【知識衝浪】羅素散文《我的一生》

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老槍按：羅素是20世紀最偉大的人物之一，是哲學家，數理學家，文學家。1950年，還由於其文學成就，獲得了諾貝爾文學獎。
他的散文《我的一生》，深邃雋永，優美紓緩，值得一讀。 讀了或多版本都不大滿意，所以老槍試著自己翻譯一遍。

羅素散文《我的一生》

三種單純而強烈的激情支配著我的一生，那就是對於愛情的渴望，對於知識的追求，以及對於人類苦難無可忍受的憐憫。這些激情猶如狂風，把我在深深的苦海上麵，悠來蕩去，放逐到絕望的邊緣，使我的生活沒有定向。

我追求愛情，因為它叫我銷魂。銷魂的愛情猶如火苗與飛蛾，那瞬間的燦爛足以使我舍取一切而奮身向前。我追求愛情，又因為它能聊慰孤獨——那種幾近絕望的孤獨，如一個渺小無助的靈魂萬分恐慌地在世界的邊緣窺望那恒大垣古而冰冷無情的永恒。我追求愛情，還因為愛的結合使我在一種神秘的縮影中，提前看到了聖者和詩人幻想過的天堂。這就是我所追求的，盡管人的生活似乎還不配享有，但它的確是我最終找到的東西。

我以同樣的激情追求知識。我想理解人類的心靈。我想了解星辰為何燦爛。我還試圖弄懂畢達哥拉斯學說，它認為數是高居於感性流變之上的永恒力量。我在這方麵略有成就，但不多。

愛情和知識，但若出現，總是引我向上通往天堂。但是，憐憫又總是把我帶回人間。痛苦的呼喊在我心中回蕩。孩子們受饑荒煎熬，無辜者受壓迫者折磨，無助的老人被自己的兒子拋棄變成可惡的累贅，以及世上觸目皆是的孤獨、貧困和痛苦，這些都是對人類體麵生活的嘲弄。我渴望能減少罪惡，所以我也倍受煎熬。

這就是我的一生。我覺得這一生價有所值，如果再給我一次機會，我會欣然前往。

Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a way－ward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.

I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy — 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 rim 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.

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 apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved.

Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their sons, and the whole of loneliness, poverty， and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, and I too suffer.

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

From Russell' s Views on Life

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