第四章
第6段
Now, it is undoubtedly true that if a man asked a waiter in a restaurant for a bottle of yellow wine and some greenish-yellow grapes, the waiter would think him mad. It is undoubtedly true that if a Government official, reporting on the Europeans in Burmah, said, "There are only two thousand pinkish men here" he would be accused of cracking jokes, and kicked out of his post. But it is equally obvious that both men would have come to grief through telling the strict truth. That too truthful man in the restaurant; that too truthful man in Burmah, is Mr. Bernard Shaw. He appears eccentric and grotesque because he will not accept the general belief that white is yellow. He has based all his brilliancy and solidity upon the hackneyed, but yet forgotten, fact that truth is stranger than fiction. Truth, of course, must of necessity be stranger than fiction, for we have made fiction to suit ourselves.
毋庸置疑的，若有人在餐廳裡跟服務生要一瓶黃酒，或是綠黃色的葡萄，服務生會以為他腦筋有問題。若政府官員彙報提及緬甸的歐洲人時說：「在那裡僅有兩千個粉紅人」，大家會以為他在說笑，並將他革職。這兩種狀況都顯示，呈現嚴謹的事實反而為當事者帶來害處。餐廳內那位誠實的顧客，提到緬甸時那誠實的官員，正是蕭伯納。他被人視為怪異、特殊，正是因為他不願意接受視白為黃的主流信念。他的卓越與可靠是建立在「真實比小說更奇異」，這個老舊陳腐，但被眾人遺忘的事實上。真實當然勢必比小說更奇異，因為小說是我們根據自己的需求所創造出來的。
第7段
So much then a reasonable appreciation will find in Mr. Shaw to be bracing and excellent. He claims to see things as they are; and some things, at any rate, he does see as they are, which the whole of our civilization does not see at all. But in Mr. Shaw's realism there is something lacking, and that thing which is lacking is serious.
因此合理欣賞蕭伯納，會發現他充滿生氣、秀異精彩。他宣稱他看到事物的本相（就事論事）。而部分事物，當我們整體社會都未能正確認識它們時，無論如何，他的確照其本質、原貌認識它們。但蕭伯納的現實主義缺少了某樣東西，而那缺失恰巧無比重要。
第8段
Mr. Shaw's old and recognized philosophy was that powerfully presented in "The Quintessence of Ibsenism." It was, in brief, that conservative ideals were bad, not because they were conservative, but because they were ideals. Every ideal prevented men from judging justly the particular case; every moral generalization oppressed the individual; the golden rule was there was no golden rule. And the objection to this is simply that it pretends to free men, but really restrains them from doing the only thing that men want to do. What is the good of telling a community that it has every liberty except the liberty to make laws? The liberty to make laws is what constitutes a free people. And what is the good of telling a man (or a philosopher) that he has every liberty except the liberty to make generalizations. Making generalizations is what makes him a man. In short, when Mr. Shaw forbids men to have strict moral ideals, he is acting like one who should forbid them to have children. The saying that "the golden rule is that there is no golden rule," can, indeed, be simply answered by being turned round. That there is no golden rule is itself a golden rule, or rather it is much worse than a golden rule. It is an iron rule; a fetter on the first movement of a man.
蕭伯納固有，且為眾人所知的哲學，強而有力呈現於<易卜生主義精華>（The Quintessence of Ibsenism）這本書中。簡言之，其哲學是認為，保守理念是不好的，但不是因為保守，而是因為那是理想、是理念。任何理念都阻礙人對事物進行公正的判斷，任一道德通則都壓迫了個體，無金科玉律才應是唯一的金科玉律。而對此哲學的異議，十分明白易暸，這哲學貌似使人自由，但其實限制人成為他們唯一想要成為的樣子。告訴一個社會他們擁有一切自由，除了制定法律之自由，這有何好處嗎？制定法律、規則的自由是構成自由人的基礎。告訴一個人（或一個哲學家）他擁有一切自由，除了提出適用於全體的通律的自由之外，這有何益呢？尋找通律、規則是人的本性。簡言之，當蕭伯納阻止人擁有明白確定的道德理念時，就好像在阻止人生養兒女。針對「所謂的黃金律，就是沒有黃金律」這名言，可簡單反轉其文句來回應：沒有黃金律即是黃金律，或者比黃金律更糟，是鐵律，是限制人舉手投足的桎梏。
第9段
But the sensation connected with Mr. Shaw in recent years has been his sudden development of the religion of the Superman. He who had to all appearance mocked at the faiths in the forgotten past discovered a new god in the unimaginable future. He who had laid all the blame on ideals set up the most impossible of all ideals, the ideal of a new creature. But the truth, nevertheless, is that any one who knows Mr. Shaw's mind adequately, and admires it properly, must have guessed all this long ago.
但近年來蕭伯納先生引人矚目、好奇的，是他突然發展出的「超人」信仰（譯註：超人原文為Superman，應是來自尼采，而非克里斯托福里維所飾演的那位..）。在過去不加掩飾嘲諷各種信仰的這位先生，竟在無法想像的未來發掘新的神祇。對各種信念、理念大加撻伐的這位先生，竟然推崇所有理念中最令人難以理解、一個關於新生物的信念。不過事實是，對於蕭伯納有充足認識，並且正確欣賞他的任何人，應該都早就猜到這必然會發生。
第10段
For the truth is that Mr. Shaw has never seen things as they really are. If he had he would have fallen on his knees before them. He has always had a secret ideal that has withered all the things of this world. He has all the time been silently comparing humanity with something that was not human, with a monster from Mars, with the Wise Man of the Stoics, with the Economic Man of the Fabians, with Julius Caesar, with Siegfried, with the Superman. Now, to have this inner and merciless standard may be a very good thing, or a very bad one, it may be excellent or unfortunate, but it is not seeing things as they are. It is not seeing things as they are to think first of a Briareus with a hundred hands, and then call every man a cripple for only having two. It is not seeing things as they are to start with a vision of Argus with his hundred eyes, and then jeer at every man with two eyes as if he had only one. And it is not seeing things as they are to imagine a demigod of infinite mental clarity, who may or may not appear in the latter days of the earth, and then to see all men as idiots. And this is what Mr. Shaw has always in some degree done. When we really see men as they are, we do not criticise, but worship; and very rightly. For a monster with mysterious eyes and miraculous thumbs, with strange dreams in his skull, and a queer tenderness for this place or that baby, is truly a wonderful and unnerving matter. It is only the quite arbitrary and priggish habit of comparison with something else which makes it possible to be at our ease in front of him. A sentiment of superiority keeps us cool and practical; the mere facts would make our knees knock under as with religious fear. It is the fact that every instant of conscious life is an unimaginable prodigy. It is the fact that every face in the street has the incredible unexpectedness of a fairytale. The thing which prevents a man from realizing this is not any clear-sightedness or experience, it is simply a habit of pedantic and fastidious comparisons between one thing and another. Mr. Shaw, on the practical side perhaps the most humane man alive, is in this sense inhumane. He has even been infected to some extent with the primary intellectual weakness of his new master, Nietzsche, the strange notion that the greater and stronger a man was the more he would despise other things. The greater and stronger a man is the more he would be inclined to prostrate himself before a periwinkle. That Mr. Shaw keeps a lifted head and a contemptuous face before the colossal panorama of empires and civilizations, this does not in itself convince one that he sees things as they are. I should be most effectively convinced that he did if I found him staring with religious astonishment at his own feet. "What are those two beautiful and industrious beings," I can imagine him murmuring to himself, "whom I see everywhere, serving me I know not why? What fairy godmother bade them come trotting out of elfland when I was born? What god of the borderland, what barbaric god of legs, must I propitiate with fire and wine, lest they run away with me?"
因為事實是，蕭伯納從不真正按照事物的本質、原貌認識它們。因為如果他是，那他必定會在這些事物面前跪拜。一直以來，他都秘密持守著一個理念，而這理念讓世上的萬事萬物失色、凋零。一直以來，他都默默地拿人性與「非人」、與火星來的怪獸，與斯多葛學派的智者、與費邊社（Fabians）的經濟人、與凱撒、與齊格菲（譯註：華格納尼伯龍指環中的主角）、與超人進行比較。內心擁有這樣一個殘酷的標準或許是件好事，也或許是件壞事，或許令人欣喜，也或許令人感到不幸，但無論如何，都不是就事論事。因先想到百手巨人（Briareus布里亞柔斯）擁有百隻手，而視只擁有兩隻手的人為殘廢，這不是正確照事物本相看事情。對照擁有驚人眼界的百眼巨人（Argus阿格斯），然後嘲弄只有兩隻眼睛的人，好像他們缺了一隻眼一樣，這也不是正確看事情。想像著一個或許會也或許不會出現於未來世上、擁有無限心智能力的半神半人生物，並因而視所有人為白痴，這也不是正確解讀事情。但這正是蕭伯納一直以來都或多或少在做的事情。當我們按照人的本質正確認識他們的時候，我們不會批評，而是崇拜，並且這崇拜之情是完全正當的。面對一個奇異的怪物，他那神秘的雙眼、奇妙的拇指、頭顱藏著的怪異夢境，對某個地方或某個嬰兒存著難以言說的溫柔，這生物既神奇又令人戰慄恐懼。只有那出於獨斷、自命不凡的好比較習性，會讓我們面對他而無感、視其為凡物。只有自以為高人一等的態度讓我們在人面前冷靜又務實，事實則會讓我們帶著宗教般的敬畏跪下俯伏。事實是，有意識的人生中的每一刻，都是超乎想像的神蹟。事實是，街上的每張臉的背後都有神話般超越心智可及的驚人之處。阻止人了解這點的，並非頭腦清醒或老練的人生經歷，而是愛比較的迂腐、挑惕習性。在實際面上，蕭伯納先生可能是有史以來最具人性的人，但從這方面來看，他實在非人。他甚至受到他新近崇拜的老師——尼采的主要思想弱點的影響，竟認為一個人愈偉大、愈強壯，愈會睥睨其他一切事物。然而事實是一個人愈偉大、愈強壯，崇敬跪拜日日春（periwinkle）的動機也愈強烈。在浩瀚廣大的帝國與文明前仰著頭、擺出一臉不屑，這樣並無法說服人蕭伯納能按事物本相正確認識它們。他帶著宗教敬虔的驚喜盯著自己的雙足，我還會真正被說服。我可想像他跟自己的對答：「這兩個美麗又勤奮的東西是什麼？我總到哪裡都看到他們，不知為何他們總是為我工作？哪個仙女在我出生的時候命令他們離開仙境？哪位邊境之地的神明，掌管雙足的神祇？我是不是該燒香獻酒，以防他們離開我？」
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