The sot or the duke? 酔っ払いか、王侯か [Emerson]

話：ラルフ・W・エマーソン『自己信頼』


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That popular fable of the sot who was picked up dead drunk in the street, carried to the duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the duke, and assured that he had been insane, owes its popularity to the fact that it symbolizes so well the state of man,

古昔（むかし）一人の泥酔者（sot）あり。路上に倒れて熟睡せしが、人これを某侯爵の邸宅に運び、その身を拭き清め、美衣を纏（まと）わしめ、侯爵の寝室に臥さしめ、その醒むるや之を遇すること真の侯爵（duke）におけるがごとく、儀容を尽くし鄭重を極め、「これまでは発狂し居たるなり（he had been insane）」と告げきかせし。という彼（か）の通俗なる寓話が、遍（あまね）く世人の記憶するところたる所以は、全くそが洵（まこと）に能（よ）く人間の現状を表象せるに因（よ）るなり。

who is the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason and finds himself a true prince.

げにや人はこの世界に在って泥酔者（sot）の如し。たまたま覚醒し、その理性（reason）を活用し、己の真の王侯たるを覚（さと）るなり。


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引用：Ralph Waldo Emerson『Self-Reliance』
訳：大谷正信『恵馬遜傑作集』自恃論