【我为之而活的三种激情】by 伯特兰·罗素

博主很喜欢的一篇文章，来自英国的著名数学家、逻辑学家、哲学家伯特兰罗素的自传。罗素总结了他所为之生活的三种激情：对爱的渴求，对知识的追逐，以及对人类苦难的不可遏制的悲悯。

以下原文：

Three Passions I have Lived for

Bertrand Russell

Three passions, simply 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 wayward 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 my life for a few hours for 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 toward 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 world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, 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.

以下译文：

三种激情，虽然简单，却异常强烈，它们统治着我的生命，那便是：对爱的渴望，对知识的追求，以及对人类苦难的难以承受的同情。这三种激情像变化莫测的狂风任意地把我刮来刮去，把我刮入痛苦的深海，到了绝望的边缘。

我曾经寻找爱，首先是因为它能使我欣喜若狂——这种喜悦之情如此强烈，使我常常宁愿为这几个小时的愉悦而牺牲生命中的其他一切。我寻求爱，其次是因为爱能解除孤独——在这种可怕的孤独中，一颗颤抖的良心在世界的边缘，注视着下面冰凉、毫无生气、望不见底的深渊。我寻求爱还因为在爱的融合中，我能以某种神秘的图像看到曾被圣人和诗人想象过的天堂里未来的景象。这就是我所追求的东西，虽然这似乎对于人类的生命来说过于完美，但这确实是我最终发现的东西。

我怀着同样的激情去寻找知识，我曾渴望着理解人心，我曾渴望知道为何星星会闪烁，我还企图弄懂毕达哥拉斯所谓的用数字控制变化的力量，但在这方面，我只知道一点点。

爱的力量和知识的力量引我接近天堂，但同情之心往往又把我拉回大地。痛苦的哭泣回响、震荡在我的心中。饥饿的儿童，被压迫、受折磨的人们，成为儿孙们讨厌的包袱的、无助的老人们，充斥着整个世界的孤独的气氛，贫穷和苦难，所有这一切都是对人类生活原本该具有的样子所作的讽刺。我渴望消除一切邪恶，但我办不到，因为我自己也处于苦难之中。

这就是我的生活，我认为值得一过。而且，如果有第二次机会，我将乐意地再过一次。

伯特兰·罗素：

伯特兰·亚瑟·威廉·罗素[註 1]，第三代羅素伯爵（英语：Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell，1872年5月18日－1970年2月2日），OM，FRS，英国哲学家、数学家和逻辑学家，致力于哲学的大众化、普及化。[2] 在數學哲學上採取弗雷格的邏輯主義立場，認為數學可以化約到邏輯，哲學可以像邏輯一樣形式系統化，主張逻辑原子論。[3] （from Wikipedia）

2019年06月01日18:40:57
北京 清华园