2019-03-19
On the Uses of Philosophy
We want to see things now as they will seem forever—"in the light of eternity."
【赏析】接续上文passing的话题
We want to learn to laugh in the face of the inevitable, to smile even at the looming of death.
*the looming of death 死亡的临近 = the approach of death
We want to be whole, to coördinate our energies by criticizing and harmonizing our desires; for coördinated energy is the last word in ethics and politics, and perhaps in logic and metaphysics too. "
* coördinate v. 调和 → 欲望不是消灭，而是调和
* the last word 最重要的话，最终的意义
To be a philosopher," said Thoreau, "is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live, according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity, and trust."
*subtle thoughts 细致入微的思考，具备专业性和品味
*not merely → nor even→but so to 结构的递进，前面两个的铺垫是为了强调最后的内容
*magnanimity 心胸宽广
We may be sure that if we can but find wisdom, all things else will be added unto us. "
*may be sure 也许应该能
*can but 只要
Seek ye first the good things of the mind," Bacon admonishes us, "and the rest will either be supplied or its loss will not be felt."
*admonish = advise/suggest
Truth will not make us rich, but it will make us free.
【赏析】真理不会让我们富裕，但会让我们自由。
Some ungentle reader will check us here by informing us that philosophy is as useless as chess, as obscure as ignorance, and as stagnant as content.
【赏析】写负面的话之前用一个some来缓和语气 some ungentle reader
*check v.（下棋）将军
"There is nothing so absurd," said Cicero, "but that it may be found in the books of the philosophers."
【赏析】用There is nothing so...but...的句型来强调哲学家的荒谬
Doubtless some philosophers have had all sorts of wisdom except common sense; and many a philosophic flight has been due to the elevating power of thin air.
*except 补刀专用，而且中文翻译不出这种转折的感觉
*a philosophic flight 哲学的飞升，进步
Let us resolve, on this voyage of ours, to put in only at the ports of light, to keep out of the muddy streams of metaphysics and the "many-sounding seas" of theological dispute.
*resolve 发毒誓
But is philosophy stagnant? Science seems always to advance, while philosophy seems always to lose ground.
*stagnant 停滞不前的 →用疑问句来表达否定
Yet this is only because philosophy accepts the hard and hazardous task of dealing with problems not yet open to the methods of science—problems like good and evil, beauty and ugliness, order and freedom, life and death; so soon as a field of inquiry yields knowledge susceptible of exact formulation it is called science.
*hazardous 危险的
*so soon as 只要…… = so long as
*yield 收获 → yield to 屈服于
【赏析】哲学尝试解释的是科学方法论不解释的困难危险的问题：好和坏、美和丑、生和死。科学能够具体描述一个东西，哲学却不能。
Every science begins as philosophy and ends as art; it arises in hypothesis and flows into achievement. → 【科学和哲学的关系】
Philosophy is a hypothetical interpretation of the unknown (as in metaphysics), or of the inexactly known (as in ethics or political philosophy); it is the front trench in the siege of truth.
*interpretation 解读 →哲学是假设性的解读
Science is the captured territory; and behind it are those secure regions in which knowledge and art build our imperfect and marvelous world.
*imperfect and marvelous 不完美但随处是惊喜
Philosophy seems to stand still, perplexed; but only because she leaves the fruits of victory to her daughters the sciences, and herself passes on, divinely discontent, to the uncertain and unexplored.
*divinely discontent 神圣的不满足
【感想】
最后一段写得太美了，把哲学的孤独和厚重描写得淋漓尽致。看似孤独破败，实则是养育了科学，深藏功与名。