It is a commonplace among moralists that you cannot get happiness by pursuing it. This is only true if you pursue it unwisely. Gamblers at Monte Carlo are pursuing money, and most of them lose it instead, but there are other ways of pursuing money, which often succeed.
道德家们都认为,追求幸福反而得不到幸福。只有当你疯狂地追求它时,这才成立。蒙特卡洛的赌徒们都在追求金钱,而他们中的大多数人却失去了金钱,但是还有其他的追求金钱的方法,这些方法往往是成功的。
So it is with happiness. If you pursue it by means of drink, you are forgetting the hang-over. Epicurus pursued it by living only in congenial society and eating only dry bread, supplemented by a little cheese on feast days.
幸福也是如此。如果你以喝酒的方式来追求它,你就是忘记了它的存在。伊壁鸠鲁追求它的方式是只生活在和谐的社会里,只吃干面包,在盛宴日再加上一点奶酪。
His method proved successful in his case, but he was a valetudinarian, and most people would need something more vigorous. For most people, the pursuit of happiness, unless supplemented in various ways, is too abstract and theoretical to be adequate as a personal rule of life.
他的方法在他的例子中被证明是成功的,但他是一个积极的人,大多数人都需要更有活力的东西。对大多数人来说,追求幸福,除非以各种方式加以补充,否则是过于抽象和理论性的,不足以作为个人的生活准则。
But I think that whatever personal rule of life you may choose it should not, except in rare and heroic cases, be incompatible with happiness.
但我认为,无论你选择什么样的个人生活规则,它都不应该与幸福不相容,除非是在罕见的英雄的情况下。
Man is an animal, and his happiness depends on his physiology more than he likes to think. This is a humble conclusion, but I cannot make myself disbelieve it. Unhappy businessmen, I am convinced, would increase their happiness more by walking six miles every day than by any conceivable change of philosophy.
人是一种动物,他的幸福更多地取决于他的生理,而不是他喜欢的想法。这是一个卑微的结论,但我不能让自己不相信。我确信,不快乐的商人每天步行六英里,而不是通过任何可以想象到的哲学转变,会增加他们的幸福感。
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