If Music Be The Food Of Love from Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

 

《假如音乐是爱情的粮食》，节选自《第十二夜》，莎士比亚

If music be the food of love, play on;

假如音乐是爱情的食粮，那么奏下去吧；

Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting the appetite may sicken, and so die.

尽量地奏下去，好让爱情因过饱噎塞而死。

That strain again! it had a dying fall.

又奏起这个调子来了！它有一种渐渐消沉下去的节奏。

O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound, that breathes upon a bank of violets, stealing and giving odour!

啊！它经过我的耳畔，就像微风吹拂一丛紫罗兰，发出轻柔的声音，一面把花香偷走，一面又把花香分送。

Enough, no more. Tis not so sweet now as it was before.

够了！别再奏下去了！它现在已经不像原来那样甜蜜了。

O spirit of love! How quick and fresh art thou, that, not with standing thy capacity receiveth as the sea, nought enters there, of what validity and pitch soe'er, but falls into abatement and low price, even in a minute.

爱情的精灵呀！你是多么敏感而活泼；虽然你有海―样的容量，可是无论怎样高贵超越的事物，一进了你的范围，便会在顷刻间失去了它的价值。

So full of shapes is fancy that it alone is high fantastical.

爱情是这样充满了意象，在一切事物中是最富于幻想的。