原文

Philosophy vs. Emerson (Excerpt)

    “HE is,” said Matthew Arnold of Emerson, “the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit.” These well-known words are perhaps the best expression of the somewhat vague yet powerful and inspiring effect of Emerson’s courageous but disjointed philosophy.

Descended from a long line of New England ministers, Emerson, finding himself fettered by even the most liberal ministry of his day, gently yet audaciously stepped down from the pulpit and, with little or no modification in his interests or utterances, become the greatest lay preacher of his time. From the days of his undergraduate essay upon “The Present State of Ethical Philosophy” he continued to be preoccupied with matters of conduct: whatever the object of his attention—an ancient poet, a fact in science, or an event in the morning newspaper—he contrives to extract from it a lesson which in his ringing, glistening style he drives home as an exhortation to a higher and more independent life.

Historically, Emerson marks one of the largest reactions against the Calvinism of his ancestors. That stern creed had taught the depravity of man, the impossibility of a natural, unaided growth toward perfection, and the necessity of constant and anxious effort to win the unmerited reward of being numbered among the elect. Emerson starts with the assumption that the individual, if he can only come into possession of his natural excellence, is the most godlike of creatures. Instead of believing with the Calvinist that as a man grows better he becomes more unlike his natural self (and therefore can become better only by an act of divine mercy), Emerson believes that as a man grows in excellence he becomes more like his natural self. It is common to hear the expression, when one is deeply stirred, as by sublime music or a moving discourse: “That fairly lifted me out of myself.” Emerson would have said that such influences lift us into ourselves.

For one of Emerson’s most fundamental and frequently recurring ideas is that of a “great nature in which we rest as the earth lies in the soft arms of the atmosphere,” an “Over-Soul, within which every man’s particular being is contained and made one with all other,” which “evermore tends to pass into our thought and hand and become wisdom and virtue and power and beauty.” This is the incentive –the sublime incentive of approaching the perfection which is ours by nature and by divine intention—that Emerson holds out when he asks us to submit us to ourselves and to all instructive influences.

Nature, which he says “is loved by what is best in us,” is all about us, inviting our perception of its remotest and most cosmic principles by surrounding us with its simpler manifestations. “A man does not tie his shoes without recognizing laws which bind the farthest regions of nature.” Thus man “carries the world in his head.” Whether he be a great scientist, providing by his discovery of a sweeping physical law that he has some such constructive sense as that which guides the universe, or whether he be a poet beholding trees as “imperfect men,” who “seem to bemoan their imprisonment, rooted in the ground,” he is being brought into his own by perceiving “the virtue and pungency of the influence on the mind of material objects, whether inorganic or organized.”

Ranging over time and space with astonishing rapidity and blinding names and things together that no ordinary vision could connect, Emerson calls the Past also to witness the need of self-reliance自力 and a steadfast obedience to intuition. The need of such independence, he thought, was particularly great for the student, who so easily becomes overawed by the great names of the Past and reads “to believe and take for granted.” This should not be, nor can it be if we remember what we are. When we sincerely find, therefore, that we cannot agree with the Past, then, says Emerson, we must break with it, no matter how great the prestige of its messengers. But often the Past does not disappoint us; often is assists us in our quest to become our highest selves. For in the Past there have been many men of genius; and, inasmuch as the man of genius has come nearer to being continually conscious of his relation to the Over-Soul, it follows that the genius is actually more ourselves than we are. So we often have to fall back upon more gifted souls to interpret for us what we mean but cannot say. Any supreme triumph of expression, therefore, should arouse in us not humility, still less discouragement, but renewed consciousness that “one nature wrote and the same reads.” So it is in travel or in any other form of contact with the Past: we cannot derive any profit or see any new thing expect we remember that “the world is nothing, the man is all.”

Similar are the uses of Society. More clearly than in Nature or in the Past, we see in certain other people such likeness to ourselves, and receive from the perception of that likeness such inspiration, that a real friend “many well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.” Yet elsewhere Emerson has more than once urged us not to be “too much acquainted”: all our participation in the life of our fellows, though rich with courtesy and sympathy, must be free from bending and copying. We must use the fellowship of Society to freshen, and never to obscure, “the recollection of the grandeur of our destiny.”

Such, in some attempt at an organization, are a few of Emerson’s favorite ideas, which occur over and over again, no matter what may be the subject of the essay. Though Emerson was to some degree identified, in his own time, with various movements which have had little or no permanent effect, yet as we read him now we find extraordinarily little that suggest the limitations of his time and locality. Often there are whole paragraphs which if we had read them in Greek would have seemed Greek. The good sense which kept him clear of Brook Farm because he thought Fourier “had skipped no fact but one, namely life,” kept him clear from many similar departures into matters which the twenty-first century will probably not remember. This is as it should be in the essay, which by custom draws the subject for its “dispersed meditations” from the permanent things of this world, such as Friendship, Truth, Superstition, and Honor. One of Emerson’s sources of strength, therefore, is his universality.

Another source of Emerson’s strength is his extraordinary compactness of style and his range and unexpectedness of illustration. His gift for epigram is, indeed, such as to make us long for an occasional stretch of leisurely commonplace. But Emerson always keeps us up—not less by his memorable terseness than his startling habit of illustration. He loves to dart from the present to the remotest past, to join names not usually associated, to link pagan with Christian, or human with divine, in single rapid sentences, such as the about “Scipio, and the Cid, and Sir Philip Sidney, and Washington, and every pure and valiant heart, who worshiped Beauty by word or by deed.”

If, in spite of all these admirable qualities, Emerson’s ideas seem too vague and unsystematic to satisfy those who feel that they could perhaps become Emersonians if there were only some definite articles to sign, it must be remembered that Emerson wishes to develop independent rather than apostleship, and that when men revolt from a system because they believe it to be too definite and oppressive, they are likely to go to other extreme. That Emerson did go so far toward this extreme identifies him with a period notable for its enthusiastic expansion of thought. That he did not systematize or restrict means that he was obedient to the idea that what really matters is not that by exact terminology, clever tactics and all the niceties of reasoning a system of philosophy shall be made tight and impregnable for others to adopt, but rather that each of us may be persuaded to hitch his own particular wagon to whatever star for him shines brightest.

我的翻译:

爱默生与哲学

马修·阿诺德曾这样赞扬过爱默生：“他是那些活在精神世界里的人们的良师益友。”也许，这句众所周知的名言正最佳地诠释了爱默生哲学思想的影响。尽管他的哲学理念无畏又有些脱节，一定程度上也显得有些模糊，但是却充满力量又能鼓舞人心。

爱默生出生于一个拥有悠久历史的新英格兰教牧师家庭，然而，即便是面对当时最自由的宗教教义他也深为之羁绊。因此，他大胆而又不失风度地涉足布道坛，带着自己不加修饰的兴趣或是言论，成为了当时最伟大的非神职布道者。爱默生在大学时代就写了关于《道德哲学现状》的论文，自那以后他就一直专注于行为问题的研究：无论他关注的内容是什么——一位古代诗人，还是一个科学真相，或是早报中的一则事件，他都努力从中提炼出哲理，并以其精炼的文笔将其上升为布道的告诫词，指引人们走向更高也更为独立的人生。

      在历史上，爱默生是反对其先人加尔文主义的反应最强烈的代表之一。加尔文主义那严厉的教条宣扬人性的堕落，否定人性自然、自主地趋于完美的可能性，倡导人们有必要通过焦灼不断地努力来获取不当的报酬以跻身完美之列。然而，爱默生提出这样的假设，如果一个人能达到自然的完美状态，那他就是世上最像神的生物。爱默生不同意加尔文主义的观点，即一个人越是远离自然本性，就发展得越好（因此这只有通过神的仁慈才能完成），而是认为如果一个人越是趋于完美，他就越接近自我。我们常常会听到这样一种说法，当一个人被崇高的音乐或是感人的演讲所感动时，他会说 “还真是‘灵魂出窍’了”。但是爱默生却可能会说，那些感动让我们回归到自我本性。

      爱默生反复提到的一个最基本的观点就是，“正像地球躺在大气柔软的怀抱那样，人类在伟大的自然之中停靠。”“超灵，它包含了人类每个单独个体的灵魂，并将他们相互融合，源源不断地融入我们的思维和行动中，形成智慧、道德、力量及美”。它是一种动力——一种崇高的动力，它与生俱来，并和着上帝的旨意，驱使我们去接近完美。爱默生支持我们遵循自我本性以及所有那些能够启发这些本性的外在因素。

      在爱默生看来，被人性中最美好的部分所喜爱的自然，它都是关于我们自身的，通过在我们周围呈现更简单的表象，让我们去感知那些深邃遥远的宇宙的哲理。“人就算是系鞋带，他也该认识到那些连接自然界最遥远区域的法则，”，这样才能做到“承载大千世界于心中”。无论是一位伟大的科学家（通过发现一项重要的能够指引宇宙的物理法则，并且这一发现具有建设性的意义），还是一位诗人（把树喻为“不完美的人”，“哀叹自己扎根于土壤，毫无自由”，他们通过“认知物质对心灵的崇高而又深刻的影响”，而真正回归到自我之中。

      爱默生疾驰于时空之中，将那些没有普遍联系的人物和事物相互联系起来，从而让“历史”也来见证人类自力的需要，以及坚定地忠于直觉的必要性。他认为，这种独立性的需要对学生来说尤为重要，因为他们很容易被历史上那些伟大的名号所震慑住，并且读了就相信，也理所当然的毫不怀疑。但如果我们清醒的知道自己是谁，那这样的事就不该也不会发生。因此，爱默生说，如果我们发现自己不能认同历史时，我们必须走出它的误区，不管他们的威望是多么显赫。但是，历史并不会经常让我们失望，历史往往会帮助我们实现自我完善。因为，历史上有许多天才，他们能够更加清晰地意识到自我与“超灵”的关系，所以他们比我们更接近人的自我本性。因而，我们常常不得不依靠那些更具天赋的人，让他们为我们阐明只能意会不可言传的思想。然而，任何精美的表述，我们都不必为之感到自卑，或是气馁，而应该有这样全新的意识：“写出的和读到的自然是同一个”。所以，在与历史有任何联系的时候，我们只有牢记“世界是渺小的，人类是伟大的”，才能从中获益。

      “社会”对我们也有类似的帮助。与“自然”和“历史”相比，在社会中我们能从其他人身上更直观地看到相似的自我本性，并且通过认识这些相似之处，还会启发我们思考：一位挚友“应该是自然的杰作”。然而爱默生却曾不止一次地劝诫我们在其他场合不要“太过亲密”——在与朋友相处时，尽管彼此之间相互尊重相互勉励，但是一定要避免屈身和效仿。我们必须将社会中人与人之间的情谊用来重新激发而非混淆“对自己恢宏命运的思考”。

     我们尽可能有条理地展现了一些爱默生津津乐道的观点，无论他的文章涉及何种主题，这些观点都反复出现贯穿其中。尽管从某种程度上来说，爱默生在当时所参加的各种运动都没有对社会造成很大的或是永久性的影响，但当今天我们再读爱默生的文章时，却会惊奇地发现他的思想很少受到时代和地域的限制。在他的文章中，常常会有整段的文字，不管我们用什么语去阅读，就会感觉像是用那种语言文字写成的。爱默生认为傅立叶“惟独忽略了生命”，这种清晰的见地让他与“布鲁克农场派”划清界线，也使他的哲学思想不至于像其他同时代的各种思潮一样，为二十一世纪所忘记。这种良好的判断力也贯穿于他的论文之中，自然地为他从那些世间永恒的事物中挑选了各种主题，如友谊、真理、迷信和荣耀，从而形成了他那“天马行空、包罗万象的思考内容”。所以说，普遍性是爱默生哲学强大生命力的源泉之一。

      爱默生哲学力量的另一个来源，是他那极其简洁凝练的写作风格和紧凑的编排，以及视野开阔、出人意表的表述方式。实际上，他在警句方面的造诣非常深，以至于我们在阅读时甚至会渴望偶尔能享受片刻的平淡无奇及慢条斯理。然而，爱默生却总是可以让我们清醒——这不仅是由于他的表达方式令人惊叹，还因为他的文风简洁令人咋舌。他喜欢从现在跳跃到远古，用简短的语句将一些通常情况下毫不相干的名字联系到一起，将异教徒和基督徒，人与神相提并论，如“西毕阿、袭德、菲利普·悉尼、华盛顿以及所有英勇纯洁的心灵，他们都用语言或是行动表达了对美的崇拜。”

      尽管爱默生的哲学思想具备以上种种值得称道的特点，但他的思想却看起来太过含糊，不成体系，让那些有意成为爱默生主义者的人们非常失望，对他们而言，也许只要能签署一点点明确的契约条文，他们就能成为爱默生的门徒。但是我们必须记住的是，爱默生所希望培养的，是精神上的独立而非使徒般的虔诚；并且当人们因为一个体系太过绝对、压抑而选择彻底与其决裂时，往往会走向另一个极端。而爱默生就走向了这样一个极端，并引领了一段引人瞩目的开拓思想的热潮。他的不成体系和不拘一格正体现出了他的信念：对一个哲学体系而言，重要的并非精确的术语或诡辩的技巧还是详尽的论证，使其周密严谨、无懈可击让人顶礼膜拜；相反，一套真正的哲学体系，能指引我们每一个人驾驭着只属于自己的马车遨游夜空，驶向那颗最耀眼的星星。