第六章
第6段
But if the wisdom of Comte was insufficient, the folly of Comte was wisdom. In an age of dusty modernity, when beauty was thought of as something barbaric and ugliness as something sensible, he alone saw that men must always have the sacredness of mummery. He saw that while the brutes have all the useful things, the things that are truly human are the useless ones. He saw the falsehood of that almost universal notion of today, the notion that rites and forms are something artificial, additional, and corrupt. Ritual is really much older than thought; it is much simpler and much wilder than thought. A feeling touching the nature of things does not only make men feel that there are certain proper things to say; it makes them feel that there are certain proper things to do. The more agreeable of these consist of dancing, building temples, and shouting very loud; the less agreeable, of wearing green carnations and burning other philosophers alive. But everywhere the religious dance came before the religious hymn, and man was a ritualist before he could speak. If Comtism had spread the world would have been converted, not by the Comtist philosophy, but by the Comtist calendar. By discouraging what they conceive to be the weakness of their master, the English Positivists have broken the strength of their religion. A man who has faith must be prepared not only to be a martyr, but to be a fool. It is absurd to say that a man is ready to toil and die for his convictions when he is not even ready to wear a wreath round his head for them. I myself, to take a corpus vile, am very certain that I would not read the works of Comte through for any consideration whatever. But I can easily imagine myself with the greatest enthusiasm lighting a bonfire on Darwin Day.
倘若孔德的智慧不足，那孔德的痴愚就成了他的智慧。在沾滿塵埃的現代，當美麗被視為野蠻，醜陋被看作恰到好處，唯有他察覺到人總是需要保有儀式的神聖感，唯有他指出，雖然那些大老粗們擁有一切有用處的東西，但真正符合人性的，是那些毫無用處的東西。他看出今日將儀式、形式當作虛偽造作的、多餘的、迂腐的，這幾乎普世通用的思維的謬誤。現實是，儀式比思想更古老，比思想更為簡潔與廣博。與自然連結所勾起的感受，不僅讓人覺得該說一些話，更讓人覺得該表現出一些舉動。而在這些舉動中，較為大眾所接受的，包含跳舞、建廟宇、大聲喊叫；較不為大眾所接受的則有，特異的性交、活焚哲學家。但世界各地都有人隨宗教頌讚起舞，人在能開口說話前就已經是個遵循儀式的人。倘若孔德主義風行世界成為宗教，那使人信服的也不是孔德的哲學，而是孔德的宗教曆法。英國實證學家貶抑他們眼中實證精神的弱點，卻正好削弱了實證精神這宗教的真正力量。一個有信仰的人不僅必須要有成為殉道者的準備，還要能甘心成為傻子。若說一個人願意為信仰肝腦塗地，卻不願意在頭上戴上儀式花圈，這豈不可笑。以我這副臭皮囊為例，我十分確定，無論基於何種考量，我都不會仔細閱讀孔德的著作。但要想像我懷抱熱情在達爾文日施放煙火慶祝紀念，卻是十分容易。
第7段
That splendid effort failed, and nothing in the style of it has succeeded. There has been no rationalist festival, no rationalist ecstasy. Men are still in black for the death of God. When Christianity was heavily bombarded in the last century upon no point was it more persistently and brilliantly attacked than upon that of its alleged enmity to human joy. Shelley and Swinburne and all their armies have passed again and again over the ground, but they have not altered it. They have not set up a single new trophy or ensign for the world's merriment to rally to. They have not given a name or a new occasion of gaiety. Mr. Swinburne does not hang up his stocking on the eve of the birthday of Victor Hugo. Mr. William Archer does not sing carols descriptive of the infancy of Ibsen outside people's doors in the snow. In the round of our rational and mournful year one festival remains out of all those ancient gaieties that once covered the whole earth. Christmas remains to remind us of those ages, whether Pagan or Christian, when the many acted poetry instead of the few writing it. In all the winter in our woods there is no tree in glow but the holly.
那偉大壯烈的努力失敗了，與其同方向的奮鬥無一成功。至今沒有理性主義紀念日，沒有因理性主義而起的狂喜。人還是穿著紀念上帝已死的喪服。當基督教在上個世紀受到猛烈批判與攻擊時，在諸多攻擊裡，沒有哪一個攻擊比批評基督教打壓人類快樂的論述要更精彩、更難摧毀。雪萊（Shelley）、史溫本（Swinburne）以及他們所有的軍隊一再巡視掠地，但從未改變過什麼，他們從沒設立任何一座新的勝利盃，或高掛凱旗讓全世界群起歡呼快樂。他們也沒有新設一個歡樂的名號或節令。史溫本也不會在雨果的生日前夕掛上襪子。亞契爾（William Archer）也不會在鄰舍門口，在雪地裡唱著描繪易卜生誕生的頌歌。從年首到年尾，在我們理性與哀悼的歲月裡，諸多曾經普世同慶的古老慶典中，唯有一個節令仍舊存在，聖誕節，這節慶仍存在，提醒著我們過去的歲月，無論異教徒或基督徒，當大多數人活出詩歌的精神而非坐在桌前創作著詩歌時，聖誕節還在。在冬季，在樹林裡，唯有冬青樹（聖誕樹）閃著光芒。
＝＝
留言
張貼留言