最近，仔細閱讀英國哲學家羅素﹝ Bertrand Russell﹞所撰《我為什麼不是基督徒》﹝Why I Am Not A Christian﹞

http://users.drew.edu/~jlenz/whynot.html﹝原文﹞

http://www.atypical-christianity.com/exanti/russell.html﹝中譯文﹞

乙文，對於他在1957年出版的同名書中，對於不存在上帝的人生發表了感慨，顯示出他晚年對人生的悲觀看法。

如此看來，科學更使我們相信世界漫無目的，毫無意義。置身於這樣的世界，從今往後，我們的理想必須尋到安身之處，如果還能尋得到的話。人是原因的產物，不曉得末後的結局；人的出生、成長、希望與懼怕，愛與信念，只不過是原子的偶然排列組合；激情、英雄氣概、深邃的思想與強烈的情感都不能留住生命使之逃離死亡；世世代代的勞苦，所有的熱情，所有的靈感，所有輝煌的才華註定要在太陽系茫茫的死亡中消逝；人類成就的殿堂終歸要埋在宇宙廢墟的瓦礫中。所有這一切，即便不是無可非議，也是真實確鑿，任何哲學都無法否認。

今後人類靈魂的歸宿只能建立在這些真理及不屈服的絕望之基礎上。

此一看法，令人無限的沮喪，原來這樣的一個智者也對人生毫無答案。

...........................................................

【原文】  2010.6.8下載

 A Free Man's Worship  (By Bertrand Russell)

To Dr. Faustus in his study Mephistopheles told the history of the Creation, saying:

"The endless praises of the choirs of angels had begun to grow wearisome; for, after all, did he not deserve their praise? Had he not given them endless joy? Would it not be more amusing to obtain undeserved praise, to be worshipped by beings whom he tortured? He smiled inwardly, and resolved that the great drama should be performed.

"For countless ages the hot nebula whirled aimlessly through space. At length it began to take shape, the central mass threw off planets, the planets cooled, boiling seas and burning mountains heaved and tossed, from masses of cloud hot sheets of rain deluged the barely solid crust. And now the first germ of life grew in the depths of the ocean, and developed rapidly in the fructifying warmth into vast forest trees, huge germ springing from the damp mould, sea monsters breeding, fighting, devouring, and passing away. And from the monsters, as the play unfolded itself, Man was born, with the power of thought, the knowledge of good and evil, and the cruel thirst for worship. And Man saw that all is passing in this mad, monstrous world, that all is struggling to snatch, at any cost, a few brief moments of life before Death's inexorable decree. And Man said: 'There is a hidden purpose, could we but fathom it, and the purpose is good; for we must reverence something, and in the visible world there is nothing worthy of reverence.' And Man stood aside from the struggle, resolving that God intended harmony to come out of chaos by human efforts. And when he followed the instincts which God had transmitted to him from his ancestry of beasts of prey, he called it Sin, and asked God to forgive him. But he doubted whether he could be justly forgiven, until he invented a divine Plan by which God's wrath was to have been appeased. And seeing the present was bad, he made it yet worse, that thereby the future might be better. And he gave God thanks for the strength that enabled him to forgo even the joys that were possible. And God smiled; and when he saw that Man had become perfect in renunciation and worship, he sent another sun through the sky, which crashed into Man's sun; and all returned again to nebula.

"Yes,' he murmured, 'it was a good play; I will have it performed again.'"

Such, in outline, but even more purposeless, more void of meaning, is the world which Science presents for our belief. Amid such a world, if anywhere, our ideals henceforward must find a home. That man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins -- all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul's habitation henceforth be safely built.

如此看來，科學更使我們相信世界漫無目的，毫無意義。置身於這樣的世界，從今往後，我們的理想必須尋到安身之處，如果還能尋得到的話。人是原因的產物，不曉得末後的結局；人的出生、成長、希望與懼怕，愛與信念，只不過是原子的偶然排列組合；激情、英雄氣概、深邃的思想與強烈的情感都不能留住生命使之逃離死亡；世世代代的勞苦，所有的熱情，所有的靈感，所有輝煌的才華註定要在太陽系茫茫的死亡中消逝；人類成就的殿堂終歸要埋在宇宙廢墟的瓦礫中。所有這一切，即便不是無可非議，也是真實確鑿，任何哲學都無法否認。﹝中譯文初稿‧此節摘自網路﹞

How, in such an alien and inhuman world, can so powerless a creature as Man preserve his aspirations untarnished? A strange mystery it is that Nature, omnipotent but blind, in the revolutions of her secular hurryings through the abysses of space, has brought forth at last a child, subject still to her power, but gifted with sight, with knowledge of good and evil, with the capacity of judging all the works of his unthinking Mother. In spite of death, the mark and seal of the parental control, Man is yet free, during his brief years, to examine, to criticise, to know, and in imagination to create. To him alone, in the world with which he is acquainted, this freedom belongs; and in this lies his superiority to the resistless forces that control his outward life.

在這樣一個奇特無人性的世界，像人類這樣無力的生物如何能保有他們的渴望不受敗壞？大自然，全能但又盲目的，從深遠空無的宇宙中急速演化最後巨變產生出一個孩子-人類，是一件奇特難解的奧秘；這個孩子仍然受制於他母親的無邊力量，但被賦了對事物的見解、分別善惡的知識、及評斷他這位大自然母親一切傑作的能力。儘管死亡和大自然母親掌控人類的其他印記，人類在其短暫的一生，在檢視、批評、認識、及想像力的創造上，仍然是自由的。在人類所熟悉的這個世界，上述自由只屬於人類所獨有；雖然大自然不可抗拒的力量控制著人類的外在生命，但他唯一超越此一力量的即是此一心靈上的自由。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

The savage, like ourselves, feels the oppression of his impotence before the powers of Nature; but having in himself nothing that he respects more than Power, he is willing to prostrate himself before his gods, without inquiring whether they are worthy of his worship. Pathetic and very terrible is the long history of cruelty and torture, of degradation and human sacrifice, endured in the hope of placating the jealous gods: surely, the trembling believer thinks, when what is most precious has been freely given, their lust for blood must be appeased, and more will not be required. The religion of Moloch -- as such creeds may be generically called -- is in essence the cringing submission of the slave, who dare not, even in his heart, allow the thought that his master deserves no adulation. Since the independence of ideals is not yet acknowledged, Power may be freely worshipped, and receive an unlimited respect, despite its wanton infliction of pain.

尚未開化的野蠻人，像我們自己，在大自然力量面前感到自己的渺小無力；但在他自己身上又無任何東西，較大自然的力量，更值得他尊敬，因此他願意匍伏在神面前，也不質疑這些神是否值得崇拜。可悲又非常可怖的是，人類長遠以來的殘酷和折磨的歷史，一個墮落退化、以人的生命為犧牲祭神的歷史，一個人類長期忍受痛苦、希望安撫好忌妒的神的歷史：肯定的，懷著顫慄之心的信神者相信，當最珍貴的生命已然奉獻給神，嗜血的神祇獲得滿足後就不會再要求更多的。閃米族的神Moloch的宗教﹝信徒以兒子為祭品﹞---籠統地可稱之為一種教義---在本質上是奴隸畏縮的臣服；奴隸不敢，甚至在心中，允許這個念頭存在-即他的主人﹝神﹞不配他的阿諛讚美。既然理想的獨立存在尚未受到承認，大自然的無邊力量得以受到自由地崇拜，並得到無限的景仰，儘管這個大自然力量毫無緣由地施加痛苦於人類。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

But gradually, as morality grows bolder, the claim of the ideal world begins to be felt; and worship, if it is not to cease, must be given to gods of another kind than those created by the savage. Some, though they feel the demands of the ideal, will still consciously reject them, still urging that naked power is worthy of worship. Such is the attitude inculcated in God's answer to Job out of the whirlwind: the divine power and knowledge are paraded, but of the divine goodness there is no hint. Such also is the attitude of those who, in our own day, base their morality upon the struggle for survival, maintaining that the survivors are necessarily the fittest. But others, not content with an answer so repugnant to the moral sense, will adopt the position which we have become accustomed to regard as specially religious, maintaining that, in some hidden manner, the world of fact is really harmonious with the world of ideals. Thus Man creates, God, all-powerful and all-good, the mystic unity of what is and what should be.

但是逐漸地，當倫理學成長茁壯，理想世界的主張開始為人們所感覺到；而且崇拜，若非即將中止，也必須給與另一類的神，而不是尚未開化的野蠻人所創造出來的神。若干人，雖他們感受到理想的召喚，仍然有意識地排斥這些召喚，仍然力持己見：即赤裸裸的力量是值得崇拜。這樣的態度，也根植在舊約聖經《約伯記》中上帝從其駕馭的旋風中向約伯的祈禱所作出的回答﹝約伯記38-41﹞：神的力量﹝即：神是“全能的”omnipotence﹞和知識﹝即：神是“全知的”omniscience﹞而非神的慈善，是被公開宣示讚美的；神的慈善毫無提及。這樣的態度，也是當今那些將倫理道德立基於“求生存”之上的人的態度，他們主張：“適者生存”。但是，也有其他人，不滿意如此一個排斥道德感的答案，將採取一個我們已習於視為特殊的宗教立場，它以某種隱諱的方式主張：“真實的世界”﹝即：所謂“適者生存”的世界﹞是確能與“理想的世界”調和的。因此，人類創造出一個上帝，一個“全能”又“全善”的上帝，一個由“應然”和“實然”兩者神秘的結合體。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

But the world of fact, after all, is not good; and, in submitting our judgment to it, there is an element of slavishness from which our thoughts must be purged. For in all things it is well to exalt the dignity of Man, by freeing him as far as possible from the tyranny of non-human Power. When we have realised that Power is largely bad, that man, with his knowledge of good and evil, is but a helpless atom in a world which has no such knowledge, the choice is again presented to us: Shall we worship Force, or shall we worship Goodness? Shall our God exist and be evil, or shall he be recognized as the creation of our own conscience?

但“真實的世界”畢竟是非善的；而且，在提出我們對這世界的判斷意見時，我們必須將奴性的因素從我們的思想中清除。因為在一切東西裏，提昇人類的尊嚴是好的，藉由盡可能把人類從無人性的力量的宰制中解放。當我們了解，﹝大自然﹞力量主要是壞的；人類具有善惡的知識，卻在一個沒有這種知識的世界中，就只是一個無助的原子，因而人類面對的選擇仍舊是：我們要崇拜力量，或我們要崇拜“善”？我們的“神”應該存在並且是“惡”的，抑或神應被我們視為我們自己良心或善惡觀念的創造者？﹝中譯文初稿﹞

The answer to this question is very momentous, and affects profoundly our whole morality. The worship of Force, to which Carlyle﹝Thomas Carlyle, 1795-1881英國的評論家‧歷史家﹞ and Nietzsche and the creed of Militarism have accustomed us, is the result of failure to maintain our own ideals against a hostile universe: it is itself a prostrate submission to evil, a sacrifice of our best to Moloch. If strength indeed is to be respected, let us respect rather the strength of those who refuse that false "recognition of facts" which fails to recognise that facts are often bad. Let us admit that, in the world we know, there are many things that would be better otherwise, and that the ideals to which we do and must adhere are not realised in the realm of matter. Let us preserve our respect for truth, for beauty, for the ideal of perfection which life does not permit us to attain, though none of these things meet with the approval of the unconscious universe. If Power is bad, as it seems to be, let us reject it from our hearts. In this lies Man's true freedom: in determination to worship only the God created by our own love of the good, to respect only the heaven which inspires the insight of our best moments. In action, in desire, we must submit perpetually to the tyranny of outside forces; but in thought, in aspiration, we are free, free from our fellowmen, free from the petty planet on which our bodies impotently crawl, free even, while we live, from the tyranny of death. Let us learn, then, that energy of faith which enables us to live constantly in the vision of the good; and let us descend, in action, into the world of fact,  with that vision always before us.

對於這個問題的回答是非常關鍵性的，而且深深地影響我們整個的倫理道德體系。力量的崇拜，Thomas Carlyle、尼采及黷武思想的信條都使我們對此熟悉，是緣於未能維持我們自己的理想以抵抗一個充滿敵意的世界的結果：這種對力量崇拜的本身就是一種對惡的匍伏投降，一種以人性中最好的東西向Moloch神進行“活人”獻祭。若力量的確要被尊重，那麼讓我們尊重那些拒絕錯誤而承認真實世界是壞的人的內在力量。讓我們承認，在這個我們所知的世界，有許多事情在另一種情況下會更好；讓我們承認，我們致力的且必須堅持的理想，無法在物質的領域內獲得實現。讓我們保有對真理、對美、對完美的重視，雖然生命不允許我們達致完善；雖然“真理”、“美”、“完善”三者任何一項都不受這個無意識的世界所允許。若力量是壞的，它看起來是如此，讓我們打從心底排斥它。人類真正的自由在於這個決心：僅對由我們自己對於“善”的愛慕所創造出來的神進行崇拜，僅對能啟發我們自己最完美時刻的洞察的天堂表達景仰。在行動上，在慾望上，我們必須永遠臣服於外在力量的暴虐控制；但在思想上，在抱負上，我們是自由的；不受制於我們同胞們的思想；不受制於這個我們肉體在其上無力地爬行的微小星球；甚至，當我們活著的時候，不受制於死神的暴虐控制。因此，讓我們學會信念的力量，使我們得以經常活在善的追求中；同時在行動上，讓我們在下到現實世界時，要將是項追求置於眼前。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

When first the opposition of fact and ideal grows fully visible, a spirit of fiery revolt, of fierce hatred of the gods, seems necessary to the assertion of freedom. To defy with Promethean constancy a hostile universe, to keep its evil always in view, always actively hated, to refuse no pain that the malice of Power can invent, appears to be the duty of all who will not bow before the inevitable. But indignation is still a bondage, for it compels our thoughts to be occupied with an evil world; and in the fierceness of desire from which rebellion springs there is a kind of self-assertion which it is necessary for the wise to overcome. Indignation is a submission of our thoughts, but not of our desires; the Stoic freedom in which wisdom consists is found in the submission of our desires, but not of our thoughts. From the submission of our desires springs the virtue of resignation; from the freedom of our thoughts springs the whole world of art and philosophy, and the vision of beauty by which, at last, we half reconquer the reluctant world. But the vision of beauty is possible only to unfettered contemplation, to thoughts not weighted by the load of eager wishes; and thus Freedom comes only to those who no longer ask of l ife that it shall yield them any of those personal goods that are subject to the mutations of Time.

當現實與理想的對立首度變得完全明顯時，一種激烈叛變的精神，一種強烈恨神祇的精神，對主張自由而言，似乎是必要的。以普羅米修士【註1】式的忠實堅定，對一個有敵意的世界進行挑釁；要隨時直視這個世界的邪惡【註2】，要隨時積極地恨這個世界的邪惡；對於外在力量的惡意所能施加的痛苦，不予拒絕，似乎是那些不準備向不可避免的事物屈服的人的責任。但憤怒的情感仍然是一種枷鎖，因為它使我們的思想被一個邪惡的世界所佔據；而且，在反抗所由產生的慾望炙情中，某種自我主張表白，對於智者而言是必須要去克服的事【註3】。憤怒的情感，是我們思想理智的一種臣服，而不是我們的欲望；而智慧所賴依存的斯多葛自由，只能在我們慾望的壓制臣伏裏被發現，而非在我們思想理智的壓制臣伏。從我們慾望的壓制臣伏裏，產生出認命態度的美德；從我們思想的自由裏，產生出現今世界的藝術與哲學，及對美的願景，藉此願景我們最後部分地重新征服這個世界。但是美的願景只有對不受箝制的沉思始有可能；對不受強烈慾望重壓的思想始有可能。因此，只有那些不再對生命有所求的人，才能擁有自由；生命所能生出的任何好東西是受制於時間的變化。

【註1】：In Greek mythology, Prometheus (Ancient Greek: Προμηθεύς, "forethought")^[1] is a Titan, the son of Iapetus and Themis, and brother to Atlas, Epimetheus and Menoetius. He was a champion of human-kind known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals.^[2] Zeus then punished him for his crime by having him bound to a rock while a great eagle ate his liver every day only to have it grow back to be eaten again the next day. His myth has been treated by a number of ancient sources, in which Prometheus is credited with – or blamed for – playing a pivotal role in the early history of humankind.

【註2】若記憶沒錯的話，羅素曾說這是快樂的要訣。

【註3】印度出家修行者；甚至有一學派信徒自願讓車輪輾過，求死，以斷絕慾望。

﹝中譯文初稿﹞

Although the necessity of renunciation is evidence of the existence of evil, yet Christianity, in preaching it, has shown a wisdom exceeding that of the Promethean philosophy of rebellion. It must be admitted that, of the things we desire, some, though they prove impossible, are yet real goods; others, however, as ardently longed for, do not form part of a fully purified ideal. The belief that what must be renounced is bad, though sometimes false, is far less often false than untamed passion supposes; and the creed of religion, by providing a reason for proving that it is never false, has been the means of purifying our hopes by the discovery of many austere truths.

雖然棄絕的必要性是世界存在邪惡的証據，然而基督宗教在宣教時，顯現出一種超越普羅米修士背叛的哲學智慧。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

But there is in resignation a further good element: even real goods, when they are unattainable, ought not to be fretfully desired. To every man comes, sooner or later, the great renunciation. For the young, there is nothing unattainable; a good thing desired with the whole force of a passionate will, and yet impossible, is to them not credible. Yet, by death, by illness, by poverty, or by the voice of duty, we must learn, each one of us, that the world was not made for us, and that, however beautiful may be the things we crave, Fate may nevertheless forbid them. It is the part of courage, when misfortune comes, to bear without repining the ruin of our hopes, to turn away our thoughts from vain regrets. This degree of submission to Power is not only just and right: it is the very gate of wisdom.

但是，認命的態度，更有一種好的元素：即使是真實好的東西，當它們是無法得到的，就不應焦燥地慾望它。每一個人遲早要面對“大出離”【註：Buddha，29歲，從城的東門，即“大出離門”(Great Renunciation Gate) 出發，騎馬跳過牆，開始其悟道之旅的，時當公元前594年七月月圓時。】對於年輕人而言，沒有什麼是達不到的；以全心全意去想望的，但事實上是不可能得到的一個美好東西，對年輕人而言，這是難以置信的。藉由死亡，藉由疾病，藉由貧窮，或責任的召喚，我們每一個人必須學習到：這個世界不是為我們創造的，而且我們所極度渴望的東西無論是多麼美好，但命運不允許我們得到。當不幸來臨時，要靠勇氣去忍受，而不對希望的破滅而哀號，同時把思想從空洞無益的悲嘆中挪開。在這種程度地臣伏於外在﹝命運﹞力量，不僅是正當的，而且是對的：這即是智慧的開端。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

But passive renunciation is not the whole of wisdom; for not by renunciation alone can we build a temple for the worship of our own ideals. Haunting foreshadowings of the temple appear in the realm of imagination, in music, in architecture, in the untroubled kingdom of reason, and in the golden sunset magic of lyrics, where beauty shines and glows, remote from the touch of sorrow, remote from the fear of change, remote from the failures and disenchantments of the world of fact. In the contemplation of these things the vision of heaven will shape itself in our hearts, giving at once a touchstone to judge the world about us, and an inspiration by which to fashion to our needs whatever is not incapable of serving as a stone in the sacred temple.

Except for those rare spirits that are born without sin, there is a cavern of darkness to be traversed before that temple can be entered. The gate of the cavern is despair, and its floor is paved with the gravestones of abandoned hopes. There Self must die; there the eagerness, the greed of untamed desire must be slain, for only so can the soul be freed from the empire of Fate. But out of the cavern the Gate of Renunciation leads again to the daylight of wisdom, by whose radiance a new insight, a new joy, a new tenderness, shine forth to gladden the pilgrim's heart.

When, without the bitterness of impotent rebellion, we have learnt both to resign ourselves to the outward rule of Fate and to recognise that the non-human world is unworthy of our worship, it becomes possible at last so to transform and refashion the unconscious universe, so to transmute it in the crucible of imagination, that a new image of shining gold replaces the old idol of clay. In all the multiform facts of the world -- in the visual shapes of trees and mountains an clouds, in the events of the life of man, even in the very omnipotence of Death -- the insight of creative idealism can find the reflection of a beauty which its own thoughts first made. In this way mind asserts its subtle mastery over the thoughtless forces of Nature. The more evil the material with which it deals, the more thwarting to untrained desire, the greater is its achievement in inducing the reluctant rock to yield up its hidden treasures, the prouder its victory in compelling the opposing forces to swell the pageant of its triumph. Of all the arts, Tragedy is the proudest, the most triumphant; for it builds its shining citadel in the very centre of the enemy's country, on the very summit of his highest mountain; from its impregnable watchtowers, his camps and arsenals, his columns and forts, are all revealed; within its walls the free life continues, while the legions of Death and Pain and Despair, and all the servile captains of tyrant Fate, afford the burghers of that dauntless city new spectacles of beauty. Happy those sacred ramparts, thrice happy the dwellers on that all-seeing eminence. Honour to those brave warriors who, through countless ages of warfare, have preserved for us the priceless heritage of liberty, and have kept undefiled by sacrilegious invaders the home of the unsubdued.

But the beauty of Tragedy does but make visible a quality which, in more or less obvious shapes, is present always and everywhere in life. In the spectacle of Death, in the endurance of intolerable pain, there is a sacredness, an overpowering awe, a feeling of the vastness, the depth, the inexhaustible mystery of existence, in which, as by some strange marriage of pain, the sufferer is bound to the world by bonds of sorrow. In these moments of insight, we lose all eagerness of temporary desire, all struggling and striving for petty ends, all care for the little trivial things that, to a superficial view, make up the common life of day by day; we see, surrounding the narrow raft illumined by the flickering light of human comradeship, the dark ocean on whose rolling waves we toss for a brief hour; from the great night without, a chill blast breaks in upon our refuge; all the loneliness of humanity amid hostile forces is concentrated upon the individual soul, which must struggle alone, with what of courage it can command, against the whole weight of a universe that cares nothing for its hopes and fears. Victory, in this struggle with the powers of darkness, is the true baptism into the glorious company of heroes, the true initiation into the overmastering beauty of human existence. From that awful encounter of the soul with the outer world, renunciation, wisdom, and charity are born; and with their birth a new life begins. To take into the inmost shrine of the soul the irresistible forces whose puppets we seem to be -- Death and change, the irrevocableness of the past, and the powerlessness of man before the blind hurry of the universe from vanity to vanity -- to feel these things and know them is to conquer them.

This is the reason why the Past has such magical power. The beauty of its motionless and silent pictures is like the enchanted purity of late autumn, when the leaves, though one breath would make them fall, still glow against the sky in golden glory. The Past does not change or strive; like Duncan, after life's fitful fever it sleeps well; what was eager and grasping, what was petty and transitory, has faded away, the things that were beautiful and eternal shine out of it like stars in the night. Its beauty, to a soul not worthy of it, is unendurable; but to a soul which has conquered Fate it is the key of religion.

The life of Man, viewed outwardly, is but a small thing in comparison with the forces of Nature. The slave is doomed to worship Time and Fate and Death, because they are greater than anything he finds in himself, and because all his thoughts are of things which they devour. But, great as they are, to think of them greatly, to feel their passionless splendour, is greater still. And such thought makes us free men; we no longer bow before the inevitable in Oriental subjection, but we absorb it, and make it a part of ourselves. To abandon the struggle for private happiness, to expel all eagerness of temporary desire, to burn with passion for eternal things -- this is emancipation, and this is the free man's worship. And this liberation is effected by a contemplation of Fate; for Fate itself is subdued by the mind which leaves nothing to be purged by the purifying fire of Time.

人類的生命，從外在觀察，與大自然的力量相比是微不足道的。奴隸﹝即：敬畏大自然的力量以致卑躬屈膝的人類﹞註定要崇拜“永恆的時間”和“命運”和“死亡﹝神﹞”，因為這三者比人類能夠在自身上所能發現的任何東西都偉大，而且，因為人類思想所涉及的一切東西也被這三者所涵蓋吞噬。但是，即使這三者如此偉大，人類若能以偉大的心靈去思考它們、去感受體會它們那種難以企及的特性，卻更偉大。而且，這樣的思想使我們成為自由人；我們在面對不可避免的命運時，不再像東方奴隸式地俯首屈服，反而，我們要吸收它，並讓它變成我們自己的一部分。要放棄爭取個人一己的幸福，要驅走人生所有短暫慾求的渴望，以熱情追求永恆事物---這就是心靈解放，這也是自由人的崇拜。而且，這種自由解放，經由對命運的沉思而達成；因為命運本身受到這樣的心靈的壓制：它不容時間的清洗之火有清洗的空間。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

United with his fellow-men by the strongest of all ties, the tie of a common doom, the free man finds that a new vision is with him always, shedding over every daily task the light of love. The life of Man is a long march through the night, surrounded by invisible forces, tortured by weariness and pain, towards a goal that few can hope to reach, and where none may tarry long. One by one, as they march, our comrades vanish from our sight, seized by the silent orders of omnipotent Death. Very brief is the time in which we can help them, in which their happiness or misery is decided. Be it ours to shed sunshine on their path, to lighten their sorrows by the balm of sympathy, to give them the pure joy of a never-tiring affection, to strengthen failing courage, to instil faith in hours of despair. Let us not weigh in grudging scales their merits and demerits, but let us think only of their need -- of the sorrows, the difficulties, perhaps the blindnesses, that make the misery of their lives; let us remember that they are fellow-sufferers in the same darkness, actors in the same tragedy with ourselves. And so, when their day is over, when their good and their evil have become eternal by the immortality of the past, be it ours to feel that, where they suffered, where they failed, no deed of ours was the cause; but wherever a spark of the divine fire kindled in their hearts, we were ready with encouragement, with sympathy, with brave words in which high courage glowed.

自由人，在與他的同胞間所有的聯繫中最堅強的---人類共同必死的命運，發現一個新的視界經常伴隨著他，把愛的光灑在每一天的工作上。人類的生命是一個在黑暗中的長征，受不可見的力量包圍，被勞苦和病痛折磨，走向一個極少人能希望企及的目標，且沒有一個人能長久停留在此世。ㄧ個接著一個，當他們向前行進，我們的同志先後從我們的眼中消失，被無邊力量的死神無聲的命令攫獲。我們的同胞一生中，我們能給予協助、且是決定他們幸福或悲慘的關鍵時刻非常短暫。讓它成為我們的事：在他們人生路途上灑上陽光，以同情的敷膏減輕他們不幸的遭遇，給予他們一個發自永不止息的同情關心所帶來的純粹喜悅，堅強其漸失的勇氣，在絕望的時刻逐漸灌輸以信心。讓我們不要用不情願的態度去衡量他們是否貢獻，而讓我們僅考量他們的需要、他們的不幸遭遇、他們的困難、甚至也許是造成他們生命悲慘的盲目無知；讓我們記得他們同是人類坎坷生命的一份子，同是人類悲劇的演員之一。而且，如此一來，當他們離世後，當他們的善與惡因過去成為永恆的記憶而成為永恆時，讓我們這樣感覺：不論他們在世時所遭受的痛苦或失敗，都不是因我們的行為所引起的；反而是，他們心中有一神聖熱情火花燃起 ，讓我們隨時給予鼓勵、同情及讓勇氣滋生的美好話語。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

Brief and powerless is Man's life; on him and all his race the slow, sure doom falls pitiless and dark. Blind to good and evil, reckless of destruction, omnipotent matter rolls on its relentless way; for Man, condemned to-day [sic] to lose his dearest, to-morrow himself to pass through the gate of darkness, it remains only to cherish, ere yet the blow falls, the lofty thoughts that ennoble his little day; disdaining the coward terrors of the slave of Fate, to worship at the shrine that his own hands have built; undismayed by the empire of chance, to preserve a mind free from the wanton tyranny that rules his outward life; proudly defiant of the irresistible forces that tolerate, for a moment, his knowledge and his condemnation, to sustain alone, a weary but unyielding Atlas, the world that his own ideals have fashioned despite the trampling march of unconscious power.

人的生命是短暫的、無力的；緩慢但確定將降臨在人類身上的死亡，無情且無望。大自然無邊的物質力量無情地向前輾行，無視善與惡、毫不留情地毀滅；對於人類而言，不是今天遭天譴失去至愛，就是明天自己步入死陰幽谷，在老天進一步施以打擊前，他唯一擁有的就是在其心中的崇高思想，而這些崇高的思想使人類短暫的一生顯得尊貴；人類，要全然蔑視這些受命運擺佈下、奴隸一般的懦弱恐懼，要在自己雙手所建立的殿堂上禮拜；人類，要無懼於機運之神，保有一顆自由的心靈，不受意外不幸暴虐的宰制；人類，要傲然地挑戰那些不可抵抗的外力，像希臘神祇Atlas一樣，雖然疲倦但不屈服地，獨立撐起這個以他自己的理想所建立的世界，不在乎無情的力量踐踏肆虐而來。﹝中譯文初稿﹞

附註﹝摘自網路﹞：

(1)   蘇格蘭文學冢卡來爾（Thomas Carlyle 1795～1881）說：「聖經乃是獨一無二的書，使人類幾千年來，得到真理的亮光，得到德性的培養，而且對於人生最奧秘的問題，得到圓滿的解答，這雖不能驗諸於表面的感覺，但已藉先知啟示，確是信而有徵，憑著靈性的眼，必能望見其福果。」「人類如無基督聖道，人類生活必十分悲慘，而且必趨滅亡！」「基督聖道，好像北極明星，永遠發光，黑夜愈深，地上愈暗，其光愈大！」

(2)   主力研究唯心主義英雄史觀的英國學者Carlyle在其著作《論英雄、英雄崇拜和歷史上的英雄業績》一書中說過，英雄是“民眾的領袖，是偉大的領袖，凡是一切普通人彈精竭慮要做或想要得到的一切事物都由他們去規範和塑造，從廣義上說，他們也就是創造者。”他甚至認為：“如果有一個偉人能揭示人生的神聖意義，那他就會以偉大的、堅韌必勝的信念去宣傳它，歌頌它，以致為它戰鬥和工作，英雄就此產生了。”

Thomas Carlyle 1795～1881

摘自網路