僕はそれでもヴォルテール

フランス語原文

ENLIGHTENMENT NOWのニューヨークタイムズの書評を読んで『カンディード』を読んだのですが、その本ではリスボン大地震について書いた詩も収められていました。Optimismを批判する為に書かれたそうですが、やるせなさを率直に書いた詩は心を打たれます。

(Wikipedia)

The Poème sur le désastre de Lisbonne (English title: Poem on the Lisbon Disaster) is a poem in French composed by Voltaire as a response to the 1755 Lisbon earthquake. It is widely regarded as an introduction to Voltaire's later acclaimed work Candide and his view on the problem of evil. The 180-line poem was composed in December 1755 and published in 1756. It is considered one of the most savage literary attacks on Optimism.[1]

最初の2節を紹介した英語訳の音声もありました。日本語訳は光文社古典新訳文庫にある斉藤悦則さんの訳です。

 Youtubeと訳は違いますが英語版の全文はこちら。

Poem on the Lisbon Disaster

Or an Inquiry into the Axiom, "All is Well"

リスボン大地震に寄せる詩

あるいは「すべては善である」という公理の検討［一七五六年］

Oh, miserable mortals! Oh wretched earth!

Oh, dreadful assembly of all mankind!

Eternal sermon of useless sufferings!

Deluded philosophers who cry, "All is well,"

Hasten, contemplate these frightful ruins,

This wreck, these shreds, these wretched ashes of the dead;

These women and children heaped on one another,

These scattered members under broken marble;

One-hundred thousand unfortunates devoured by the earth

Who, bleeding, lacerated, and still alive,

Buried under their roofs without aid in their anguish,

End their sad days!

おお、不幸な人間たち、おお、呪われた地球 

おお、死すべき者たちの恐ろしい群 

永遠に味わわされる無用な苦しみ

「すべては善である」と唱える歪んだ哲学者よ 

来い、すさまじい破壊のようすをよーく見るがいい 

その残骸、その瓦礫、その灰を見よ 

地面には、女たち、子どもたちの死体が重なる 

砕けた大理石のしたに、ひとの手

大地の餌食となった十万もの人間たちが 

深手を負い、血にまみれても、まだぴくぴく動いている 

落ちた屋根に埋まり、救援もなく、痛みと恐怖のなかで 

惨めに一生を終えようとしている

In answer to the half-formed cries of their dying voices,

At the frightful sight of their smoking ashes,

Will you say: "This is result of eternal laws

Directing the acts of a free and good God!"

Will you say, in seeing this mass of victims:

"God is revenged, their death is the price for their crimes?"

What crime, what error did these children,

Crushed and bloody on their mothers' breasts, commit?

Did Lisbon, which is no more, have more vices

Than London and Paris immersed in their pleasures?

Lisbon is destroyed, and they dance in Paris!

死にゆく者の言葉にならない叫びを聞いて 

あるいは、焼けた体からのぼる煙を見て 

哲学者は「こうなるのが永遠の法則だ」とか 

「法則は善なる神をも縛る」などと答えるのか

圧死した母親の血だらけの乳房にすがりつく赤子は 

この世でどんな罪、どんな過ちを犯したというのだ 

壊滅したリスボンは、歓楽の都市パリやロンドンよりも 

悪徳にまみれていたのか

リスボンは海に飲みこまれ、パリではひとびとが踊る

1755年に起きたリスボン大地震はドキュメンタリーの題材にもなるほどの大災害だったそうです。 ヴォルテールがこの詩を書いた経緯やOptimisに対する態度などは文庫本の解説がわかりやすく書いてくれています。

こちらがNYTの書評です。本の内容を肯定的に捉えています。

Steven Pinker Continues to See the Glass Half Full

By SARAH BAKEWELLMARCH 2, 2018

Optimism is not generally thought cool, and it is often thought foolish. The optimistic philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote in 1828, “I have observed that not the man who hopes when others despair, but the man who despairs when others hope, is admired by a large class of persons as a sage.” In the previous century, Voltaire’s “Candide” had attacked what its author called “optimism”: the Leibnizian idea that all must be for the best in this best of all possible worlds. After suffering through one disaster after another, Candide decides that optimism is merely “a mania for insisting that all is well when things are going badly.”

Yet one might argue (and Steven Pinker does) that the philosophy Voltaire satirizes here is not optimism at all. If you think this world is already as good as it gets, then you just have to accept it. A true optimist would say that, although human life will never be perfect, crucial aspects of it can improve if we work at it, for example by refining building standards and seismological predictions so that fewer people die in earthquakes. It’s not “best,” but it is surely better.

同じNYTのこちらの書評は批判的に書いています。

Steven Pinker Wants You to Know Humanity Is Doing Fine. Just Don’t Ask About Individual Humans.

Books of The Times

By JENNIFER SZALAI FEB. 28, 2018

いくらピンカーがA true optimist would say that, although human life will never be perfect, crucial aspects of it can improve if we work at itと言ったところで、メッセージそのものは同じだと思うんですよね。It’s not “best,” but it is surely better.とありますが、今良いと言おうが、これから良くなると言おうが、世界を肯定しようとする点においては変わらないからです。再びヴォルテールの詩の抜粋です。

Without offense to my master, 

I humbly wish Only that the pit of fire and sulphur had erupted, 

Spewing its fires in the desert wastes.

I respect my God, but I love the universe.

When one dares to moan of a terrible scourge, 

It’s not arrogance; alas, it’s sensitivity!

私は主に抗わず、ただ控え目に願う 

硫黄が燃える地獄の業火は

奥地の砂漠で噴き出してほしかった 

私は神を敬うが、人間の住む地球を私は愛する 

悲惨な災害にたいして人間が吐き出す声は 

思い上がりの声ではなく、痛みを共感する声だ

In the midst of their torments, would it comfort

The sad inhabitants of these desolate shores

If someone said to them: “Fall, die in peace;

Your homes are destroyed for the good of the world; 

Other hands will rebuild your ruined palaces;

Other people will be born from the rubble of your walls; 

The North will grow rich from your terrible loss.

To the universal law, all your troubles are for the best.

To God, you are the same as the vile worms 

Waiting for you at the bottom of your graves”? 

What a horrible speech to the unfortunate!

Do not add such cruelty to their pain.

テージョ川の両岸で、責め苦を受ける被災者たちに 

こんな言葉をかけたら、はたして慰めになるだろうか 

「安らかに死ね、世界の幸福の犠牲になれたぞ 

宮殿は燃え落ちても、べつの人がまた建てる

おまえがこうむる悪はすべて、全体の法則で善なのだ 

神の目から見れば、おまえはおまえの墓のしたで 

おまえの体を食うウジ虫と同等の存在にすぎない」 

不幸なひとびとにむかっての、何と恐ろしい言葉 

残酷な哲学者よ、私の心の痛みを憤りに変えたいのか