激情晨读英语美文50篇 双语1-6

Chapter One Human Life Like a Poem 人生如诗

I think that, from a biological standpoint, human life almost reads like a poem.

我以为，从生物学角度看，人的一生恰如诗歌。

It has its own rhythm and beat, its internal cycles of growth and decay.

人生自有其韵律和节奏，自有内在的生成与衰亡。

No one can say that a life with childhood, manhood and old age is not a beautiful arrangement; 人生有童年、少年和老年，谁也不能否认这是一种美好的安排，

the day has its morning, noon and sunset, and the year has its seasons, and it is good

一天要有清晨、正午和日落，一年要有四季之分，如此才好。

that it is so. There is no good or bad in life, except what is good according to its own season.

人生本无好坏之分，只是各个季节有各自的好处。

And if we take this biological view of life and try to live according to the seasons, no one but a conceited fool or an impossible idealist can deny that human life can be lived like a poem.

如若我们持此种生物学的观点，并循着季节去生活，除了狂妄自大的傻瓜和无可救药的理想主义者，谁能说人生不能像诗一般度过呢。

——Lin Yutang

1.We Are on a Journey人在旅途

By Henry Van Dyke

Wherever you are, and whoever you maybe, there is one thing in which you and I are just alike at this moment, and in all the moments of our existence. We are not at rest; we are on a journey, our life is a movement, a tendency, a steady, ceaseless progress towards an unseen goal. We are gaining something, or losing something, everyday. Even when our position and our character seem to remain precisely the same, they are changing. For the mere advance of time is a change. It is not the same thing to have a bare field in January and in July, the season makes the difference. The limitations that are childlike in the child are childish in the man.

无论你在何处，无论你是何人，此刻，而且在我们生命的每时每刻，你与我有一点是类似的。我们不是在休息，我们在旅途中。生命是一种运动，一种趋势，一个稳步、持续的通往一个未知目标的过程。每天，我们都在获得，或失去。尽管我们的地位和性格看起来好像一点都没变，但是它们在变化。因为时光的流逝本身是一种变化。在一月和七月拥有一片贫瘠的土地是不同的，是季节本身带来了变化。孩童时可爱的缺点到了成人时便成了幼稚。

Everything that we do is a step in one direction or another, even the failure to do something is in itself a deed. It sets us forward or backward. The action of the negative pole of a magnetic needle is just as real as the action of the positive pole. To decline is to accept – the other alternative.

我们做的每件事都是迈向一个或另外一个方向，甚至“什么都没做”本身也是一种行为，它让我们前进或倒退。一棵磁针的阴极的作用与阳极是一样的。拒绝即接受??接受反面。

Are you nearer to your port today than you were yesterday? Yes, -- you must be a little nearer to some port or other; for since your ship was first lunched upon the sea of life, you have never been still for a single moment; the sea is too deep, you could not find an anchorage if you would. There can be no pause until you come into port.

你今天比昨天更加接近你的目标了吗？是的，你肯定是离一个或另一个码头或更近一些了。因为自从你的小船从生命的海洋上启航时，你没有哪一刻是停止的。大海是这样深，你想抛锚时找不到地方。在你驶入码头之前，你不可能停留。

2. The True Nobility真正的高贵

By Ernest Hemingway

In a calm sea every man is a pilot.

在风平浪静的大海上,每个人都是领航员。

But all sunshine without shade, all pleasure without pain, is not life at all. Take the lot of the happiest - it is a tangled yarn. Bereavements and blessings, one following another, make us sad and blessed by turns. Even death itself makes life more loving. Men come closest to their true selves in the sober moments of life, under the shadows of sorrow and loss.

但只有阳光没有阴影,只有快乐没有痛苦,根本不是真正的生活.就拿最幸福的人来说,他的生活也是一团缠结在一起的乱麻。痛苦与幸福交替出现,使得我们一会悲伤一会高兴。甚至死亡本身都使得生命更加可爱。在人生清醒的时刻,在悲伤与失落的阴影之下,人们与真实的自我最为接近。

In the affairs of life or of business, it is not intellect that tells so much as character, not brains so much as heart, not genius so much as self-control, patience, and discipline, regulated by judgment.

在生活和事业的种种事务之中，性格比才智更能指导我们，心灵比头脑更能引导我们，而由判断获得的克制、耐心和教养比天分更能让我们受益。

I have always believed that the man who has begun to live more seriously within begins to live more simply without. In an age of extravagance and waste, I wish I could show to the world how few the real wants of humanity are.

我一向认为，内心生活开始更为严谨的人，他的外在生活也会变得更为简朴。在物欲横流的年代，但愿我能向世人表明：人类的真正需求少得多么可怜。

To regret one's errors to the point of not repeating them is true repentance. There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self.

反思自己的过错不至于重蹈覆辙才是真正的悔悟。高人一等并没有什么值得夸耀的。真正的高贵是优于过去的自己。

3. The World as I See It我的世界观

By Albert Einstein

How strange is the lot of us mortals! Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose he knows not, though he sometimes thinks he senses it. But without deeper reflection one knows from daily life that one exists for other people—first of all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness is wholly dependent, and then for the many, unknown to us, to whose destinies we are bound by the ties of sympathy. A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving. I am strongly drawn to a frugal life and am often oppressively aware that I am engrossing an undue amount of the labor of my fellowmen. I regard class distinctions as unjustified and, in the last resort, based on force. I also believe that a simple and unassuming life is good for everybody, physically and mentally.

我们这些肉体凡胎是多么奇怪啊！每个人来到这个世上都只作短暂停留，究竟为了什么目的却无从知晓，虽然有时觉得自己好像有所感悟。但是，无需深入思考，仅从日常生活就可明白，人是为他人而存在的——首先是为这样一些人：他们的欢笑、健康和福祉与我们的幸福息息相关；其次是为那些为数众多的陌生人，因为同情他们，使得我们与他们的命运联系在了一起。每一天，我都上百次地提醒自己，我的精神和物质生活都是建立在他人(包括生者和死者)的劳动基础上，对于我已经得到和正在得到的一切，我必须尽力给以相同程度的回报。我深深向往一种俭朴的生活，由于经常意识到自己占用了同胞太多的劳动而心有不安。我认为阶级区分是不正当的，其最终的达成方式常常诉诸暴力。我还认为，无论是在身体上还是心理上，过一种简单而不铺张浪费的生活对每个人都有好处。

I do not at all believe in human freedom in the philosophical sense. Everybody acts not only under external compulsion but also in accordance with inner necessity. Schopenhauer’s saying, “A man can do what he wants, but not want what he wants,” has been a very real inspiration to me since my youth; it has been a continual consolation in the face of life’s hardships, my own and others’, and an unfailing wellsp ring of tolerance. This realization mercifully mitigates the easily paralyzing sense of responsibility and prevents us from taking ourselves and other people all too seriously; it is conducive to a view of life which, in particular, gives humor its due.

我完全不相信哲学意义上的人的自由。每个人的行为不仅受外在力量的约束，还要与内在需求协调一致。叔本华说：“人可以任意而为，却不能心想事成。”这句话从我年轻时起就一直深深地启发着我。在面对生活的艰辛时——无论是我自己还是他人的艰辛，这句话总能不断地给我安慰，成为永不枯竭的忍耐的源泉。这一认识能够仁慈地缓和那份令人几欲崩溃的责任感，并防止我们太把自己或者他人当回事，还有助于形成一种尤其幽默的人生观。

To inquire after the meaning or object of one’s own existe nce or that of all creatures has always seemed to me absurd from an objective point of view. And yet everybody has certain ideals which determine the direction of his endeavors and his judgments. In this sense I have never looked upon ease and happiness as ends in themselves—this ethical basis I call the ideal of a pigsty. The ideals which have lighted my way and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth. Without the sense of kinship with

men of like mind, without the occupation with the objective world, the eternally unattainable in the field of art and scientific endeavors, life would have seemed to me empty. The trite objects of human efforts—possessions, outward success, luxury—have always seemed to me contemptible. 客观地说，探求自己或者其他所有生命存在的意义或者目标，我一直都认为是荒唐之举。然而，每个人多少都有自己的理想，决定着他的奋斗目标和他对事情的看法。从这个意义上说，我从来都不会把安逸和幸福看作终极目标——我将这种伦理道德的基础称之为“猪圈理想”。一直以来，是对真、善、美的追求照亮了我的道路，一次又一次给我以新的勇气，让我愉快地面对生活。如果没有对志同道合者的那种亲近感，如果没有对客观世界——那个艺术和科学研究永远也无法穷极的世界——的孜孜以求，生命对我来说就是一场空。那些向来为世人竞相追求的目标——财产、奢华和外在的成功——我对此不屑一顾。

4. Love Your Life热爱生活

By Henry David Thoreau

However mean your life is, meet it and live it

不论你的生活如何卑微，你都得面对与度过

do not shun it and call it hard names

不要逃避，更不要抱怨

it is not so bad as you are

生活不像你认为的那般坏

It looks poorest when you are richest

当你富甲天下之时，生活却显得贫瘠乏味

The fault finder will find faults in paradise

即使在天堂，爱找缺点的人也能找到缺点。

Love your life, poor as it is

即使生活贫穷，你也该热爱生活

You may perhaps have some pleasant, thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poor-house

因为就是在贫济院，你也有自己快乐激动与光荣的岁月

The setting sun is reflected from the windows of the almshouse as brightly as from the rich man's abode

夕阳照在贫济院窗上的反光与照在富人家的一样耀目

The snow melts before its door as early in the spring.

其门前的积雪也同样在早春融化

I do not see but a quiet mind may live as contentedly there

我只是看到，一个心绪宁静的人就算居住在贫济院，生活起来也会心满意足。

And have as cheering thoughts, as in a palace.

思想愉悦，如同生活在皇宫中一样。

The town`s poor seem to me often to live the most independent lives of any.

在我看来，城镇中的贫民大凡过着最为无拘无束的生活。

Maybe they are simply great enough to receive without misgiving.

或许他们只是超乎寻常，不然岂会毫无疑惧地接受这一切。

Most think that they are above being supported by the town.

大多数人认为自己超凡脱俗而无须依赖城镇的资助

5.The Road to Happiness通往幸福的道路

By Bertrand Russell

If you look around at the men and women whom you can call happy, you will see that they all hav e certain things in common. The most important of these things is an activity which at most grad ually builds up something that you are glad to see coming into existence. Women who take an ins tinctive pleasure in their children can get this kind of satisfaction out of bringing up a family. Artis ts and authors and men of science get happiness in this way if their own work seems good to the m. But there are many humbler forms of the same kind of pleasure. Many men who spend their working life in the city devote their weekends to voluntary and unremunerated toil in their garde ns, and when the spring comes, they experience all the joys of having created beauty.

只要你观察一下周围那些你可称之为幸福的男男女女，就会看出他们都有某些共同之处。在这些共同之处中有一点是最重要的：那就是活动本身，它在大多数情况下本身就很有趣，而且可逐渐的使你的愿望得以实现。生性喜爱孩子的妇女，能够从抚养子女中得到这种满足。艺术家、作家和科学家如果对自己的工作感到满意，也能以同样的方式得到快乐。不过，还有很多是较低层次的快乐。许多在城里工作的人到了周末自愿地在自家的庭院里做无偿的劳动，春天来时，他们就可尽情享受自己创造的美景带来的快乐。

The whole subject of happiness has, in my opinion, been treated too solemnly. It had been thoug ht that man cannot be happy without a theory of life or a religion. Perhaps those who have been rendered unhappy by a bad theory may need a better theory to help them to recovery, just as yo u may need a tonic when you have been ill. But when things are normal a man should be healthy without a tonic and happy without a theory. It is the simple things that really matter. If a man deli ghts in his wife and children, has success in work, and finds pleasure in the alternation of day and night, spring and autumn, he will be happy whatever his philosophy may be. If, on the other han d, he finds his wife fateful, his children's noise unendurable, and the office a nightmare; if in the d aytime he longs for night, and at night sighs for the light of day, then what he needs is not a new philosophy but a new regimen--a different diet, or more exercise, or what not.

在我看来，整个关于快乐的话题一向都被太严肃的对待过了。过去一直有这样的看法：如果

没有一种生活的理论或者宗教信仰，人是不可能幸福的。也许那些由于理论不好才导致不快乐的人需要一种较好的理论帮助他们重新快活起来，就像你生过病需要吃补药一样。但是，正常情况下，一个人不吃补药也应当是健康的；没有理论也应当是幸福的。真正有关系的是一些简单的事情。如果一个男人喜爱他的妻子儿女，事业有成，而且无论白天黑夜，春去秋来，总是感到高兴，那么不管他的理论如何，都会是快乐的。反之，如果他讨厌自己的妻子，受不了孩子们的吵闹，而且害怕上班；如果他白天盼望夜晚，而到了晚上又巴望着天明，那么，他所需要的就不是一种新的理论，而是一种新的生活——改变饮食习惯，多锻炼身体等等。

Man is an animal, and his happiness depends on his physiology more than he likes to think. This is a humble conclusion, but I cannot make myself disbelieve it. Unhappy businessmen, I am convi nced, would increase their happiness more by walking six miles every day than by any conceivabl e change of philosophy.

人是动物，他的幸福更多的时候取决于其生理状况而非思想状况。这是一个很庸俗的结论，然而我无法使自己怀疑它。我确信，不幸福的商人与其找到新的理论来使自己幸福，还不如每天步行六英里更见效。

6. Work, Labor, and Play 工作、劳作和娱乐

By Wystan Hugh Auden

So far as I know, Miss Hannah Arendt was the first person to define the essential difference betw een work and labor. To be happy, a man must feel, firstly, free and, secondly, important. He canno t be really happy if he is compelled by society to do what he does not enjoy doing, or if what he e njoys doing is ignored by society as of no value or importance. In a society where slavery in the st rict sense has been abolished, the sign that what a man does is of social value is that he is paid m oney to do it, but a laborer today can rightly be called a wage slave. A man is a laborer if the job s ociety offers him is of no interest to himself but he is compelled to take it by the necessity of earn ing a living and supporting his family.

据我所知，汉纳·阿伦特小姐是第一个给予工作和劳作之间本质区别的人。一个人要高兴，首先要感到自由，其次是感到重要。如果他被社会强迫做他不愿做的事，或者他喜欢做的事被社会忽视，被认为无价值和不重要，他就不会真正高兴。在一个从严格意义上来说奴隶制已被废除的社会里，一个人所做的事情具有社会价值的樗是他的工作得到了报酬。但今天的劳动者可以恰当地称为薪金的奴隶。如果他对社会提供给他的工作不感兴趣，但出于谋生和养家而被迫接受，这个人就称为劳作者。

The antithesis to labor is play. When we play a game, we enjoy what we are doing, otherwise we should not play it, but it is a purely private activity; society could not care less whether we play it or not.

与劳作相对的是玩，当玩耍时我们在享受，否则是不会去玩的，不过这纯粹是私人活动，社会对你玩或不玩是极不关心的。

Between labor and play stands work. A man is a worker if he is personally interested in the job w hich society pays him to do; what from the point of view of society is necessary labor is from his o

wn point of view voluntary play. Whether a job is to be classified as labor or work depends, not o n the job itself, but on the tastes of the individual who undertakes it. The difference does not,for example, coincide with the difference between a manual and a mental job; a gardener or a cobbl er may be a worker, a bank clerk a laborer. Which a man is can be seen from his attitude toward l eisure. To a worker, leisure means simply the hours he needs to relax and rest in order to work eff iciently. He is therefore more likely to take too little leisure than too much; workers die of coronar ies and forget their wives' birthdays. To the laborer, on the other hand, leisure means freedom fr om compulsion, so that it is natural for him to imagine that the fewer hours he has to spend labor ing, and the more hours he is free to play, the better.

处于劳作和玩之间的是工作。如果一个人对社会付酬给他的工作感兴趣的话，他就是工作者；从社会的观点看，工作是必要的劳作也是个人心目中自愿的玩。例如：这个区别不同于体力劳动和脑力劳动之间的区别；一个园艺工人或一个补鞋匠可能是工作者，一个银行职员可能是劳作者。一个人属于哪一种可以从他对休闲的态度看出来。对于工作者来说，休闲只是他为了有效地工作而放松和休息的时间，所以他可能少休息而不是多休闲。工作者可能致于冠状动脉血栓症，忘记妻子的生日。反之，对于劳作者来说，休闲意味着从强迫中的摆脱，因此他们会很自然地想花在工作上的时间越少，自由自在玩的时间越多就越好。