What I Have Lived For
by Bertrand Russell
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This prelude is the prologue to Bertrand Russell's Autobiography, in which the philosopher reflects on the three great passions that governed his life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, 'like great winds', blew him across a 'great ocean of anguish' to the verge of despair. He sought love for the ecstasy it brings, because it relieves loneliness, and because in the union of love he glimpsed a 'mystic miniature' of heaven. With equal passion he sought knowledge, to understand people, to know why the stars shine and to grasp the power of number, achieving 'a little of this, but not much'. Yet pity always brought him back to earth: the cries of children in famine, of the tortured and the lonely, made 'a mockery of what human life should be'. He longs to relieve this evil but cannot, and so suffers too. He concludes that this has been his life, and he 'would gladly live it again'.
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'What I Have Lived For' is the moving prologue to the Autobiography of the philosopher Bertrand Russell. In it he distils the meaning of his whole life into three simple yet 'overwhelmingly strong' passions that guided him.
The three ruling passions
Russell names his three passions: 'the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind.' These passions, 'like great winds', blew him 'hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a great ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.'
Love and knowledge
He sought love, first, for the 'ecstasy' it brings, so great that he 'would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy'; next, because it relieves the 'terrible loneliness' of one consciousness peering into a 'cold unfathomable lifeless abyss'; and finally, because in the union of love he saw 'the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined'.
With equal passion he sought knowledge, to understand the hearts of people, to know why the stars shine and to apprehend 'the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux'. Of this, he admits, he achieved 'a little… but not much'.
Pity and the meaning of his life
Love and knowledge led him 'upward towards the heavens', but pity always brought him 'back to earth'. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in his heart, 'children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people… loneliness, poverty and pain', which 'make a mockery of what human life should be'. He longs to relieve this evil but cannot, and so he too suffers.
He concludes simply: 'This has been my life. I have found it worth living and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.' The passage is a profound meditation on love, learning and compassion as the sources of a meaningful life.