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.

我刚才收到您1号的来信，按我们之间的约定给您复信，这一约定是不可违背的。你确实说过，在我们早起的时候，大自然总是有不同的面貌。

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...

谁能猜想到我上次写信的境况呢？我心灵的知己，这太可怕，太令人沮丧了。我的心为之一沉，浑身的锐气消磨殆尽……

Dear being, I am thine again; the happiness shall again predominate over this fleeting tribute to self-interest. Yet who would not feel now? Oh'twere as reckless a task to endeavor to annihilate perception while sense existed, as to blunt the sixth sense to such impressions as these! ...

亲爱的心，我又是您的了，这幸福又将压倒我这短暂的孤芳自赏。然而在这种时候，谁又不会有相同的感受呢? 啊，如果一息尚存而欲对其不闻不问岂非与使第六感觉对这样一些印象变得迟钝同样的不顾后果了吗?

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.

最亲爱的朋友，能宽恕我吗? 我把整个心都掏给您了。几度举笔，笔不从心。但我理智的情感终于又涌现上我的心头，您的信也深深地影响着我。

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.

我从不认为我们之间的交往会永远终止，您与我的交往给我带来了生命的曙光，是洒在我冰凉而漫长的人生旅途上的期待的温暖阳光。偏见可能要求人们以牺牲为代价，那只不过是幽灵，您我都不会向这个幽灵屈服。

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.

世俗可能要我们做出牺牲，舆论也会提出要求；但遥望飘过远方山岭的云彩，不是也乐在其中，有益于我们的身心吗?这决不可能，只要一息尚存，决不屈服，决不低头；即使时光把我们列入告别的名单中，毫无疑问，我们这般友情在天国中也一同相聚。

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 be a particularization of the general passion.

何谓爱情?何谓友情?是一些实在的东西吗?是球、苹果、玩偶……可以信手拈来、随意给人的实物吗?是不能深化、不能交流的吗?Kaimes勋爵给爱情下的定义是，爱情是一般激情的特殊体现。

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 selfcentered, selfinterested: It desires its own interest; it is the parent of jealousy. Its object is the plaything which it desires to monopolize.

但这是肉欲之爱、情欲之爱……是荒谬绝伦的逢场作戏，是寻欢作乐的爱，不是幸福的爱。这是一种自私自利的爱，它只求利已，是嫉妒之源，其目的在于垄断追求的玩物，其本质是私心、垄断。

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.

这种爱的表现也是对爱的亵渎，使脆如纤草的爱泯灭殆尽。

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's own loveliness ...

但我们崇拜的爱，象征美德、天意和无私，一句话，真情……它既能感知，又与远方山头上的云朵息息相通。它追求大家的幸福……首先是对方的幸福，不是因为对方给予欢乐，有愧于心，因为它有力量，有情感，并能无私奉献，因为美德的可爱而受美德……

Desiring the happiness of others not from the obligation of fearing 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.

不是因为怕下地狱或升天堂而为他人求得幸福，而是出于纯朴无华的美德。你不久又会收到我的倍。再见了，我最亲爱的朋友。请你继续相信这一点：我什么时候对阁下不忠，我便将不复存在。

（来源：爱词霸沙龙 英语点津姗姗编辑）