What I Have Lived For [🏛️公版经典 B2]
📖 阅读导读
本文选自伯特兰·罗素《自传》的序言，是广为流传的哲理散文。罗素概括支配自己一生的三种激情：对爱的渴求、对知识的求索、对人类苦难深切的悲悯。
爱与知识把人引向理想的高处，而悲悯又将作者拉回充满苦难的现实。全文结构清晰，比喻精彩，大量使用并列、让步句式。适合B2水平精读，非常适合模仿英语议论文、散文写作。
🇬🇧 英文原文
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 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 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 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 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 this 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.
🇨🇳 中文译文（本站自译）
三种朴素却无比强烈的激情，支配了我的一生：对爱的渴望，对知识的求索，以及对人类苦难难以遏制的怜悯。
这些激情如同狂风，肆意将我四处吹拂，掠过痛苦的深海，直抵绝望的边缘。
我追寻爱，首先是因为爱带来狂喜——这份狂喜如此强烈，我常常愿意舍弃余生，只为换取短短几小时的这份欢愉。
我追寻爱，其次是因为爱能消解孤独：在那可怕的孤独之中，人战栗的灵魂站在世界边缘，望向冰冷、幽深、死寂的万丈深渊。
我追寻爱，最后是因为在爱的交融之中，我仿佛窥见了圣徒与诗人们所畅想的天堂，那是一幅神秘而微缩的图景。
这便是我所追寻之物。尽管它对于尘世人生而言近乎奢望，但我终究寻得了。
我以同等的热忱追求知识。我渴望读懂人心，渴望知晓星辰因何闪耀。我也曾试图领会毕达哥拉斯所说的力量：数字主宰流变世间。对此，我略有领悟，却所知甚少。
爱与知识，但凡力所能及，总将我引向天国。可怜悯总把我拉回现实大地。
痛苦呼喊的回响在我心中久久震荡：饥寒交迫的孩童、受压迫者折磨的受害者、成为子女负担的无助老人。世间遍地的孤独、贫穷与苦难，嘲弄着人类本该拥有的生活。
我渴望消除这些苦难，却无能为力，我自己也因此承受煎熬。
这便是我的一生。我觉得此生值得一过，如果可以，我欣然愿意再活一次。
📚 重点词汇
overwhelmingly /ˌəʊvəˈwelmɪŋli/ adv. 压倒性地，极其
govern /ˈɡʌvn/ v. 支配，掌控
hither and thither 四处，来回
wayward /ˈweɪwəd/ adj. 任性的，不受约束的
anguish /ˈæŋɡwɪʃ/ n. 巨大痛苦，苦恼
verge /vɜːdʒ/ n. 边缘
ecstasy /ˈekstəsi/ n. 狂喜，入迷
sacrifice /ˈsækrɪfaɪs/ v. 牺牲
unfathomable /ʌnˈfæðəməbl/ adj. 深不可测的
abyss /əˈbɪs/ n. 深渊
miniature /ˈmɪnətʃə(r)/ n. 缩影，缩微图景
prefigure /ˌpriːˈfɪɡə(r)/ v. 预示，预想
apprehend /ˌæprɪˈhend/ v. 理解，领会
flux /flʌks/ n. 流变，不断变化
reverberate /rɪˈvɜːbəreɪt/ v. 回响，回荡
alleviate /əˈliːvieɪt/ v. 减轻，缓和
🔍 长难句语法解析
1. 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.
"simple but overwhelmingly strong" 插入形容词短语修饰主语passions；冒号引出三个并列同位语，是英语散文经典开篇句式。
2. ...ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy.
so…that…结果状语从句；would have sacrificed 虚拟语气，表示想象中本会做出的牺牲。
3. …that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss.
介词+关系代词in‑which引导定语从句，修饰loneliness；文学书面常用句式。
4. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens.
so far as 引导条件插入状语，意为“在它们力所能及的范围内”。
5. …make a mockery of what human life should be.
what引导宾语从句作介词of的宾语；make a mockery of 固定短语：嘲弄，使……沦为笑话。
6. …and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.
if引导虚拟条件句，were为虚拟语气，表达与现实相反的假想。