文/罗伯特·斯蒂文森
译/叶子南
It seems as if a great deal were attainable in a world where there are
so many marriages and decisive battles, and where we all, at certain hours
of the day, and with great gusto and despatch, stow a portion of victuals
finally and irretrievably into the bag which contains us. And it would seem
also, on a hasty view, that the attainment of as much as possible was the
one goal of man’s contentious life. And yet, as regards the spirit, this is but
a semblance. We live in an ascending scale when we live happily, one thing
leading to another in an endless series. There is always a new horizon for
onward-looking men, and although we dwell on a small planet, immersed
in petty business and not enduring beyond a brief period of years, we are
so constituted that our hopes are inaccessible, like stars, and the term of
hoping is prolonged until the term of life. To be truly happy is a question
of how we begin and not of how we end, of what we want and not of
what we have. An aspiration is a joy forever, a possession as solid as a
landed estate, a fortune which we can never exhaust and which gives us
year by year a revenue of pleasurable activity. To have many of these is to
be spiritually rich.
Life is only a very dull and ill-directed theatre unless we have some interests in the piece; and to those who have neither art nor science, the world is a mere arrangement of colours, or a rough footway where they may very well break their shins. It is in virtue of his own desires and curiosities that any man continues to exist with even patience, that he is charmed by the look of things and people, and that he wakens every morning with a renewed appetite for work and pleasure. Desire and curiosity are the two eyes through which he sees the world in the most enchanted colours: it is they that make women beautiful or fossils interesting: and the man may squander his estate and come to beggary, but if he keeps these two amulets he is still rich in the possibilities of pleasure. Suppose he could take one meal so compact and comprehensive that he should never hunger anymore; suppose him, at a glance, to take in all the features of the world and allay the desire for knowledge; suppose him to do the like in any province of experience — would not that man be in a poor way for amusement ever after?
人生只是一出枯燥的戏文，编导得又十分拙劣，要想让人生不乏味，我们就得对这出戏文兴致勃勃。一个人若无艺术爱好，又缺科学头脑，世界便只是五颜六色的组合，或可比为崎岖的旅程，让人历尽坎坷。但正因有了欲望和好奇，人才能永远耐心地活下去， 才能见物而喜，遇人而乐，才能在晨起时重新激起想工作、要欢乐的冲动。欲望和好奇是两只眼睛，人通过它们观看世界，世界于是也色彩纷呈。正因有了欲望和好奇，女人才能美得倾国倾城，岩石竟会让人兴趣盎然。人可倾家荡产，沦为乞丐，可只要有这两样财宝，他就仍可能有无限的欢乐。假如一个人可以饱食一餐，便不再饥肠辘辘，看上一眼就饱览大千，消解求知的欲望，假如万事皆能这样一劳永逸，是否那人便再难有乐趣兴致可言？
One who goes touring on foot with a single volume in his knapsack reads with circumspection, pausing often to reflect, and often laying the book down to contemplate the landscape or the prints in the inn parlour; for he fears to come to an end of his entertainment, and be left companionless on the last stages of his journey. A young fellow recently finished the works of Thomas Carlyle, winding up, if we remember aright, with the ten note-books upon Frederick the Great. “What!” cried the young fellow, in consternation, “is there no more Carlyle? Am I left to the daily papers?” A more celebrated instance is that of Alexander, who wept bitterly because he had no more worlds to subdue. And when Gibbon had finished the DECLINE AND FALL, he had only a few moments of joy; and it was with a “sober melancholy” that he parted from his labours.
一个人徒步旅行，行囊中仅一册书，他有意细读慢品，时而止步沉思，时而放下书本，去看周遭的景物或客栈墙上的名画，生怕走到兴致的尽头，在旅途的最后一程无书陪伴。一位年轻人最近读完了托马斯·卡莱尔的作品，若我记得没错，他读毕《腓特烈大帝》时的笔记已有十本。这位年轻人惊异地哀叹：“怎么？再没有卡莱尔了？难道我只能每天去读报纸？”名人也一样，亚历山大因再无天下可征服，居然失声痛哭；吉本写完《罗马帝国衰亡史》后快乐的心绪仅续片刻，封笔脱稿那一瞬间心中尽是“清冷的悲哀”。
Happily we all shoot at the moon with ineffectual arrows; our hopes are set on inaccessible El Dorado; we come to an end of nothing here below. Interests are only plucked up to sow themselves again, like mustard. You would think, when the child was born, there would be an end to trouble; and yet it is only the beginning of fresh anxieties; and when you have seen it through its teething and its education, and at last its marriage, alas! it is only to have new fears, new quivering sensibilities, with every day; and the health of your children’s children grows as touching a concern as that of your own. Again, when you have married your wife, you would think you were got upon a hilltop, and might begin to go downward by an easy slope. But you have only ended courting to begin marriage. Falling in love and winning love are often difficult tasks to overbearing and rebellious spirits; but to keep in love is also a business of some importance, to which both man and wife must bring kindness and goodwill. The true love story commences at the altar, when there lies before the married pair a most beautiful contest of wisdom and generosity, and a life-long struggle towards an unattainable ideal. Unattainable? Ay, surely unattainable, from the very fact that they are two instead of one.
我们弯弓射月，纵然徒劳，却射得乐此不疲；我们将希望设在那无法企及的“黄金国”；于是此生前行的路就永无止境。兴致与希望恰如芥菜收种不断，循环不息。你也许认为，孩子降生，麻烦就此结束。但新的焦虑却刚刚开始；孩子要成长，要念书，最后还要结婚，哪一步不牵动你的心？每日都有新的惶恐，都有新的焦虑不安，孙辈的健康让你担心，不亚于你担心自己的健康。你和妻子步入婚姻殿堂，本以为那是人生巅峰，从峰上下来的路定能走得轻松。但那只是结束了恋爱，开始了婚姻。坠入爱河、赢得芳心对于高傲自大的人并非易事，可要让爱情常驻也是要事一桩，为此夫妻彼此都要相敬如宾。真正的爱情始于圣坛，一路上夫妻两人做一场绝妙的竞争，看谁更智慧，看谁更大度，他们一生都在朝不可企及的目标奋进。不可企及？没错，是不可企及，因为夫妻毕竟是两人而非一体。
“Of making books there is no end,” complained the Preacher; and did not perceive how highly he was praising letters as an occupation. There is no end, indeed, to making books or experiments, or to travel, or to gathering wealth. Problem gives rise to problem. We may study for ever, and we are never as learned as we would. We have never made a statue worthy of our dreams. And when we have discovered a continent, or crossed a chain of mountains, it is only to find another ocean or another plain upon the further side. In the infinite universe there is room for our swiftest diligence and to spare. It is not like the works of Carlyle, which can be read to an end. Even in a corner of it, in a private park, or in the neighbourhood of a single hamlet, the weather and the seasons keep so deftly changing that although we walk there for a lifetime there will be always something new to startle and delight us.
“著书之事，永无止境。”传道者不无抱怨地说，没有意识到他把文字生涯看得那么高尚。确实著书没有止境，试验、游历、聚财也没有止境。一个问题引出另一个问题。我们尽可以读书不倦，但仍不能饱学如愿。我们竖起的雕像，总比不上梦中那座更令人向往。我们发现了一个大陆，跨越了一片峻岭，却看见横在眼前的是又一块大陆，又一片汪洋。在这个无穷的宇宙中，最勤勉的人也大有进步的空间。这不同于卡莱尔的著作可以读完。即便是在宇宙的一隅，在幽幽的庭园里，独立的村落旁，仍可见时序更迭气候万千，就算一生漫步其间，新事仍可层出不穷，我们仍会惊喜不断。
There is only one wish realisable on the earth; only one thing that can be perfectly attained: Death. And from a variety of circumstances we have no one to tell us whether it be worth attaining.
地球上只有一个愿望可以实现，那个能圆满实现的愿望便是死亡。死亡的例子众多各异，但却无人告诉我们死亡是否为一值得实现的理想。
A strange picture we make on our way to our chimaeras, ceaselessly marching, grudging ourselves the time for rest; indefatigable, adventurous pioneers. It is true that we shall never reach the goal; it is even more than probable that there is no such place; and if we lived for centuries and were endowed with the powers of a god, we should find ourselves not much nearer what we wanted at the end. O toiling hands of mortals! O unwearied feet, travelling ye know not whither! Soon, soon, it seems to you, you must come forth on some conspicuous hilltop, and but a little way further, against the setting sun, descry the spires of El Dorado. Little do ye know your own blessedness; for to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour.
我们向那子虚乌有的理想挺进，一路上绘一幅非比寻常的自画像，画中的探索者不停地前行，吝啬得不愿歇息，不屈不挠，勇往直前。不错，我们永远不会达到目标，甚至可能根本就没有那个目标。假若人寿数百年，还赋有神力无边，我们仍会发现，期盼中的终点和现在一样遥远。啊，凡人劳苦的双手！不倦的双腿，却不知道旅途走向何方！你似乎感到，马上就要登临峰顶一览四野，但衬着夕阳，在不远处，你却又见黄金国里楼宇的尖顶。你不知道自己是何其多福，因为满怀希望向前远比抵达目标更美好，而真正的成功恰在于辛劳。
摘自《斯蒂文森散文翻译与赏析》
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编辑：向程
复审：马浩岚
终审：陈小文
