我为何而活

节选自《罗素自传》序言

原文地址: 我为何而活：What I have lived for

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.

对爱情的渴望，对知识的追求，对人类苦难不可遏制的同情心，这三种纯洁而无比强烈的激情支配着我的一生。

These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the verge of despair.

这三种激情，就像飓风一样，在深深的苦海上，肆意地把我吹来吹去，吹到濒临绝望的边缘。

I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy —- ecstasy so great that I would have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy.

我寻求爱情，首先因为爱情给我带来狂喜，它如此强烈以致我经常愿意为了几小时的欢愉而牺牲生命中的其他一切。

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 cold unfathomable lifeless abyss.

我寻求爱情，其次是因为爱情可以解除孤寂一-那是一颗震颤的心，在世界的边缘，俯瞰那冰冷死寂、深不可测的深渊。

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.

我寻求爱情，最后是因为在爱情的结合中，我看到圣徒和诗人们所想像的天堂景象的神秘缩影。

This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what —- at last —- I have found.

这就是我所寻求的，虽然它对人生似乎过于美好，然而最终我还是得到了它。

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.

我以同样的热情追求知识，我想理解人类的心灵，我想了解星辰为何灿烂，我还试图弄懂毕达哥拉斯学说的力量，是这种力量使我在无常之上高踞主宰地位。我在这方面略有成就，但不多。

Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth.

爱情和知识只要存在，总是向上导往天堂。但是，怜悯又总是把我带回人间。

Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be.

痛苦的呼喊在我心中反响回荡，孩子们受饥荒煎熬，无辜者被压迫者折磨，孤弱无助的老人在自己的儿子眼中变成可恶的累赘，以及世上触目皆是的孤独、贫困和痛苦－－这些都是对人类应该过的生活的嘲弄。

I long to alleviate this evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.

我渴望能减少罪恶，可我做不到，于是我感到痛苦。

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。我觉得这一生是值得活的，如果真有可能再给我一次机会，我将欣然再重活-次。