原文：

Three passions,simple but overwhelmingly strong,have governed my life — the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and the 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,reacing 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 living 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 wishd 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 my heart. Children in famine,victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated 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 the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.

譯文：

有三種樸實卻異常強烈的激情左右著我的人生：渴望愛情、尋求知識和對受苦人的憐憫。這三種激情尤如颶風肆意地吹著我,從無邊的苦海吹向絕境。

我尋找愛，因為愛使人陶醉。我常常寧愿用我全部的余生來換取幾個小時這樣的欣喜。我尋找愛，因為愛使我解除了孤寂，解除了一個顫抖的靈魂從人世間到冷漠無底的深淵所經歷的孤寂。我尋找愛，因為我在愛的縮影中看到了圣人和詩人眼里天堂的景象。這就是以往我尋找的，雖然對于人生來說似乎過于美好，但我終于找到了。

以同樣的激情，我尋求知識。我渴望理解人類的心靈。我想知道群星為何閃爍。我試圖領悟畢達哥拉斯的數的魔力，它支配著數的和諧。我已多少達到了此目的。

愛和知識總是通往天堂。但是憐憫總把我帶回塵世。痛苦喊叫的回聲在我心中回蕩。挨餓的孩子，遭摧殘的受害者，被子女視為累贅的無助老人，以及這個充滿孤獨、貧窮和痛苦的世界，是對應有人生的一種嘲弄。我渴望減輕這種災難，但是我無能為力，我也在受苦。