The Haunted Mind

What a singular moment is the first one, when you have hardly begun to recollect yourself after starting from midnight slumber! By unclosing your eyes so suddenly, you seem to have surprised the personages of your dream in full convocation round your bed, and catch one broad glance at them before they can flit into obscurity. Or, to vary the metaphor, you find yourself, for a single instant, wide awake in that realm of illusions, whither sleep has been the passport, and behold its ghostly inhabitants and wondrous scenery, with a perception of their strangeness, such as you never attain while the dream is undisturbed. The distant sound of a church-clock is borne faintly on the wind. You question with yourself, half seriously, whether it has stolen to your waking ear from some gray tower, that stood within the precincts of your dream. While yet in suspense, another clock flings its heavy clang over the slumbering town, with so full and distinct a sound, and such a long murmur in the neighboring air, that you are certain it must proceed from the steeple at the nearest corner. You count the strokes—one—two, and there they cease, with a booming sound, like the gathering of a third stroke within the bell.

从午夜的沉睡中猛然惊醒、你还几乎来不及回过神来的那一刻，是多么奇特的一瞬啊！你突然睁开双眼，仿佛撞见了梦中的那些人物正齐聚在你床边议论纷纷，就在他们消散于朦胧之前，你抓住了看他们一眼的机会。或者换个说法，你会发觉自己在那一瞬间，竟完全清醒地置身于那个幻境之中——睡眠正是通往那里的通行证——你目睹着那里那些幽灵般的居民和奇异的景致，感受到一种它们的陌生感，而这种感觉，是你在梦境未受打扰时永远也体会不到的。远处教堂的钟声隐约随风飘来。你半信半疑地问自己，这声音是否是从你梦境边界之内某座灰色的钟楼，悄悄潜入了你此刻清醒的耳中。就在你还犹疑不定的时候，另一座钟又把它沉重的钟声抛向了这座沉睡的城镇，那声音是那么饱满而清晰，在邻近的空气中久久回荡，你确信这一定是从最近那个街角的尖塔上传来的。你数着钟声——一下，两下，随后便停了，带着一声轰隆隆的余响，仿佛第三声还在钟里聚集着一般。

If you could choose an hour of wakefulness out of the whole night, it would be this. Since your sober bedtime, at eleven, you have had rest enough to take off the pressure of yesterday's fatigue; while before you, till the sun comes from "far Cathay" to brighten your window, there is almost the space of a summer night; one hour to be spent in thought, with the mind's eye half shut, and two in pleasant dreams, and two in that strangest of enjoyments, the forgetfulness alike of joy and woe. The moment of rising belongs to another period of time, and appears so distant, that the plunge out of a warm bed into the frosty air cannot yet be anticipated with dismay. Yesterday has already vanished among the shadows of the past; to-morrow has not yet emerged from the future. You have found an intermediate space, where the business of life does not intrude; where the passing moment lingers, and becomes truly the present; a spot where Father Time, when he thinks nobody is watching him, sits down by the wayside to take breath. O that he would fall asleep, and let mortals live on without growing older!

倘若能从整整一夜之中挑出一个清醒的时辰，那便该是此刻了。自从你十一点钟规规矩矩就寝以来，你已经歇息得足以卸去昨日疲惫的重压；而在你面前，直到太阳从“遥远的震旦”升起、照亮你的窗户为止，还有几乎一整个夏夜那么长的时间——一个时辰用来沉思冥想，眼帘半合；两个时辰沉浸在惬意的梦境里；还有两个时辰，用来体味那种最奇特的享受——将喜与悲一并遗忘。起床的那一刻，属于另一段时光，看起来还遥远得很，因此从温暖的被窝一跃跳进凛冽的空气之中，此刻还无须担惊。昨天已经消散在往昔的阴影之中；明天也尚未从未来浮现出来。你找到了一处中间地带，尘世的营生尚未闯入其中；流逝的片刻在这里逗留，真正地成为了“当下”；这是个地方，时间老人以为无人窥见时，便会在路边坐下来喘口气。但愿他能就此睡去，让世人从此活下去，永不再老去！

Hitherto you have lain perfectly still, because the slightest motion would dissipate the fragments of your slumber. Now, being irrevocably awake, you peep through the half-drawn window-curtain, and observe that the glass is ornamented with fanciful devices in frostwork, and that each pane presents something like a frozen dream. There will be time enough to trace out the analogy, while waiting the summons to breakfast. Seen through the clear portion of the glass, where the silvery mountain-peaks of the frost scenery do not ascend, the most conspicuous object is the steeple, the white spire of which directs you to the wintry lustre of the firmament. You may almost distinguish the figures on the clock that has just told the hour. Such a frosty sky, and the snow-covered roofs, and the long vista of the frozen street, all white, and the distant water hardened into rock, might make you shiver, even under four blankets and a woollen comforter. Yet look at that one glorious star! Its beams are distinguishable from all the rest, and actually cast the shadow of the casement on the bed, with a radiance of deeper hue than moonlight, though not so accurate an outline.

到目前为止，你一直纹丝不动地躺着，因为哪怕最轻微的一点动作，都会把你残存的睡意驱散。如今，你已经彻底清醒过来，便透过半掩的窗帘朝外窥望，只见玻璃上凝结着奇幻的霜花图案，每一块窗玻璃上都仿佛呈现出一场凝固的梦境。在等待唤你去吃早餐的号令之前，尽有时间去细细描摹这层譬喻。透过玻璃上那一小片没有被银白色霜峰所覆盖的清澈之处望去，最醒目的物件便是那座尖塔，它洁白的塔尖将你的目光引向冬日苍穹那清冷的光辉。你几乎能分辨出那座刚刚报过时辰的钟面上的数字。这般寒霜满布的天空，这白雪覆盖的屋顶，还有那条被冻结的长街尽头一片洁白的景象，以及远处已然凝结成冰的水面，即便裹着四床毛毯、围着一条羊毛围巾，也足以让你打个寒战。可是瞧那颗璀璨的星星！它的光芒与众星迥然不同，竟真的把窗棂的影子投在了床上，那光晕的色调比月光还要浓重深沉，只是轮廓不如月光那般清晰。

You sink down and muffle your head in the clothes, shivering all the while, but less from bodily chill than the bare idea of a polar atmosphere. It is too cold even for the thoughts to venture abroad. You speculate on the luxury of wearing out a whole existence in bed, like an oyster in its shell, content with the sluggish ecstasy of inaction, and drowsily conscious of nothing but delicious warmth, such as you now feel again. Ah! that idea has brought a hideous one in its train. You think how the dead are lying in their cold shrouds and narrow coffins, through the drear winter of the grave, and cannot persuade your fancy that they neither shrink nor shiver, when the snow is drifting over their little hillocks, and the bitter blast howls against the door of the tomb. That gloomy thought will collect a gloomy multitude, and throw its complexion over your wakeful hour.

你缩下身去，把头埋进被褥里，仍旧不住地发抖，与其说是因身体的寒冷，倒不如说是因为那极地般严寒的念头本身。此刻实在太冷了，连思绪都不愿探出头去闯荡。你幻想着一辈子躺在床上度日的那种奢侈，就像牡蛎躲在自己的壳里那样，满足于那种慵懒无为的极乐，昏昏然只觉察到一片美妙的暖意，正如你此刻再度感受到的那样。啊！这个念头却带来了一个可怖的念头。你想起死者们此刻正躺在冰冷的裹尸布和狭窄的棺木之中，度过坟墓那漫长凄凉的寒冬，而你怎么也无法说服自己的想象，相信当积雪飘落在他们那一个个小小的坟丘上、凛冽的寒风呼啸着扑打墓穴之门时，他们竟真的不会瑟缩、不会战栗。这个阴郁的念头会招来一大群阴郁的同伴，将它们的阴影投射到你这清醒的时辰之中。

In the depths of every heart there is a tomb and a dungeon, though the lights, the music, and revelry above may cause us to forget their existence, and the buried ones, or prisoners whom they hide. But sometimes, and oftenest at midnight, these dark receptacles are flung wide open. In an hour like this, when the mind has a passive sensibility, but no active strength; when the imagination is a mirror, imparting vividness to all ideas, without the power of selecting or controlling them; then pray that your griefs may slumber, and the brotherhood of remorse not break their chain. It is too late! A funeral train comes gliding by your bed, in which Passion and Feeling assume bodily shape, and things of the mind become dire spectres to the eye. There is your earliest Sorrow, a pale young mourner, wearing a sister's likeness to first love, sadly beautiful, with a hallowed sweetness in her melancholy features, and grace in the flow of her sable robe. Next appears a shade of ruined loveliness, with dust among her golden hair, and her bright garments all faded and defaced, stealing from your glance with drooping head, as fearful of reproach; she was your fondest Hope, but a delusive one; so call her Disappointment now. A sterner form succeeds, with a brow of wrinkles, a look and gesture of iron authority; there is no name for him unless it be Fatality, an emblem of the evil influence that rules your fortunes; a demon to whom you subjected yourself by some error at the outset of life, and were bound his slave forever, by once obeying him. See! those fiendish lineaments graven on the darkness, the writhed lip of scorn, the mockery of that living eye, the pointed finger, touching the sore place in your heart! Do you remember any act of enormous folly, at which you would blush, even in the remotest cavern of the earth? Then recognize your Shame.

在每一颗心的深处，都藏着一座坟墓和一间地牢，尽管上方的灯光、乐声与欢腾，会让我们忘却它们的存在，也忘却那些被埋葬的人，或是被囚禁其中的囚徒。可是有时候，尤其是在午夜时分，这些幽暗的密室会被猛然敞开。在这样的一个时辰里，心灵只有被动的感受力，却没有主动的力量；此时想象宛如一面镜子，赋予一切念头以鲜明的形貌，却无力去挑选或掌控它们；那么便祈祷你的悲伤能够安睡，愿那悔恨的一族不要挣脱它们的锁链吧。可惜为时已晚！一支送葬的队伍缓缓滑过你的床前，其中，激情与情感化作了有形之躯，那些原本只存在于心中的事物，在你眼前变成了可怖的幽灵。那是你最早的悲伤，一位苍白年轻的哀悼者，模样像极了初恋，忧伤而美丽，那忧郁的面容中带着一种神圣的甜美，那黑色长袍飘拂间也自有一份优雅。接着出现的是一个昔日美貌已然凋零的幽影，她金色的发丝间沾满尘土，身上曾经鲜艳的衣裳如今全都褪色、残破不堪，她低垂着头，躲避着你的目光，仿佛畏惧责备；她曾是你最钟爱的希望，却是个虚幻的希望；如今你只能称她为“失望”了。接着来了一个更为严峻的身影，眉头满是皱纹，神情与举止都透着铁一般的威严；除了称他为“命数”，再也没有别的名字适合他了，他是主宰你命运的邪恶力量的象征；是个恶魔，你在人生之初的某个过错中，把自己交给了他，一旦顺从了他一次，便永远沦为了他的奴隶。看啊！那魔鬼般的容貌镌刻在黑暗之中，嘴角扭曲着讥讽的冷笑，那双活生生的眼睛里满是嘲弄，还有那根伸出的手指，正戳在你心中最痛的伤处！你可还记得自己曾做过什么荒唐至极的蠢事，即便藏身天涯海角最幽深的洞穴，也会为之羞愧脸红？那么，认出你的“羞耻”吧。

Pass, wretched band! Well for the wakeful one, if, riotously miserable, a fiercer tribe do not surround him, the devils of a guilty heart, that holds its hell within itself. What if Remorse should assume the features of an injured friend? What if the fiend should come in woman's garments, with a pale beauty amid sin and desolation, and lie down by your side? What if he should stand at your bed's foot, in the likeness of a corpse, with a bloody stain upon the shroud? Sufficient without such guilt is this nightmare of the soul; this heavy, heavy sinking of the spirits; this wintry gloom about the heart; this indistinct horror of the mind, blending itself with the darkness of the chamber.

走开吧，这一群可悲的东西！倘若这清醒的人不至于放纵地陷入更深的痛苦，不曾被一群更凶狠的部族——那罪孽深重之心里蕴藏着自身地狱的恶魔——所包围，那便算他幸运了。倘若“悔恨”竟化身为一位曾受你伤害的朋友的容貌，那该如何是好？倘若那恶魔竟穿着女子的衣裙，带着一种在罪孽与荒凉之中透出的苍白之美，躺到你的身边，那又该如何？倘若他竟站在你床脚之处，化作一具尸体的模样，裹尸布上还沾着血迹，那又该如何？即便没有这般深重的罪孽，单是这心灵的梦魇——这沉重、沉重的意志消沉——这萦绕心头的冬日般的阴郁——这与卧室的黑暗交融在一起、令人心生模糊恐惧的心绪——便已经够受的了。

By a desperate effort, you start upright, breaking from a sort of conscious sleep, and gazing wildly round the bed, as if the fiends were anywhere but in your haunted mind. At the same moment, the slumbering embers on the hearth send forth a gleam which palely illuminates the whole outer room, and flickers through the door of the bedchamber, but cannot quite dispel its obscurity. Your eye searches for whatever may remind you of the living world. With eager minuteness, you take note of the table near the fireplace, the book with an ivory knife between its leaves, the unfolded letter, the hat, and the fallen glove. Soon the flame vanishes, and with it the whole scene is gone, though its image remains an instant in your mind's eye, when darkness has swallowed the reality. Throughout the chamber, there is the same obscurity as before, but not the same gloom within your breast. As your head falls back upon the pillow, you think—in a whisper be it spoken—how pleasant in these night solitudes would be the rise and fall of a softer breathing than your own, the slight pressure of a tenderer bosom, the quiet throb of a purer heart, imparting its peacefulness to your troubled one, as if the fond sleeper were involving you in her dream.

你使出拼死的力气，猛然坐直了身子，从那种半梦半醒的状态中挣脱出来，惊惶地环视床的四周，仿佛那些恶魔并不在别处，正藏在你这颗萦绕着幽灵的心中一般。就在这同一时刻，炉膛里将熄未熄的余烬发出一丝微光，苍白地照亮了整个外间的房间，又透过卧室的门闪烁进来，却怎么也无法完全驱散屋内的幽暗。你的目光四处搜寻着，想找到任何能让你想起这活生生的尘世的东西。你带着急切而细致的目光，留意到炉边的那张桌子、夹着一把象牙裁纸刀的书本、摊开的信件、帽子，还有那只跌落在地的手套。不多时，那火光便熄灭了，随着它一同消失的，还有眼前的整个景象，尽管这景象的影像，在黑暗吞没现实之后，仍在你的心眼之中停留了片刻。整间屋子里，笼罩着与先前一样的幽暗，可你胸中的那份阴郁，却已不再相同。当你的头重新枕回枕头上时，你不禁想到——且容我低声说来——在这夜的孤寂之中，若能有一种比你自己更轻柔的呼吸此起彼伏，若能有一具更温柔的胸怀轻轻贴近，若能有一颗更纯洁的心安静地跳动着，把它的宁静传递给你这颗烦乱的心，仿佛那位含情的沉睡者正把你带入她的梦境之中——那该是何等惬意的事啊。

Her influence is over you, though she have no existence but in that momentary image. You sink down in a flowery spot, on the borders of sleep and wakefulness, while your thoughts rise before you in pictures, all disconnected, yet all assimilated by a pervading gladsomeness and beauty. The wheeling of gorgeous squadrons, that glitter in the sun, is succeeded by the merriment of children round the door of a school-house, beneath the glimmering shadow of old trees, at the corner of a rustic lane. You stand in the sunny rain of a summer shower, and wander among the sunny trees of an autumnal wood, and look upward at the brightest of all rainbows, overarching the unbroken sheet of snow, on the American side of Niagara. Your mind struggles pleasantly between the dancing radiance round the hearth of a young man and his recent bride, and the twittering flight of birds in spring, about their new-made nest. You feel the merry bounding of a ship before the breeze; and watch the tuneful feet of rosy girls, as they twine their last and merriest dance in a splendid ballroom; and find yourself in the brilliant circle of a crowded theatre, as the curtain falls over a light and airy scene.

她的影响笼罩着你，尽管她不过是那一瞬间的幻象，并无真实的存在。你沉入了一片繁花似锦之地，徘徊在睡与醒的边界之间，你的思绪在眼前化作一幅幅画面浮现而起，彼此毫不相干，却都被一种弥漫的欢愉与美感融为一体。华丽的方阵在阳光下闪耀盘旋而过，紧接着是孩子们在一所校舍门前嬉笑欢闹，那校舍坐落在乡间小路的拐角处，笼罩在古树摇曳的微光阴影之下。你站在夏日骤雨中那洒满阳光的雨幕里，又漫步在秋日树林里那片洒满阳光的树影间，抬头仰望着所有彩虹中最璀璨的一道，横跨在尼亚加拉美国一侧那片完整无缺的雪原之上。你的心思愉悦地在两幅画面间流连——一边是一个年轻人和他新婚妻子炉边跳跃的光影，一边是春日里群鸟啁啾着飞向它们新筑的巢穴。你感受到一艘船在微风中欢快地颠簸前行；又望着面色红润的姑娘们那踏着节拍的双脚，在一座华丽的舞厅里跳完她们最后、也是最欢快的一支舞；接着你又发觉自己置身于一座座无虚席的剧院那绚丽的圈子当中，帷幕正落在一幕轻盈飘逸的场景之上。

With an involuntary start, you seize hold on consciousness, and prove yourself but half awake, by running a doubtful parallel between human life and the hour which has now elapsed. In both you emerge from mystery, pass through a vicissitude that you can but imperfectly control, and are borne onward to another mystery. Now comes the peal of the distant clock, with fainter and fainter strokes as you plunge further into the wilderness of sleep. It is the knell of a temporary death. Your spirit has departed, and strays like a free citizen, among the people of a shadowy world, beholding strange sights, yet without wonder or dismay. So calm, perhaps, will be the final change; so undisturbed, as if among familiar things, the entrance of the soul to its Eternal home!

你不由自主地猛然一惊，抓住了那一丝清醒的意识，并借着在人生与刚刚过去的这一个时辰之间勾画出一种疑似的对应关系，证明了自己不过是半睡半醒罢了。在这两者之中，你都是从神秘中浮现，经历一段你只能不完全掌控的变迁，随后又被送往另一重神秘之中。此刻，远处的钟声又敲响了，随着你渐渐沉入睡眠的荒野，钟声也一声比一声微弱。这是一场短暂死亡的丧钟。你的灵魂已经离去，如同一个自由的公民，漫游在一个影影绰绰的世界的人群之中，目睹着种种奇异的景象，却既不惊奇，也不惧怕。也许，最终那场变迁也会是这般平静；灵魂步入它永恒的家园时，也会这般安然无扰，仿佛置身于熟悉的事物之间一般！