Shelly to Elizabeth Hitchener

Chestnut Cottage, Keswick

Tuesday, 12 November 1811 雪萊致伊麗莎白•西琴勒

Chestnut Cottage, Keswick

星期二　1811年11月12日

Your letter of the 1st hath this moment reached me. I answer it according to our agreement, which shall be inviolable. Truly did you say that, at our arising in the morning, Nature assumes a different aspect. Who could have conjectured the circumstances of my last letter? Friend of my soul, this is terrible, dismaying: it makes one's heart sink, it withers vital energy ... Dear being, I am thine again; thy happiness shall again predominaute over this fleeting tribute to self-interest. Yet who would not feel now? Oh'twere as reckless a task to endeavour to annihilate perception while sense existed, as to blunt the sixth sense to such impressions as these!--forgive me, dearest friend! I pour out my whole soul to you. I write by fleeting intervals: my pen runs away with my senses. The impassionateness of my sensations grows upon me. Your letter, too, has much affected me. Never, with my consent, shall that intercourse cease which has been the day-dawn of my existence, the sun which has shed warmth on the cold drear length of the anticipated prospect of life. Prejudice might demand the sacrifice, but she is an idol to whom we bow not. The world might demand it; its opinion might require; but the cloud which flees over yon mountain were as important to our happiness, to our usefulness. This must never be, never whilst this existence continues; and when Time has enrolled us in the list of the departed, surely this friendship will survive to bear our identity to heaven. What is love, or friendship? Is it something material--a ball, an apple, a plaything--which must be taken from one to be given to another? Is it capable of no extension, no communication? Lord Kaimes defines love to a particularization of the general passion. But this is the love of sensation, of sentiment--the absurdest of absurd vanities: it is the love of pleasure, not the love of happiness. The one is a love which is self-centered, self-devoted, self-interested: It desires its own interest; it is the parent of jealousy. Its object is the plaything which it desires to monopolize. Selfishness, monopoly, is its very soul, and to communicate to others part of this love were to destroy its essence, to annihilate this chain of straw. But love, the love which we worship,--virtue, heaven, disinterestedness--in a word, Friendship--which has as much to do with the senses as with yonder mountains; that which seeks the good of all--the good of its object first, not because that object is a minister to its pleasures, not merely because it even contributes to its happiness, but because it is really worthy, because it has powers, sensibilities, is capable of abstracting itself, and loving virtue for virtue's own loveliness--desiring the happiness of others not from the obligation of fearing hell or desiring heaven: but for pure, simple, unsophisticated virtue. You will soon hear again. Adieu, my dearest friend. Continue to believe that when I am insensible to your excellence, I shall cease to exist.

剛才收到你1號的來信，我按我們之前的默契復信。這個默契是不能違背的。我們早上起身時，你確實說過，實際情況已經不一樣了。誰能猜得到我上次寫信時的境況呢？我心靈的知己，這太可怕，太令人沮喪了。我的心為之一沉，銳氣消磨殆盡……親愛的人兒，我又是你的了，你的幸福又將壓倒我這短暫的孤芳自賞。然而在這種時候，誰又不會有同感呢？啊，如果一息尚存而欲其不聞不問豈非與使第六感對這樣一些印象變得遲鈍同樣不顧后果嗎？最親愛的朋友，寬恕我吧，我把整個心都掏給你了。幾度提筆，筆不從心。但激情終于涌現，你的信也起了作用。我認為我們之間的交往永遠不會終止，這種交往給我帶來了生命的曙光，是灑在我冰涼而漫長的人生旅途上的溫暖陽光。偏見可能要求人們做出犧牲，但我們不會向這個幽靈屈服。世俗可能要我們做出犧牲，輿論也會提出要求；但遙望漂過遠方山嶺的云朵也樂在其中，有益于身心。只要一息尚存，決不屈服，決不低頭；即使大限到來，人間情侶也要天上相聚。何謂愛情，何謂友情？是球、蘋果、玩偶－－可以信手拈來、隨意給人的實物？是不能深化、不能交流的嗎？凱米斯勛爵把愛情定義為一般激情的特殊體現，但這是肉欲之愛、情欲之愛－－是荒謬絕倫的逢場作戲：是尋歡作樂的愛，不是幸福的愛。這是一種以自我為中心的愛，自私自利的愛：它只求利己，是嫉妒之源，其目的在于壟斷追求的玩物，其本質是私心、壟斷。這種愛的些許表現也是對愛的褻瀆，使脆如纖草的愛泯滅殆盡。但我們崇拜的愛，象征美德、天意和無私，一句話，真情－－它既能感知，又與遠方山頭的云朵息息相通。它追求大家的幸福－－首先是對方的幸福，不是因為對方給予歡樂，也不僅因為對方使自己幸福，而是因為這種愛真正無愧于心，因為它有力量，有情感，并能無私奉獻，因為美德的可愛而愛美德－－不是因為怕下地獄或想升天堂而為他人求得幸福，而是出于純樸無華的美德。你不久又會收到我的信。再見了，我最親愛的朋友。請你繼續相信這一點：我什么時候對閣下不忠，我便將不復存在。

Yours most sincerely, inviolably, eternally.

你的最誠摯和至死不渝的Percy S. 珀西•雪萊