy⁸ - ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness--that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim⁹ of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what--at last--I have found.

我寻求爱情，是因为它带来狂喜,它是如此令人心醉神迷，我常常会为了这种短暂的欢乐而牺牲余生。我寻求爱情，是因为它能摆脱孤寂,身临这种难耐的孤寂。一个人战栗的目光会瞥过尘世的边缘，直透那冰冷而不可测的无生命的深渊。我寻求爱情，还因为在爱的结合中，我看到了古今圣贤和诗人在梦想中描绘的天堂的神秘缩影。这正是我追求的境界，虽然它对于人类的生活可能显得过分美妙了，但它却是我最终在爱情中发现的东西。

With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend¹⁰ the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux¹¹. A little of thi but not much, I have achieved.

我以同样的激情追求知识。我想理解人类的心。我想知道星星为什么闪耀。我试图悟出毕达哥拉斯的力量，这力量使得数成为变动不居的世界的本质。在这方面我有所得，但所获并不很多。

Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate¹² in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressor helpless old people a burden to their son and the whole world of lonelines poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate¹³ this evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.

爱情和知识，在其最大的可能中，将我引升到天堂。但悲悯之心总是使我回到现实的大地。那些痛苦的呼号在我心中回荡。忍饥挨饿的小孩，被压迫者欺凌的不幸者，被子女视为可厌负担的孤苦无助的老人，以及这整个孤寂、贫穷和痛苦的世界，对于人类生活的理想，不啻是一种嘲讽。我切盼减缓苦难，但我无能为力，同时亦身受其害。

This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.

这就是我的一生，我没有白活。如果有谁再给我一次生活的机会，我将欣然接受这难得的赐予。