《高考英语晨读美文六100篇》
晨读英语美文100篇前20篇之欧阳美创编
星火书业晨读英语美文100篇六级Passage1. Knowledge and VirtueKnowledge is one thing, virtue is another; good sense is not conscience, refinement is not humility, nor is largeness and justness of view faith. Philosophy, however enlightened, however profound, gives no command over the passions, no influential motives, no vivifying principles. Liberal Education makes not the Christian, not the Catholic,but the gentleman. It is well to be a gentleman, it is well to have a cultivated intellect, a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind, a noble and courteous bearing in the conduct of life—these are the connatural qualities of a large knowledge; they are the objects of a University. I am advocating, I shall illustrate and insist upon them; but still, I repeat, they are no guarantee for sanctity or even for conscientiousness, andthey may attach to the man of the world, to the profligate, to the heartless, pleasant, alas, and attractive as he shows when decked out in them. Taken by themselves, they do but seem to be what they are not; they look like virtue at a distance, but they are detected by close observers, and in the long run; and hence it is that they are popularly accused of pretense and hypocrisy, not, I repeat, from their own fault, but because their professorsand their admirers persist in taking them for what they are not,and are officious in arrogating for them a praise to which they have no claim. Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk, then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants,the passion and the pride of man.Passage2. “Packing” a PersonA person, like a commodity, needs packaging. But going too far is absolutely undesirable. A little exaggeration, however, does no harm when it shows the person's unique qualities to their advantage. To display personal charm in a casual and natural way, it is important for one to have a clear knowledge of oneself. A master packager knows how to integrate art and nature without any traces of embellishment, so that the person so packaged is no commodity but a human being, lively and lovely. A young person, especially a female, radiant with beauty and full of life, has all the favor granted by God. Any attempt to make up would be self-defeating. Youth, however, comes and goes in a moment of doze. Packaging for the middle-aged is primarily to conceal the furrows ploughed by time. If you still enjoy life's exuberance enough to retain self-confidence and pursue pioneering work, you are unique in your natural qualities, and your charm and grace will remain. Elderly people are beautiful if their river of life has been, through plains, mountainsand jungles, running its course as it should. You have really lived your life which now arrives at a complacent stage of serenity indifferent to fame or wealth. There is no need to resort to hair-dyeing；the snow-capped mountain is itself a beautiful scene of fairyland. Let your looks change from young to old synchronizing with the natural ageing process so as to keep in harmony with nature, for harmony itself is beauty, while the other way round will only end in unpleasantness. To be in the elder's company is like reading a thick book of deluxe edition that fascinates one so much as to be reluctant to part with. As long as one finds where one stands, one knows how to package oneself, just as a commodity establishes its brand by the right packaging.Passage3. Three Passions I Have Lived for Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy —ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness —that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what—at last—I have found. With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine ... A little of this, but not much, I have achieved. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people —a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human lifeshould be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.Passage4. A Little GirlSitting on a grassy grave, beneath one of the windows of the church, was a little girl. With her head bent back she was gazing up at the sky and singing, while one of her little hands was pointing to a tiny cloud that hovered like a golden feather above her head. The sun, which had suddenly become very bright, shining on her glossy hair, gave it a metallic luster, and it was difficult to say what was the color, dark bronze or black. So completely absorbed was she in watching the cloud to which her strange song or incantation seemed addressed, that she did not observe me when I rose and went towards her. Over her head, high up in the blue, a lark that was soaring towards the same gauzy cloud was singing, as if in rivalry. As I slowly approached the child, I could see by her forehead, which in the sunshine seemed like a globe of pearl, and especiallyby her complexion, that she uncommonly lovely. Her eyes, which at one moment seemed blue-gray, at another violet, were shaded by long black lashes, curving backward in a most peculiar way, and these matched in hue her eyebrows, and the tresses that were tossed about her tender throat were quivering in the sunlight. All this I did not take in at once; for at first I could see nothing but those quivering, glittering, changeful eyes turned up into my face. Gradually the other features, especially the sensitive full-lipped mouth, grew upon me as I stood silently gazing. Here seemed to me a more perfect beauty than had ever come to me in my loveliest dreams of beauty. Yet it was not her beauty so much as the look she gave me that fascinated me, melted me. Passage5 Declaration of Independence When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declarethe causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Libertyand the pursuit of Happiness. —That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience has shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absoluteDespotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.Passage6. A Tribute to the DogThe best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it most. A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor whensuccess is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is his dog. A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer; he will lick the wounds and sores that come from encounter with the roughness of the world. He will guard the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journeys through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth, an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless，the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him, to guard him against danger, to fight against his enemies. And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace, andhis body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the grave will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death.Passage7. Knowledge and Progress Why does the idea of progress loom so large in the modern world? Surely because progress of a particular kind is actually taking place around us and is becoming more and more manifest. Although mankind has undergone no general improvement in intelligence or morality, it has made extraordinary progress in the accumulation of knowledge. Knowledge began to increase as soon as the thoughts of one individual could be communicated to another by means of speech. With the invention of writing， a great advance was made, for knowledge could then be not only communicated but also stored. Libraries made education possible, and education in its turn added to libraries: the growth of knowledge followed a kind of compound interest law, which was greatly enhanced by the invention of printing. All this was comparatively slow until, with the coming ofscience,the tempo was suddenly raised. Then knowledge began to be accumulated according to a systematic plan. The trickle became a stream; the stream has now become a torrent. Moreover, as soon as new knowledge is acquired, it is now turned to practical account. What is called “modern civilization” is not the result of a balanced development of all man's nature, but of accumulated knowledge applied to practical life. The problem now facing humanity is: What is going to be done with all this knowledge? As is so often pointed out, knowledge is a two-edged weapon which can be used equally for good or evil. It is now being used indifferently for both. Could any spectacle, for instance, be more grimly weird than that of gunners using science to shatter men's bodies while, close at hand, surgeons use it to restore them? We have to ask ourselves very seriously what will happen if this twofold use of knowledge, with its ever-increasing power, continues.Passage8. Address by Engels On the 14th of March, at a quarter to three in the afternoon, the greatest living thinker ceased to think.He had been left alone for scarcely two minutes, and when we came back we found him in his armchair,peacefully gone to sleep—but forever. An immeasurable loss has been sustained both by the militant proletariat of Europe and America, and by historical science, in the death of this man. The gap that has been left by the departure of this mighty spirit will soon enough make itself felt. Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology,that mankind must first of all eat, drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, religion, etc.; that therefore the production of the immediate material means of subsistence and consequently the degree of economic development attained by a given people or during a given epoch form the foundation upon which the state institutions, the legal conceptions, art, and even the ideas on religion, of the people concerned have been evolved, and in the light of which they must, therefore, be explained, instead of vice versa, as hadhitherto been the case. But that is not all. Marx also discovered the special law of motion governing the present-day capitalist mode of production and the bourgeois society that this mode of production has created. The discovery of surplus value suddenly threw light on the problem, in trying to solve which all previous investigations, of both bourgeois economists and socialist critics, had been groping in the dark. Two such discoveries would be enough for one lifetime. Happy the man to whom it is granted to make even one such discovery. But in every single field which Marx investigated—and he investigated very many fields, none of them superficially—in every field, even in that of mathematics, he made independent discoveries. Passage9. Relationship that Lasts If somebody tells you,“ I’ll love you for ever,” will you believe it? I don’t think there’s any reason not to. We are ready to believe such commitment at the moment, whatever change may happen afterwards. As for t he belief in an everlasting love, that’s another thing. Then you may be asked whether there is such a thing as an everlasting love. I’d answer I believe init, but an everlasting love is not immutable.You may unswervingly love or be loved by a person. But love will change its composition with the passage of time. It will not remain the same. In the course of your growth and as a result of your increased experience, love will become something different to you. In the beginning you believed a fervent love for a person could last definitely. By and by, however, “fervent” gave way to “prosaic”. Precisely because of this change it became possible for love to last. Then what was meant by an everlasting love would eventually end up in a sort of interdependence. We used to insist on the difference between love and liking. The former seemed much more beautiful than the latter. One day, however, it turns out there’s really no need to make such difference. Liking is actually a sort of love. By the same token, the everlasting interdependence is actually an everlasting love. I wish I could believe there was somebody who would love me for ever. That’s, as we all know, too romantic to be true. Instead, it will more often than not be a case of lasting relationship.Passage10. Rush Swallows may have gone, but there is a time of return; willow trees may have died back, but there is a time of regreening; peach blossoms may have fallen, but they will bloom again. Now, you the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? If they had been stolen by someone, who could it be? Where could he hide them? If they had made the escape themselves, then where could they stay at the moment? I don’t know how many days I have been given to spend, but I do feel my hands are getting empty. Taking stock silently, I find that more than eight thousand days have already slid away from me. Like a drop of water from the point of a needle disappearing into the ocean, my days are dripping into the stream of time, soundless, traceless. Already sweat is starting on my forehead, and tears welling up in my eyes. Those that have gone have gone for good, those to come keep coming; yet in between, how fast is the shift, in such a rush? When I get up in the morning, the slanting sun marks its presence in my small room in two or three oblongs. The sun has feet, look, he is treading on, lightly and furtively; and Iam caught, blankly, in his revolution. Thus — the day flows away through the sink when I wash my hands, wears off in the bowl when I eat my meal, and passes away before my day-dreaming gaze as reflect in silence. I can feel his haste now, so I reach out my hands to hold him back, but he keeps flowing past my withholding hands. In the evening, as I lie in bed, he strides over my body, glides past my feet, in his agile way. The moment I open my eyes and meet the sun again, one whole day has gone. I bury my face in my hands and heave a sigh. But the new day begins to flash past in the sigh. What can I do, in this bustling world, with my days flying in their escape? Nothing but to hesitate, to rush. What have I been doing in that eight-thousand-day rush, apart from hesitating? Those bygone days have been dispersed as smoke by a light wind, or evaporated as mist by the morning sun. What traces have I left behind me? Have I ever left behind any gossamer traces at all? I have come to the world, stark naked; am I to go back, in a blink, in the same stark nakedness? It is not fair though: why should I have made such a trip for nothing! You the wise, tell me, why should our daysleave us, never to return?Passage11. A Summer Day One day thirty years ago Marseilles lay in the burning sun. A blazing sun upon a fierce August day was no greater rarity in southern Francethan at any other time before or since. Everything in Marseilles and about Marseilles had stared at the fervid sun, and had been stared at in return, until a staring habit had become universal there. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away. The only things to be seen not fixedly staring and glaring were the vines drooping under their loads of grapes. These did occasionally wink a little, as the hot air barely moved their faint leaves.The universal stare made the eyes ache. Towards the distant blue of the Italian coast, indeed, it was a little relieved by light clouds of mist slowly rising from the evaporation of the sea, but it softened nowhere else. Far away the dusty vines overhanging wayside cottages, and the monotonous wayside avenues of parched trees without shade, droppedbeneath the stare of earth and sky. So did the horses with drowsy bells, in long files of carts, creeping slowly towards the interior; so did their recumbent drivers, when they were awake, which rarely happened; so did the exhausted laborers in the fields. Everything that lived or grew was oppressed by the glare; except the lizard, passing swiftly over rough stone walls, and cicada, chirping its dry hot chirp, like a rattle. The very dust was scorched brown, and something quivered in the atmosphere as if the air itself were panting. Blinds, shutters, curtains, awnings, were all closed and drawn to deep out the stare. Grant it but a chink or a keyhole, and it shot in like a white-hot arrow. Passage12. NightNight has fallen over the country. Through the trees rises the red moon and the stars are scarcely seen. In the vast shadow of night, the coolness and the dews descend. I sit at the open window to enjoy them; and hear only the voice of the summer wind. Like black hulks, the shadows of the great trees ride at anchor on the billowy sea of grass. I cannot see the red and blue flowers, but I know that they are there. Far away inthe meadow gleams the silver Charles. The tramp of horses' hoofs sounds from the wooden bridge. Then all is still save the continuous wind or the sound of the neighboring sea. The village clock strikes; and I feel that I am not alone. How different it is in the city! It is late, and the crowd is gone. You step out upon the balcony, and lie in the very bosom of the cool, dewy night as if you folded her garments about you. Beneath lies the public walk with trees, like a fathomless, black gulf. The lamps are still burning up and down the long street. People go by with grotesque shadows, now foreshortened, and now lengthening away into the darkness and vanishing, while a new one springs up behind the walker, and seems to pass him revolving like the sail of a windmill. The iron gates of the park shut with a jangling clang. There are footsteps and loud voices; —a tumult; —a drunken brawl; —an alarm of fire; —then silence again. And now at length the city is asleep, and we can see the night. The belated moon looks over the roofs, and finds no one to welcome her. The moonlight is broken. It lieshere and there in the squares and the opening of the streets—angular like blocks of white marble.Passage13. Peace and Development: the Themes of Our TimesPeace and development are the themes of the times. People across the world should join hands in advancing the lofty cause of peace and development of mankind. A peaceful environment is indispensable for national, regional and even global development. Without peace or political stability there would be no economic progress to speak of. This has been fully proved by both the past and the present. In today’s world, the international situation is, on the whole, moving towards relaxation. However, conflicts and even local wars triggered by various factors have kept cropping up, and tension still remains in some areas. All this has impeded the economic development of the countries and regions concerned, and has also adversely affected the world economy. All responsible statesmen and governments must abide by the purposes of the UN Charter and the universally acknowledged norms governing international relations, and work for auniversal, lasting and comprehensive peace. Nobody should be allowed to cause tension or armed conflicts against the interests of the people. There are still in this world a few interest groups, which always want to seek gains by creating tension here and there. This is against the will of the majority of the people and against the trend of the times. An enormous market demand can be created and economic prosperity promoted only when continued efforts are made to advance the cause of peace and development, to ensure that people around the world live and work in peace and contentment and focus on economic development and on scientific and technological innovation. I hope that all of us here today will join hands with all other peace-loving people and work for lasting world peace and the common development and prosperity of all nations and regions. Passage14. Self-Esteem Self-esteem is the combination of self-confidence and self-respect—the conviction that you are competent to cope with life’s challenges and are worthy of happiness. Self-esteem is the way you talk to yourself about yourself. Self-esteem has two interrelatedaspects; it entails a sense of personal efficacy and a sense of personal worth. It is the integrated sum of self-confidence and self-respect. It is the conviction that one is competent to live and worthy of living. Our self-esteem and self-image are developed by how we talk to ourselves. All of us have conscious and unconscious memories of all the times we felt bad or wrong—they are part of the unavoidable scars of childhood. This is where the critical voice gets started. Everyone has a critical inner voice. People with low self-esteem simply have a more vicious and demeaning inner voice. Psychologists say that almost every aspect of our lives—our personal happiness, success, relationships with others, achievement, creativity, dependencies—are dependent on our level of self-esteem. The more we have, the better we deal with things. Positive self-esteem is important because when people experience it, they feel good and look good, they are effective and productive, and they respond to other people and themselves in healthy, positive, growing ways. People who have positive self-esteem know that they are lovable and capable, and they care about themselves and otherpeople.They do not have to build themselves up by tearing other people down or by patronizing less competent people. Our background largely determines what we will become in personality and more importantly in self-esteem. Where do feelings of worthlessness come from? Many come from our families, since more than 80% of our waking hours up to the age of eighteen are spent under their direct influence. We are who we are because of where we’ve been. We build our own brands of self-esteem from four ingredients: fate, the positive things life offers, the negative things life offers and our own decisions about how to respond to fate, the positives and the negatives. Neither fate nor decisions can be determined by other people in our own life. No one can change fate. We can control our thinking and therefore our decisions in life.Passage15. Struggle for Freedom It is not possible for me to express all that I feel of appreciation for what has been said and given to me. I accept, for myself, with the conviction of having received far beyond what I have been able to give in my books. I can only hope that the many books which I haveyet to write will be in some measure a worthier acknowledgment than I can make tonight. And, indeed, I can accept only in the same spirit in which I think this gift was originally given—that it is a prize not so much for what has been done, as for the future. Whatever I write in the future must, I think, be always benefited and strengthened when I remember this day. I accept,too, for my country,the United States of America. We are a people still young and we know that we have not yet come to the fullest of our powers. This award, given to an American, strengthens not only one, but the whole body of American writers, who are encouraged and heartened by such generous recognition. And I should like to say, too, that in my country it is important that this award has been given to a woman. You who have already so recognized your own Selma Lagerlof, and have long recognized women in other fields, cannot perhaps wholly understand what it means in many countries that it is a woman who stands here at this moment. But I speak not only for writers and for women, but for all Americans, for we all share in this. I should not be truly myself if I did not, in my own wholly unofficialway, speak also of the people of China,whose life has for so many years been my life also, whose life,indeed, must always be a part of my life. The minds of my own country and China, my foster country, are alike in many ways, but above all, alike in our common love of freedom.And today more than ever, this is true, now when China's whole being is engaged in the greatest of all the struggles, the struggle for freedom. I have never admired China more than I do now, when I see her uniting as she has never before, against the enemy who threatens her freedom. With this determination for freedom, which is in so profound a sense the essential quality of her nature, I know that she is unconquerable. Freedom—it is today more than ever the most precious human possession. We—Sweden and the United States—we have it still. My country is young—but it greets you with a peculiar fellowship, you whose earth is ancient and free.Passage16. Passing on Small Change The pharmacist handed me my prescription, apologized for the wait, and explained that his register had already closed. He asked if I would mind using the。
晨读英语美文100篇前20篇之欧阳科创编
星火书业晨读英语美文100篇六级Passage1. Knowledge and Virtue Knowledge is one thing, virtue is another; good sense is not conscience, refinement is not humility, nor is largeness and justness of view faith. Philosophy, however enlightened, however profound, gives no command over the passions, no influential motives, novivifying principles. Liberal Education makes not the Christian, not the Catholic, but the gentleman. It is well to be a gentleman, it is well to have a cultivated intellect, a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind, a noble and courteous bearing in the conduct of life—these are the connatural qualities of a large knowledge; they are the objects of a University. Iam advocating, I shall illustrate and insist upon them;but still, I repeat, they are no guarantee for sanctity or even for conscientiousness, and they may attach to the man of the world, to the profligate, to the heartless, pleasant, alas, and attractive as he shows when decked out in them. Taken by themselves, they do but seem to be what they are not;they look like virtue at a distance, but they are detected by close observers, and in the long run; and hence it is that they are popularly accused of pretense and hypocrisy, not, I repeat, from their own fault, but because their professors and their admirers persist in taking them for what they are not,and are officious in arrogating for them a praise to which they have no claim.Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk, then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants,the passion and the pride of man.Passage2. “Packing” a PersonA person, like a commodity, needs packaging. But going too far is absolutely undesirable. A little exaggeration, however, does no harm when it shows the person's unique qualities totheir advantage. To display personal charm in a casual and natural way, it is important for one to have a clear knowledge of oneself. A master packager knows how to integrate art and nature without any traces of embellishment, so that the person so packaged is no commodity but a human being, lively and lovely. A young person, especially a female, radiant with beauty and full of life, has all the favor granted by God. Any attempt to make up would be self-defeating. Youth, however, comes and goes in a moment of doze. Packaging for the middle-aged is primarily to conceal the furrows ploughed by time. If you still enjoy life's exuberance enough to retain self-confidence and pursue pioneering work, you are unique in your natural qualities, and your charm and grace will remain. Elderly people are beautiful if their river of life has been, through plains, mountains and jungles, running its course as it should. You have really lived your life which now arrives at a complacent stage of serenity indifferent to fame or wealth. There is no need to resort to hair-dyeing；the snow-capped mountain is itself a beautiful scene of fairyland. Let your looks change from young to old synchronizing with the natural ageing process so as to keep in harmony with nature,for harmony itself is beauty, while the other way round will only end in unpleasantness. To be in the elder's company is like reading a thick book of deluxe edition that fascinates one so much as to be reluctant to part with. As long as one finds where one stands, one knows how to package oneself, just as a commodity establishes its brand by the right packaging.Passage3. Three Passions I Have Lived for Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy —ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness —that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This iswhat I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what—at last—I have found. With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine ... A little of this, but not much, I have achieved. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people —a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.Passage4. A Little GirlSitting on a grassy grave, beneath one of the windows of the church, was a little girl. With her head bent back she was gazing up at the sky and singing, while one of her little hands was pointing to a tiny cloud that hovered like a golden feather above her head. The sun, which had suddenlybecome very bright, shining on her glossy hair, gave it a metallic luster, and it was difficult to say what was the color, dark bronze or black. So completely absorbed was she in watching the cloud to which her strange song or incantation seemed addressed, that she did not observe me when I rose and went towards her. Over her head, high up in the blue, a lark that was soaring towards the same gauzy cloud was singing, as if in rivalry. As I slowly approached the child, I could see by her forehead, which in the sunshine seemed like a globe of pearl, and especially by her complexion, that she uncommonly lovely. Her eyes, which at one moment seemed blue-gray, at another violet, were shaded by long black lashes, curving backward in a most peculiar way, and these matched in hue her eyebrows, and the tresses that were tossed about her tender throat were quivering in the sunlight. All this I did not take in at once; for at first I could see nothing but those quivering, glittering, changeful eyes turned up into my face. Gradually the other features, especially the sensitive full-lipped mouth, grew upon me as I stood silently gazing. Here seemed to me a more perfect beauty than had ever come to me in my loveliest dreams of beauty. Yet it was not her beauty so much as the look shegave me that fascinated me, melted me.Passage5 Declaration of IndependenceWhen in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Libertyand the pursuit of Happiness. —That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed forlight and transient causes; and accordingly all experience has shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.Passage6. A Tribute to the DogThe best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to theirfaith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it most. A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is his dog. A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer; he will lick the wounds and sores that come from encounter with the roughness of the world. He will guard the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journeys through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth, an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless，the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him, to guardhim against danger, to fight against his enemies. And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace, and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the grave will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death.Passage7. Knowledge and ProgressWhy does the idea of progress loom so large in the modern world? Surely because progress of a particular kind is actually taking place around us and is becoming more and more manifest. Although mankind has undergone no general improvement in intelligence or morality, it has made extraordinary progress in the accumulation of knowledge. Knowledge began to increase as soon as the thoughts of one individual could be communicated to another by means of speech. With the invention of writing，a great advance was made, for knowledge could then be not only communicated but also stored. Libraries made education possible, and education in its turn added to libraries: the growth of knowledge followed a kind of compound interest law, which was greatly enhanced by the invention of printing.All this was comparatively slow until, with the coming of science,the tempo was suddenly raised. Then knowledge began to be accumulated according to a systematic plan. The trickle became a stream; the stream has now become a torrent. Moreover, as soon as new knowledge is acquired, it is now turned to practical account. What is called “modern civilization” is not the result of a balanced development of all man's nature, but of accumulated knowledge applied to practical life. The problem now facing humanity is: What is going to be done with all this knowledge? As is so often pointed out, knowledge is a two-edged weapon which can be used equally for good or evil. It is now being used indifferently for both. Could any spectacle, for instance, be more grimly weird than that of gunners using science to shatter men's bodies while, close at hand, surgeons use it to restore them? We have to ask ourselves very seriously what will happen if this twofold use of knowledge, with its ever-increasing power, continues.Passage8. Address by EngelsOn the 14th of March, at a quarter to three in the afternoon, the greatest living thinker ceased to think. He had been left alone for scarcely two minutes, and when we came back wefound him in his armchair,peacefully gone to sleep—but forever. An immeasurable loss has been sustained both by the militant proletariat of Europe and America, and by historical science, in the death of this man. The gap that has been left by the departure of this mighty spirit will soon enough make itself felt. Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology,that mankind must first of all eat, drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, religion, etc.; that therefore the production of the immediate material means of subsistence and consequently the degree of economic development attained by a given people or during a given epoch form the foundation upon which the state institutions, the legal conceptions, art, and even the ideas on religion, of the people concerned have been evolved, and in the light of which they must, therefore, be explained, instead of vice versa, as had hitherto been the case. But that is not all. Marx also discovered the special law of motion governing the present-day capitalist mode of production and the bourgeois society that this mode of production has created.The discovery of surplus value suddenly threw light on the problem, in trying to solve which all previous investigations, of both bourgeois economists and socialist critics, had been groping in the dark. Two such discoveries would be enough for one lifetime. Happy the man to whom it is granted to make even one such discovery. But in every single field which Marx investigated—and he investigated very many fields, none of them superficially—in every field, even in that of mathematics, he made independent discoveries. Passage9. Relationship that LastsIf somebody tells you,“ I’ll love you for ever,” will you believe it? I don’t think there’s any reason not to. We are ready to believe such commitment at the moment, whatever change may happen afterwards. As for the belief in an everlasting love, that’s another thing. Then you may be asked whether there is such a thing as an everlasting love. I’d answer I believe in it, but an everlasting love is not immutable.You may unswervingly love or be loved by a person. But love will change its composition with the passage of time. It will not remain the same. In the course of your growth and as a result of your increased experience, love will become something different to you. In the beginning you believed afervent love for a person could last definitely. By and by, however, “fervent” gave way to “prosaic”. Precisely because of this change it became possible for love to last. Then what was meant by an everlasting love would eventually end up in a sort of interdependence. We used to insist on the difference between love and liking. The former seemed much more beautiful than the latter. One day, however, it turns out there’s really no need to make such difference. Liking is actually a sort of love. By the same token, the everlasting interdependence is actually an everlasting love. I wish I could believe there was somebody who would love me for ever. That’s, as we all know, too romantic to be true. Instead, it will more often than not be a case of lasting relationship.Passage10. RushSwallows may have gone, but there is a time of return; willow trees may have died back, but there is a time of regreening; peach blossoms may have fallen, but they will bloom again. Now, you the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? If they had been stolen by someone, who could it be? Where could he hide them? If they had made the escape themselves, then where could they stay at themoment? I don’t know how many days I have been given to spend, but I do feel my hands are getting empty. Taking stock silently, I find that more than eight thousand days have already slid away from me. Like a drop of water from the point of a needle disappearing into the ocean, my days are dripping into the stream of time, soundless, traceless. Already sweat is starting on my forehead, and tears welling up in my eyes. Those that have gone have gone for good, those to come keep coming; yet in between, how fast is the shift, in such a rush? When I get up in the morning, the slanting sun marks its presence in my small room in two or three oblongs. The sun has feet, look, he is treading on, lightly and furtively; and I am caught, blankly, in his revolution. Thus —the day flows away through the sink when I wash my hands, wears off in the bowl when I eat my meal, and passes away before my day-dreaming gaze as reflect in silence. I can feel his haste now, so I reach out my hands to hold him back, but he keeps flowing past my withholding hands. In the evening, as I lie in bed, he strides over my body, glides past my feet, in his agile way. The moment I open my eyes and meet the sun again, one whole day has gone. I bury my face in my hands and heave a sigh.But the new day begins to flash past in the sigh. What can I do, in this bustling world, with my days flying in their escape? Nothing but to hesitate, to rush. What have I been doing in that eight-thousand-day rush, apart from hesitating? Those bygone days have been dispersed as smoke by a light wind, or evaporated as mist by the morning sun. What traces have I left behind me? Have I ever left behind any gossamer traces at all? I have come to the world, stark naked; am I to go back, in a blink, in the same stark nakedness? It is not fair though: why should I have made such a trip for nothing! You the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? Passage11. A Summer DayOne day thirty years ago Marseilles lay in the burning sun. A blazing sun upon a fierce August day was no greater rarity in southern Francethan at any other time before or since. Everything in Marseilles and about Marseilles had stared at the fervid sun, and had been stared at in return, until a staring habit had become universal there. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away. The only things to be seen not fixedly staring and glaring were the vines droopingunder their loads of grapes. These did occasionally wink a little, as the hot air barely moved their faint leaves.The universal stare made the eyes ache. Towards the distant blue of the Italian coast, indeed, it was a little relieved by light clouds of mist slowly rising from the evaporation of the sea, but it softened nowhere else. Far away the dusty vines overhanging wayside cottages, and the monotonous wayside avenues of parched trees without shade, dropped beneath the stare of earth and sky. So did the horses with drowsy bells, in long files of carts, creeping slowly towards the interior; so did their recumbent drivers, when they were awake, which rarely happened; so did the exhausted laborers in the fields. Everything that lived or grew was oppressed by the glare; except the lizard, passing swiftly over rough stone walls, and cicada, chirping its dry hot chirp, like a rattle. The very dust was scorched brown, and something quivered in the atmosphere as if the air itself were panting. Blinds, shutters, curtains, awnings, were all closed and drawn to deep out the stare. Grant it but a chink or a keyhole, and it shot in like a white-hot arrow.Passage12. NightNight has fallen over the country. Through the trees rises the red moon and the stars are scarcely seen. In the vast shadow of night, the coolness and the dews descend. I sit at the open window to enjoy them; and hear only the voice of the summer wind. Like black hulks, the shadows of the great trees ride at anchor on the billowy sea of grass. I cannot see the red and blue flowers, but I know that they are there. Far away in the meadow gleams the silver Charles. The tramp of horses' hoofs sounds from the wooden bridge. Then all is still save the continuous wind or the sound of the neighboring sea. The village clock strikes; and I feel that I am not alone. How different it is in the city! It is late, and the crowd is gone. You step out upon the balcony, and lie in the very bosom of the cool, dewy night as if you folded her garments about you. Beneath lies the public walk with trees, like a fathomless, black gulf. The lamps are still burning up and down the long street. People go by with grotesque shadows, now foreshortened, and now lengthening away into the darkness and vanishing, while a new one springs up behind the walker, and seems to pass him revolving like the sail of a windmill. The iron gates of the park shut with a jangling clang. There are footsteps and loud voices; —atumult; —a drunken brawl; —an alarm of fire; —then silence again. And now at length the city is asleep, and we can see the night. The belated moon looks over the roofs, and finds no one to welcome her. The moonlight is broken. It lies here and there in the squares and the opening of the streets—angular like blocks of white marble.Passage13. Peace and Development: the Themes of Our TimesPeace and development are the themes of the times. People across the world should join hands in advancing the lofty cause of peace and development of mankind. A peaceful environment is indispensable for national, regional and even global development. Without peace or political stability there would be no economic progress to speak of. This has been fully proved by both the past and the present. In today’s world, the international situation is, on the whole, moving towards relaxation. However, conflicts and even local wars triggered by various factors have kept cropping up, and tension still remains in some areas. All this has impeded the economic development of the countries and regions concerned, and has also adversely affected the world economy. All responsible statesmen and governments mustabide by the purposes of the UN Charter and the universally acknowledged norms governing international relations, and work for a universal, lasting and comprehensive peace. Nobody should be allowed to cause tension or armed conflicts against the interests of the people. There are still in this world a few interest groups, which always want to seek gains by creating tension here and there. This is against the will of the majority of the people and against the trend of the times. An enormous market demand can be created and economic prosperity promoted only when continued efforts are made to advance the cause of peace and development, to ensure that people around the world live and work in peace and contentment and focus on economic development and on scientific and technological innovation.I hope that all of us here today will join hands with all other peace-loving people and work for lasting world peace and the common development and prosperity of all nations and regions.Passage14. Self-EsteemSelf-esteem is the combination of self-confidence and self-respect—the conviction that you are competent to cope with life’s challenges and are worthy of happiness.Self-esteem is the way you talk to yourself about yourself. Self-esteem has two interrelated aspects; it entails a sense of personal efficacy and a sense of personal worth. It is the integrated sum of self-confidence and self-respect. It is the conviction that one is competent to live and worthy of living. Our self-esteem and self-image are developed by how we talk to ourselves. All of us have conscious and unconscious memories of all the times we felt bad or wrong—they are part of the unavoidable scars of childhood. This is where the critical voice gets started. Everyone has a critical inner voice. People with low self-esteem simply have a more vicious and demeaning inner voice. Psychologists say that almost every aspect of our lives—our personal happiness, success, relationships with others, achievement, creativity, dependencies—are dependent on our level of self-esteem. The more we have, the better we deal with things. Positive self-esteem is important because when people experience it, they feel good and look good, they are effective and productive, and they respond to other people and themselves in healthy, positive, growing ways. People who have positive self-esteem know that they are lovable and capable, and they care about themselves and otherpeople.They do not have to build themselves up by tearing other people down or by patronizing less competent people. Our background largely determines what we will become in personality and more importantly in self-esteem. Where do feelings of worthlessness come from? Many come from our families, since more than 80% of our waking hours up to the age of eighteen are spent under their direct influence. We are who we are because of where we’ve been. We build our own brands of self-esteem from four ingredients: fate, the positive things life offers, the negative things life offers and our own decisions about how to respond to fate, the positives and the negatives. Neither fate nor decisions can be determined by other people in our own life. No one can change fate. We can control our thinking and therefore our decisions in life.Passage15. Struggle for FreedomIt is not possible for me to express all that I feel of appreciation for what has been said and given to me. I accept, for myself, with the conviction of having received far beyond what I have been able to give in my books. I can only hope that the many books which I have yet to write will be in some measure a worthier acknowledgment than I can maketonight. And, indeed, I can accept only in the same spirit in which I think this gift was originally given—that it is a prize not so much for what has been done, as for the future. Whatever I write in the future must, I think, be always benefited and strengthened when I remember this day. I accept,too, for my country,the United States of America. We are a people still young and we know that we have not yet come to the fullest of our powers. This award, given to an American, strengthens not only one, but the whole body of American writers, who are encouraged and heartened by such generous recognition. And I should like to say, too, that in my country it is important that this award has been given to a woman. You who have already so recognized your own Selma Lagerlof, and have long recognized women in other fields, cannot perhaps wholly understand what it means in many countries that it is a woman who stands here at this moment. But I speak not only for writers and for women, but for all Americans, for we all share in this. I should not be truly myself if I did not, in my own wholly unofficial way, speak also of the people of China,whose life has for so many years been my life also, whose life,indeed, must always be a part of my life. The minds of my own country and China, my foster。
超有激情的晨读英语美文必读
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您的努力学习是为了更美好的未来！晨读英语美文篇1：Of Studies Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight, is in privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment, and disposition of business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one; but the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, come best, from those that are learned. To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar. They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need proyning, by study; and studies themselves, do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience. Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use; but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation. Read not to contradict and confute; nor tobelieve and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them bothers; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled books are like common distilled waters, flashy things.Reading make a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth not. Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtitle; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend.读书足以怡情，足以博彩，足以长才。
晨读英语美文100篇前20篇之欧阳道创编
星火书业晨读英语美文100篇六级Passage1. Knowledge and VirtueKnowledge is one thing, virtue is another; good sense is not conscience, refinement is not humility, nor is largeness and justness of view faith. Philosophy, however enlightened, however profound, gives no command over the passions, no influential motives, no vivifying principles. Liberal Education makes not the Christian, not the Catholic, but the gentleman. It is well to be a gentleman, it is well to have a cultivated intellect, a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind, a noble andcourteous bearing in the conduct of life—these are the connatural qualities of a large knowledge; they are the objects of a University. I am advocating, I shall illustrate and insist upon them;but still, I repeat, they are no guarantee for sanctity or even for conscientiousness, and they may attach to the man of the world, to the profligate, to the heartless, pleasant, alas, and attractive as he shows when decked out in them. Taken by themselves, they do but seem to be what they are not; they look like virtue at a distance, but they are detected by close observers, and in the long run; and hence it is that they are popularly accused of pretense andhypocrisy, not, I repeat, from their own fault, but because their professors and their admirers persist in taking them for what they are not,and are officious in arrogating for them a praise to which they have no claim. Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk, then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants,the passion and the pride of man.Passage2. “Packing” a PersonA person, like a commodity, needs packaging. But going too far is absolutely undesirable. A little exaggeration, however, does no harm when it shows the person's uniquequalities to their advantage. To display personal charm in a casual and natural way, it is important for one to have a clear knowledge of oneself. A master packager knows how to integrate art and nature without any traces of embellishment, so that the person so packaged is no commodity but a human being, lively and lovely. A young person, especially a female, radiant with beauty and full of life, has all the favor granted by God. Any attempt to make up would be self-defeating. Youth, however, comes and goes in a moment of doze. Packaging for the middle-aged is primarily to conceal the furrows ploughed by time. If you still enjoy life's exuberance enough to retain self-confidence and pursue pioneering work, you are unique in your natural qualities, and your charm and grace will remain. Elderly people are beautiful if their river of life has been, through plains, mountains and jungles, running its course as it should. You have really lived your life which now arrives at a complacent stage of serenity indifferent to fame or wealth. There is no need to resort to hair-dyeing；the snow-capped mountain is itself a beautiful scene of fairyland. Let your looks change from young to old synchronizing with thenatural ageing process so as to keep in harmony with nature, for harmony itself is beauty, while the other way round will only end in unpleasantness. To be in the elder's company is like reading a thick book of deluxe edition that fascinates one so much as to be reluctant to part with. As long as one finds where one stands, one knows how to package oneself, just as a commodity establishes its brand by the right packaging.Passage3. Three Passions I Have Lived for Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy —ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness —that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally,because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what—at last—I have found. With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine ... A little of this, but not much, I have achieved. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people —a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me. Passage4. A Little GirlSitting on a grassy grave, beneath one of the windows of the church, was a little girl. With her head bent back she wasgazing up at the sky and singing, while one of her little hands was pointing to a tiny cloud that hovered like a golden feather above her head. The sun, which had suddenly become very bright, shining on her glossy hair, gave it a metallic luster, and it was difficult to say what was the color, dark bronze or black. So completely absorbed was she in watching the cloud to which her strange song or incantation seemed addressed, that she did not observe me when I rose and went towards her. Over her head, high up in the blue, a lark that was soaring towards the same gauzy cloud was singing, as if in rivalry. As I slowly approached the child, I could see by her forehead, which in the sunshine seemed like a globe of pearl, and especially by her complexion, that she uncommonly lovely. Her eyes, which at one moment seemed blue-gray, at another violet, were shaded by long black lashes, curving backward in a most peculiar way, and these matched in hue her eyebrows, and the tresses that were tossed about her tender throat were quivering in the sunlight. All this I did not take in at once; for at first I could see nothing but those quivering, glittering, changeful eyes turned up into my face. Gradually the otherfeatures, especially the sensitive full-lipped mouth, grew upon me as I stood silently gazing. Here seemed to me a more perfect beauty than had ever come to me in my loveliest dreams of beauty. Yet it was not her beauty so much as the look she gave me that fascinated me, melted me.Passage5 Declaration of Independence When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Libertyand the pursuit of Happiness. —That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomesdestructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience has shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment ofan absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.Passage6. A Tribute to the DogThe best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it most. A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is his dog. A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He willkiss the hand that has no food to offer; he will lick the wounds and sores that come from encounter with the roughness of the world. He will guard the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journeys through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth, an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless，the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him, to guard him against danger, to fight against his enemies. And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace, and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the grave will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death. Passage7. Knowledge and Progress Why does the idea of progress loom so large in the modern world? Surely because progress of a particular kind is actually taking place around us and is becoming more and more manifest. Although mankind has undergone nogeneral improvement in intelligence or morality, it has made extraordinary progress in the accumulation of knowledge. Knowledge began to increase as soon as the thoughts of one individual could be communicated to another by means of speech. With the invention of writing， a great advance was made, for knowledge could then be not only communicated but also stored. Libraries made education possible, and education in its turn added to libraries: the growth of knowledge followed a kind of compound interest law, which was greatly enhanced by the invention of printing. All this was comparatively slow until, with the coming of science,the tempo was suddenly raised. Then knowledge began to be accumulated according to a systematic plan. The trickle became a stream; the stream has now become a torrent. Moreover, as soon as new knowledge is acquired, it is now turned to practical account. What is called “modern civilization” is not the result of a balanced development of all man's nature, but of accumulated knowledge applied to practical life. The problem now facing humanity is: What is going to be done with all this knowledge? As is so often pointed out,knowledge is a two-edged weapon which can be used equally for good or evil. It is now being used indifferently for both. Could any spectacle, for instance, be more grimly weird than that of gunners using science to shatter men's bodies while, close at hand, surgeons use it to restore them? We have to ask ourselves very seriously what will happen if this twofold use of knowledge, with its ever-increasing power, continues.Passage8. Address by Engels On the 14th of March, at a quarter to three in the afternoon, the greatest living thinker ceased to think. He had been left alone for scarcely two minutes, and when we came back we found him in his armchair,peacefully gone to sleep—but forever. An immeasurable loss has been sustained both by the militant proletariat of Europe and America, and by historical science, in the death of this man. The gap that has been left by the departure of this mighty spirit will soon enough make itself felt. Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology,thatmankind must first of all eat, drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, religion, etc.; that therefore the production of the immediate material means of subsistence and consequently the degree of economic development attained by a given people or during a given epoch form the foundation upon which the state institutions, the legal conceptions, art, and even the ideas on religion, of the people concerned have been evolved, and in the light of which they must, therefore, be explained, instead of vice versa, as had hitherto been the case. But that is not all. Marx also discovered the special law of motion governing the present-day capitalist mode of production and the bourgeois society that this mode of production has created. The discovery of surplus value suddenly threw light on the problem, in trying to solve which all previous investigations, of both bourgeois economists and socialist critics, had been groping in the dark. Two such discoveries would be enough for one lifetime. Happy the man to whom it is granted to make even one such discovery. But in every single field which Marx investigated—and he investigated very many fields, none of them superficially—in every field,even in that of mathematics, he made independent discoveries.Passage9. Relationship that Lasts If somebody tells you,“ I’ll love you for ever,” will you believe it? I don’t think there’s any reason not to. We are ready to believe such commitment at the moment, whatever change may happen afterwards. As for the belief in an everlasting love, that’s another thing. Then you may be asked whether there is such a thing as an everlasting love. I’d answer I believe in it, but an everlasting love is not immutable.You may unswervingly love or be loved by a person. But love will change its composition with the passage of time. It will not remain the same. In the course of your growth and as a result of your increased experience, love will become something different to you. In the beginning you believed a fervent love for a person could last definitely. By and by, however, “fervent” gave way to “prosaic”. Precisely because of this change it became possible for love to last. Then what was meant by an everlasting love would eventually end up in a sort of interdependence. We used to insist on the differencebetween love and liking. The former seemed much more beautiful than the latter. One day, however, it turns out there’s really no need to make such difference. Liking is actually a sort of love. By the same token, the everlasting interdependence is actually an everlasting love. I wish I could believe there was somebody who would love me for ever. That’s, as we all know, too romantic to be true. Instead, it will more often than not be a case of lasting relationship.Passage10. Rush Swallows may have gone, but there is a time of return; willow trees may have died back, but there is a time of regreening; peach blossoms may have fallen, but they will bloom again. Now, you the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? If they had been stolen by someone, who could it be? Where could he hide them? If they had made the escape themselves, then where could they stay at the moment? I don’t know how many days I have been given to spend, but I do feel my hands are getting empty. Taking stock silently, I find that more than eight thousand days have already slid away from me. Like a dropof water from the point of a needle disappearing into the ocean, my days are dripping into the stream of time, soundless, traceless. Already sweat is starting on my forehead, and tears welling up in my eyes. Those that have gone have gone for good, those to come keep coming; yet in between, how fast is the shift, in such a rush? When I get up in the morning, the slanting sun marks its presence in my small room in two or three oblongs. The sun has feet, look, he is treading on, lightly and furtively; and I am caught, blankly, in his revolution. Thus —the day flows away through the sink when I wash my hands, wears off in the bowl when I eat my meal, and passes away before my day-dreaming gaze as reflect in silence. I can feel his haste now, so I reach out my hands to hold him back, but he keeps flowing past my withholding hands. In the evening, as I lie in bed, he strides over my body, glides past my feet, in his agile way. The moment I open my eyes and meet the sun again, one whole day has gone. I bury my face in my hands and heave a sigh. But the new day begins to flash past in the sigh. What can I do, in this bustling world, with my days flying in their escape? Nothing but to hesitate, to rush. Whathave I been doing in that eight-thousand-day rush, apart from hesitating? Those bygone days have been dispersed as smoke by a light wind, or evaporated as mist by the morning sun. What traces have I left behind me? Have I ever left behind any gossamer traces at all? I have come to the world, stark naked; am I to go back, in a blink, in the same stark nakedness? It is not fair though: why should I have made such a trip for nothing! You the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return?Passage11. A Summer Day One day thirty years ago Marseilles lay in the burning sun.A blazing sun upon a fierce August day was no greater rarity in southern Francethan at any other time before or since. Everything in Marseilles and about Marseilles had stared at the fervid sun, and had been stared at in return, until a staring habit had become universal there. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away. The only things to be seen not fixedly staring and glaring were the vines drooping under their loads of grapes. These did occasionally wink alittle, as the hot air barely moved their faint leaves.The universal stare made the eyes ache. Towards the distant blue of the Italian coast, indeed, it was a little relieved by light clouds of mist slowly rising from the evaporation of the sea, but it softened nowhere else. Far away the dusty vines overhanging wayside cottages, and the monotonous wayside avenues of parched trees without shade, dropped beneath the stare of earth and sky. So did the horses with drowsy bells, in long files of carts, creeping slowly towards the interior; so did their recumbent drivers, when they were awake, which rarely happened; so did the exhausted laborers in the fields. Everything that lived or grew was oppressed by the glare; except the lizard, passing swiftly over rough stone walls, and cicada, chirping its dry hot chirp, like a rattle. The very dust was scorched brown, and something quivered in the atmosphere as if the air itself were panting. Blinds, shutters, curtains, awnings, were all closed and drawn to deep out the stare. Grant it but a chink or a keyhole, and it shot in like a white-hot arrow. Passage12. NightNight has fallen over the country. Through the trees rises the red moon and the stars are scarcely seen. In the vast shadow of night, the coolness and the dews descend. I sit at the open window to enjoy them; and hear only the voice of the summer wind. Like black hulks, the shadows of the great trees ride at anchor on the billowy sea of grass. I cannot see the red and blue flowers, but I know that they are there. Far away in the meadow gleams the silver Charles. The tramp of horses' hoofs sounds from the wooden bridge. Then all is still save the continuous wind or the sound of the neighboring sea. The village clock strikes; and I feel that I am not alone. How different it is in the city! It is late, and the crowd is gone. You step out upon the balcony, and lie in the very bosom of the cool, dewy night as if you folded her garments about you. Beneath lies the public walk with trees, like a fathomless, black gulf. The lamps are still burning up and down the long street. People go by with grotesque shadows, now foreshortened, and now lengthening away into the darkness and vanishing, while a new one springs up behind the walker, and seems to pass him revolving like the sail of a windmill. The iron gates of the park shut with ajangling clang. There are footsteps and loud voices; —a tumult; —a drunken brawl; —an alarm of fire; —then silence again. And now at length the city is asleep, and we can see the night. The belated moon looks over the roofs, and finds no one to welcome her. The moonlight is broken. It lies here and there in the squares and the opening of the streets—angular like blocks of white marble.Passage13. Peace and Development: the Themes of Our TimesPeace and development are the themes of the times. People across the world should join hands in advancing the lofty cause of peace and development of mankind. A peaceful environment is indispensable for national, regional and even global development. Without peace or political stability there would be no economic progress to speak of. This has been fully proved by both the past and the present. In today’s world, the international situation is, on the whole, moving towards relaxation. However, conflicts and even local wars triggered by various factors have kept cropping up, and tension still remains in some areas. All this has impeded the economic development of the countries andregions concerned, and has also adversely affected the world economy. All responsible statesmen and governments must abide by the purposes of the UN Charter and the universally acknowledged norms governing international relations, and work for a universal, lasting and comprehensive peace. Nobody should be allowed to cause tension or armed conflicts against the interests of the people. There are still in this world a few interest groups, which always want to seek gains by creating tension here and there. This is against the will of the majority of the people and against the trend of the times. An enormous market demand can be created and economic prosperity promoted only when continued efforts are made to advance the cause of peace and development, to ensure that people around the world live and work in peace and contentment and focus on economic development and on scientific and technological innovation. I hope that all of us here today will join hands with all other peace-loving people and work for lasting world peace and the common development and prosperity of all nations and regions.Passage14. Self-EsteemSelf-esteem is the combination of self-confidence and self-respect—the conviction that you are competent to cope with life’s challenges and are worthy of happiness. Self-esteem is the way you talk to yourself about yourself. Self-esteem has two interrelated aspects; it entails a sense of personal efficacy and a sense of personal worth. It is the integrated sum of self-confidence and self-respect. It is the conviction that one is competent to live and worthy of living. Our self-esteem and self-image are developed by how we talk to ourselves. All of us have conscious and unconscious memories of all the times we felt bad or wrong—they are part of the unavoidable scars of childhood. This is where the critical voice gets started. Everyone has a critical inner voice. People with low self-esteem simply have a more vicious and demeaning inner voice. Psychologists say that almost every aspect of our lives—our personal happiness, success, relationships with others, achievement, creativity, dependencies—are dependent on our level of self-esteem. The more we have, the better we deal with things. Positive self-esteem is important because when people experience it, they feel good and look good, they are effective andproductive, and they respond to other people and themselves in healthy, positive, growing ways. People who have positive self-esteem know that they are lovable and capable, and they care about themselves and other people.They do not have to build themselves up by tearing other people down or by patronizing less competent people. Our background largely determines what we will become in personality and more importantly in self-esteem. Where do feelings of worthlessness come from? Many come from our families, since more than 80% of our waking hours up to the age of eighteen are spent under their direct influence. We are who we are because of where we’ve been. We build our own brands of self-esteem from four ingredients: fate, the positive things life offers, the negative things life offers and our own decisions about how to respond to fate, the positives and the negatives. Neither fate nor decisions can be determined by other people in our own life. No one can change fate. We can control our thinking and therefore our decisions in life.Passage15. Struggle for Freedom It is not possible for me to express all that I feel ofappreciation for what has been said and given to me. I accept, for myself, with the conviction of having received far beyond what I have been able to give in my books. I can only hope that the many books which I have yet to write will be in some measure a worthier acknowledgment than I can make tonight. And, indeed, I can accept only in the same spirit in which I think this gift was originally given—that it is a prize not so much for what has been done, as for the future. Whatever I write in the future must, I think, be always benefited and strengthened when I remember this day. I accept,too, for my country,the United States of America. We are a people still young and we know that we have not yet come to the fullest of our powers. This award, given to an American, strengthens not only one, but the whole body of American writers, who are encouraged and heartened by such generous recognition. And I should like to say, too, that in my country it is important that this award has been given to a woman. You who have already so recognized your own Selma Lagerlof, and have long recognized women in other fields, cannot perhaps wholly understand what it means in many countries that it is awoman who stands here at this moment. But I speak not only for writers and for women, but for all Americans, for we all share in this. I should not be truly myself if I did not, in my own wholly unofficial way, speak also of the people of China,whose life has for so many years been my life also, whose life,indeed, must always be a part of my life. The minds of my own country and China, my foster country, are alike in many ways, but above all, alike in our common love of freedom.And today more than ever, this is true, now when China's whole being is engaged in the greatest of all the struggles, the struggle for freedom. I have never admired China more than I do now, when I see her uniting as she has never before, against the enemy who threatens her freedom. With this determination for freedom, which is in so profound a sense the essential quality of her nature, I know that she is unconquerable. Freedom—it is today more than ever the most precious human possession. We—Sweden and the United States—we have it still. My country is young—but it greets you with a peculiar fellowship, you whose earth is ancient and free.。
文学_精选高中英语晨读美文
精选高中英语晨读美文高中英语晨读美文一Sweet-Pea SummersEach summer in the late 1960s, my two sisters and I would ride the Greyhound bus from Arizona to Arkansas to stay with our father.A World War II veteran, Dad had many medical problems, any one of which could cause many people to lose more than their sense of humor, but not him.I have vivid memories of Dad waking us up in the morning. Before hed put on his legs for the day (he had lost his legs after his discharge), his wheelchair was his mobility. Holding his cane, which was his extended arm, he would roll through the house yelling, "Up, up, up! Get up and face the day! Its a beautiful day! Rise and Shine!" If we didnt get up right away, he would repeat his song in rhythm with his cane hitting the end of our beds. This was no performance put on for our benefit; every day was truly a beautiful day to him.Back in the sixties, there was no handicapped parking or wheelchair-accessible ramps like there are now, so even a trip to the grocery store was a difficult task. Dad wanted no assistance from anyone. He would climb stairs slowly but surely, whistling all the way. As a teenager, I found this embarrassing, but if Dad noticed, he didnt let me help.Those summers always ended too soon. He would drive us back to Arizona every year, stopping at the checkpoint for fruit and vegetables at the New Mexico-Arizona border. When asked if he had any fruits or vegetables, he would reply, "Just three sweet peas."Our father has been gone for a long time now, but not the lesson that he taught us: You are only as handicapped as you let yourself be.高中英语晨读美文二never too late to become what you want to beThe first day of school our professor introduced a little old lady to us."Why are you in college at such a young age?" I asked later. She jokingly replied, " Im here to meet a rich husband, get married, have a couple of children, and then retire and travel.""No seriously," I asked. I was curious what may have motivated her to be taking on this challenge at her age. "I always dreamed of having a college education and now Im getting one!" she told me.We became instant friends. Every day for the next three months we wouldleave class together and tolk nonstop. I was always listening to this "time machine" as she shared her wisdom and experience with me.At the end of the semester we invited Rose to make a speech to our football team. Ill never forget what she taught us. As she began to deliver her prepared speech, she dropped her note card on the floor. A little embarrassed she simply said, "Im sorry. This whiskey is killing me! Illnever get my speech back in order so let me just tell you what I know." As we laughed she cleared her throat and began:" We do not stop playing because we are old; we grow old because we stop playing. There are only four secrets to staying young, being happy, and achieving success. You have to laugh and find humor every day. Youve got to have a dream. When you lose your dreams, you die. We have so many people walking around who are dead and dont even know it! There is a huge difference between growing older and growing up. If you are nineteen years old and lie in bed for one full year and dont do one productive thing, you will turn twenty years old. Anybody can grow older. That doesnt take any talent or ability. The idea is to grow up by always finding the opportunity in change.Have no regrets. The elderly usually dont have regrets for what we did, but rather for things we did not do.The only people who fear death are those with regrets."At the years end Rose finished the college degree. One week after graduation Rose died peacefully in her sleep. Over two thousand college students attended her funeral to honor the wonderful woman who taught by example that its never too late to be all you can possibly be.高中英语晨读美文三The Most Beautiful FlowerThe park bench was deserted as I sat down to read Beneath the long, straggly branches of an old willow tree. Disillusioned by life with good reason to frown, For the world was intent on dragging me down.And if that werent enough to ruin my day, A young boy out of breath approached me, all tired from play. He stood right before me with his head tilted down And said with great excitement, "Look what I found!"In his hand was a flower, and what a pitiful sight, With its petals all worn - not enough rain, or too little light. Wanting him to take his dead flower and go off to play, I faked a small smile and then shifted away.But instead of retreating he sat next to my side and placed the flower to his nose and declared with surprise, "It sure smells pretty and its beautiful, too. Thats why I picked it; here, its for you."The weed before me was dying or dead. Not vibrant of colors, orange, yellow or red. But I knew I must take it, or he might never leave. So I reached for the flower, and replied, "Just what I need."But instead of him placing the flower in my hand, He held it mid-air without reason or plan. It was then that I noticed for the very first time, that weed-toting boy could not see: he was blind.I heard my voice quiver, tears shone like the sun. As I thanked him for picking the very best one. "Youre welcome," he smiled, and then ran off to play, Unaware of the impact hed had on my day.I sat there and wondered how he managed to see a self-pitying woman beneath an old willow tree. How did he know of my self-indulged plight? Perhaps from his heart, hed been blessed with true sight.Through the eyes of a blind child, at last I could see, the problem was not with the world; the problem was me. And for all of those times I myself had been blind, I vowed to see beauty,Then I held that wiltedflower up to my nose and breathed in the fragrance of a beautiful rose And smiled as that young boy, another weed in his hand About to change the life of an unsuspecting old man.高中英语晨读美文四Catch of a LifetimeHe was 11 years old and went fishing every chance he got from the dock at his family’s cabin on an island in the middle of a New Hampshire lake.On the day before the bass season opened, he and his father were fishing early in the evening, catching sunfish and perch with worms. Then he tied on a small silver lure and practiced casting. The lure struck the water and caused coloredripples in the sunset, then silver ripples as the moon rose over the lake.When his peapole doubled over, he knew something huge was on the other end. His father watched with admiration as the boy skillfully worked the fish alongside the dock.Finally, he very gingerly lifted the exhausted fish from the water. It was the largest one he had ever seen, but it was a bass.The boy and his father looked at the handsome fish, gills playing back and forth in the moonlight. The father lit a match and looked at his watch. It was 10 P.M.-- two hours before the season opened. He looked at the fish, then at the boy.“You’ll have to put it back, son,” he said. “Dad!” cried the boy.“There will be other fish,” said his father. “Not as big as this one,” cried the boy.He looked around the lake. No other fishermen or boats were anywhere around in the moonlight. He looked again at his father. Even though no one had seen them, nor could anyone ever know what time he caught the fish, the boy could tell by the clarity of his father’s voice that the decision was not negotiable. He slowly worked the hook out of the lip of the huge bass and lowered it into the black water.The creature swished its powerful body and disappeared. The boy suspected that he would never again see such a great fish.That was 34 years ago. Today, the boy is a successful architect in New York City. His father’s cabin is still there on the island in the middle of the lake. He takes his own son and daughters fishing from the same dock.And he was right. He has never again caught such a magnificent fish as the one he landed that night long ago. But he does see that same fish-again and again-every time he comes up against a question of ethics.For, as his father taught him, ethics are simple matters of right and wrong. It is only the practice of ethics that is difficult. Do we do right when no one is looking? Do we refuse to 14)cut corners to get the design in on time? Or refuse to trade stocks based on information that we know we aren’t supposed to have?We would if we were taught to put the fish back when we were young. For we would have learned the truth.The decision to do right lives fresh and fragrant in our memory.高中英语晨读美文五The fireA couple,John and Mary,had two lovely children.John had just been asked to go on a business trip and would be gone for several days.Mary would go along too.They hired a reliable woman to care for children and made the trip,returning home a little earlier than they had planned.As they drove into their home town feeling glad to be back,they noticed smoke,and they went off their usual route to see what it was.They found a home in flames.Mary said,”Oh,well, it isn’t our fire,let’s go home.”But John drove closer and exclaimed, “That home belongs to Fred Jones who works at the plant.He wouldn’t be off work yet,maybe there is something we could do. ”“It has nothing to do with us, ”protested Mary.But John drove up and stopped and they were both horror stricken to see the whole house in flames.A woman on the lawn was in hysterics screaming, “The children!Get the children! ”John grabbed her by the shoulder saying, “Get a hold of yourself and tell us where the children are! ”“In the basement, ”sobbed the woman,”down the hall and to the left. ”In spite of Mary’s protests John bolted for the basement which was full of smoke and scorching hot.He found the door and two children.As he left he could hear some more whimpering.He delivered the two badly frightened and nearly suffocated children into waiting arms and started back asking how many more children were down there.They told him two moreand Mary grabbed his arm and screamed, “John!Don’t go back!It’ssuicide!That house will cave in any second. ”But he ran into the smoke filed hallway and into the room.At last he found both children.As he stumbled up the endless steps,the thought went through his mind that there was something strangely familiar about the little bodies clinging to him,and at last when they came out into the sunlight and fresh air,he found that he had just rescued his own children.The baby-sitter had left them at this home while she did some shopping…高中英语晨读美文六Nail in the FenceThere once was a little boy who had a bad temper. His Father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, he must hammer a nail into the back of the fence. The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence. Over the next few weeks, as he learned to control his anger,the number of nails hammered daily gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.Finally the day came when the boy didnt lose his temper at all. He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper. The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. He said, "You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in thefence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out. It wont matter how many times you say Im sorry, the wound is still there."。
晨读英语美文60篇
Starbucks invades Parisian cafe culture (1)The beauty industry (2)Holiday Headache (2)Arthritis all-clear for high heels (3)Disney World (4)Secrets to a Great Life (5)The 50-Percent Theory of Life (6)The Road to Happiness (7)Six Famous Words (8)Write Your Own Life (8)Starbucks invades Parisian cafe cultureA form of alien civilisation has finally landed in Paris - unfamiliar green and black signs have appeared on the Avenue de L'Opera.It is the first Starbucks cafe to boldly go where no Starbucks has gone before, onto potentially hostile French territory.Its advertising posters on the Champs Elysee announce "Starbucks - a passion pour le cafe".But is the company aware of the risk it is taking by challenging the very birthplace of cafe society?"I think every time we come into a new market we do it with a great sense of respect, a great deal of interest in how that cafe society has developed over time," Bill O'Shea of Starbucks says."We recognise there is a huge history here of cafe society and we have every confidence we can enjoy, augment and join in that passion."And he may be right. Despite some sniffiness in the French press, some younger French are expressing their excitement that they will finally be able to visit the kind of cafe they love to watch on the US TV series Friends.In fact, for some, it is an exotic rarity, far more exciting than the average French cafe.Melissa, aged 18, says she can hardly wait: "I love Starbucks caramel coffee - it's very good and I like the concept that they're opening in Paris. I think Starbucks will be OK for French people."An American tourist is equally excited when she spots the sign - this could be just the thing to help her get over the occasional twinge of homesickness."I love the French cafes, but Starbucks is so popular in the States and it's become part of American culture and now it's come to France, and that's OK," she said.But that is the problem for many French, who do not want France to be just like the rest of the world: with standardised disposal cups of coffee - identical in 7,000 branches around the world - even if they are termed handcrafted beverages.At the traditional cafes, customers worry that the big US coffee house chains could drive out small, family-owned cafes.Others here think they could come round to the idea of Starbucks, though for them it would never replace the corner cafe or the typical Parisian petit noir coffee.The beauty industryThe one American industry unaffeted by the general depression of trade is the beauty industry. American women continue to spend on their faces and bodies as much as they spent before the coming of the slump--about three million pounds a week. These facts and figures are 'official', and can be accepted as being substantially true.The modern cult of beauty is not exclusively a function of wealth. If it were, then the personal appearance industries would have been as hit by the trade depression as any other business. But, as we have seen, they have not are retrenching on other things than their faces.Women, it is obvious, are freer than in the past. Freer not only to perform the generally unenviable social functions hithero reserved to the male, but also freer to exercise the more pleasing, feminine privilege of being attractive. The fortunes are made justly by face-cream manufacturers and beauty-specialists, by the sellers of rubber reducing-belts and massage machines, by the patentees of hair-lotions and the authors of books on the culture of the abdomen.It is a success in so far as more women retain their youthful appearance to a greater age than in the past. The Portrait of the Artist's Mother will come to be almost indisinguishable, at future picture shows, from the Portrai of the Artist's Daughter. The success is part due to skin foods and injections of paraffin-wax, facial surgery, mud baths, and paint, and in part due to impoved health. So for some people, the campaign for more beauty is also a compaign for more health. Beauty that is merely the artificial shadow of these symptoms of heslth is intrinsically of poorer quality than the genuine article. Still, it is a sufficiently good imitation to be sometimes mistakable for the real thing. Every middle-in-come preson can afford the cosmetic apparatus and more knowledge of the way in which real herlth can be achieved is being universally aced upon. When that happy moment comes, will every woman be beautiful-as beautiful, at any rate, as the natural shape of her features? The answer is apparent: No,for real beauty is as much an affair of the inner as of the outer self.Holiday HeadacheAll I wanted was a cozy log cabin in the state of Maine, somewhere deep in the woods, to hang out under the stars. It was to be my first vacation with my boyfriend, and I wanted it to be perfect.So rather than waste money on a guidebook that was bound to be outdated before it appeared on the shelves of my local bookstore, I decided to search online. Little did I know that when I typed the words “Maine log cabin rental〞at altavista , I was stepping into 48 hours of Internet hell. Forget dinner, forget work, forget sleep. I was glued to my computer for hours clicking from one listing to another to find the perfect hideaway.I was wrong. The first site that I tried, cyberrentals , grouped rentals by region but had no map to tell me where such romantic-sounding, places as Seal Cove or Owl’s Head were. So I had to log on to mapblast to locate each one, then return to slogging through site, vacationspot , let me find 50 cabins and cottages right off, but most of the rentals turned out to be closed for the winter.I learned only after reading a lot of fine print. One day and hundreds of listings later, I was ready to throw my computer out the window. For every 10 vacation spots I looked into, I found maybe one that sounded good and more often than not, it was booked, too far away, or outrageously priced. Searching on line was really giving me a finally decided to put our log-cabin Web dreams on hold and search the old-fashioned way at a bookstore. I bought a paperback book called America’s Favorite Inns, B&Bs, and Small Hotels. I was relieved to see that each city was neatly pinpointed on a detailed map, and most had good descriptions to help me figure out where in Maine we should go in the first place.Then I found it: an old inn on the southern coast of Maine that rented us one of its best rooms for $100 a night. Guess what? It didn’t have a Website. I took my chances based on a good review, a great location and a bargain price. It wasn’t a log cabin, and it was far from the woods, but there were lace curtains, a hardwood floor and a quilt on the bed. With the ocean outside our window and a fireplace in the room, my holiday was just as cozy as I dreamed it would be.Arthritis all-clear for high heelsFears that wearing high-heeled shoes could lead to knee arthritis are unfounded,say researchers.But being overweight,smoking,and having a previous knee injury does increase the risk,the team from Oxford Brookes Universtity found.They looked at more than 100 women aged between 50 and 70 waiting for knee surgery, and found that choice of shoes was not a factorThe study was published in the Journal of Epidemilology and public health.More than 2% of the population aged over 55 suffers extreme pain as a result of osteoarthrits of the knee.The condition is twice as common in 65-year-old women as it is in men of the same age.Women's and men's knees are not biologically different, so the reserachers wanted to find out why twice as many women as men develop osteoarthritis in the joint.Some researchers have speculated tha high-heeled shoes maybe to blame.The women in the study were quizzed on details of their height and weight when they left school, between 36 and 40 and between 51 and 55.They were asked about injuries, their jobs, smoking and use of contraceptive hormones.Howere, while many of these factors were linked to an increased risk over the years was not.The researchers wrote:"Most of the women had been exposed to high heeled shoes over the years-nevertheless, a consistent finding was a reduced risk of osteoarthritis of the knee.There was an even more pronounced link between regular dancing in three-inch heels and a reduced risk of knee problems.The researchers described this finding as "surprising", but said that they would not expect a larger-scale study to overturn their findings.Disney WorldDisney World, Florida, is the biggest amusement resort in the world. It covers 24.4 thousand acres, and is twice the size of Manhattan. It was opened on October 1 1971, five years after Walt Disney’s death, and it is a larger, slightly more ambitious version of Disneyland near Los Angeles.Foreigners tend to associate Walt Disney with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and with his other famous cartoon characters, Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck.There is very little that could be called vulgar in Disney World. It attracts people of most tastes and most income groups, and people of all ages, from toddlers to grandpas. There are two expensive hotels, a golf course, forest trails for horseback riding and rivers for canoeing. But the central attraction of the resort is the Magic Kingdom.Between the huge parking lots and the Magic Kingdom lies a broad artificial lake. In the distance rise the towers of Cinderella’s Castle. Even getting to the Magic Kingdom is quite an adventure. You have a choice of transportation. You can either cross the lake on a replica of a Mississippi paddlewheeler, or you can glide around the shore in a streamlined monorail train.When you reach the terminal, you walk straight into a little square which faces Main Street. Main Street is late 19th century. There are modern shops inside the buildings, but all the facades are of the period. There are hanging baskets full of red and white flowers, andthere is no traffic except a horse-drawn streetcar and an ancient double-decker bus. Yet as you walk through the Magic Kingdom, you are actually walking on top of a network of underground roads. This is how the shops, restaurants and all other material needs of the Magic Kingdom are invisibly supplied.Secrets to a Great LifeA great life doesn’t happen by accident. A great life is the resu lt of allocating your time, energy, thoughts, and hard work towards what you want your life to setting yourself up for stress and failure, and start setting up your life to support success and ease.A great life is the result of using the 24/7 you get in a creative and thoughtful way, instead of just what comes next. Customize these “secrets〞to fit your own needs and style, and start creating your own great life today!1. S—Simplify.A great life is the result of simplifying your life. When you focus on simplifying your life, you free up energy and time for the work that you enjoy and the purpose for which you are here. In order to create a great life, you will have to make room for it in yours first.2. E—Effort.A great life is the result of your best effort. Creating a great life requires that you make some adjustments. It means looking for new ways to spend your energy that coincide with your particular definition of a great life. Life will reward your best effort.3. C—Create Priorities.A great life i s the result of creating priorities. It’s easy to spend your days just responding to the next thing that gets your attention, instead of intentionally using the time, energy and money you have in a way that’s important to you. Make sure you are honoring yo ur priorities.4. R—Reserves.A great life is the result of having reserves—reserves of things, time, space, energy, money. With reserves, you acquire far more than you need. Reserves are important because they reduce the fear of consequences, and that allows you to make decisions based on what you really want instead of what the fear decides for you.5. E—Eliminate distractions.A great life is the result of eliminating distractions. Look around at someone’s life you admire. What do they do that you would like to incorporate into your own life? Ask them how they did it. Find ways to free up your mental energy for things that are more important to you.6. T—Thoughts.A great life is the result of controlling your thoughts so that you accept and allow for the possibility that it actually can happen to you! Your belief in the outcome will directly dictate how successful you are. Motivated people have specific goals and look for ways to achieve them.7. S—Start.A great life is the result of starting. There’s the old saying everyone’s familiar with “a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step〞. There’s no better time to start than today.Don’t wait for a raise, or until the kids get older, or the weather is better. It’s what you do TODAY that will make a difference in your life tomorrow.The 50-Percent Theory of LifeI believe in the 50-percent theory. Half the time things are better than normal; the other half, they are worse. I believe life is a pendulum swing. It takes time and experience to understand what normal is, and that gives me the perspective to deal with the surprises of the future.Let’s benchmark the parameters: Yes, I will die. I’ve dealt with the deaths of both parents, a best friend, a beloved boss and cherished pets. Some of these deaths have been violent, before my eyes, or slow and agonizing. Bad stuff, and it belongs at the bottom of the scale. Then there are those high points: romance and marriage to the right person; having a child and doing those Dad things like coaching my son’s baseball team, paddling around the creek in the boat while he’s swimming with the dogs, discovering his compassion so deep it manifests even in his kindness to snails, his imagination so vivid he builds a spaceship from a scattered pile of Legos.But there is a vast meadow of life in the middle, where the bad and the good flip-flop acrobatically. This is what convinces me to believe in the50-percent spring I planted corn too early in a bottomland so flood-prone that neighbors laughed. I felt chagrined at the wasted effort. Summer turned brutal—the worst heat wave and drought in my lifetime. The air-conditioner died, the well went dry, the marriage ended, the job lost, the money gone. I was living lyrics from a country tune—music I disliked. Only a surging Kansas City Royals team, bound for their first World Series, buoyed my back on that horrible summer, I soon understood that all succeeding good things merely offset the bad. Worse than normal wouldn’t last long. I am owed and savor the peaceful and happy times. They reinvigorate me for the next nasty surprise and offer assurance that I can thrive.The 50 percent theory even helps me see hope beyond my Royals’ recent slump, a field of struggling rookies sown so that some year soon we can reap an October harvest. Oh, yeah, the corn crop? For that one blistering summer, the ground moisture was just right, planting early allowed pollination before heat withered the tops, and the lack of rain spared the standing corn from floods. That winter my crib overflowed with corn—fat, healthythree-to-a-stalk ears filled with kernels from heel to tip—while my neighbors’ fields yielded only brown, empty husks.Although plantings past may have fallen below the 50-percent expectation, and they probably will again in the future, I am still sustained by the crop that flourishes during the drought.The Road to HappinessIt is a commonplace among moralists that you cannot get happiness by pursuing it. This is only true if you pursue it unwisely. Gamblers at Monte Carlo are pursuing money, and most of them lose it instead, but there are other ways of pursuing money, which often succeed. So it is with happiness. If you pursue it by means of drink, you are forgetting the hangover.Epicurus pursued it by living only in congenial society and eating only dry bread, supplemented by a little cheese on feast days. His method proved successful in his case, but he was a valetudinarian, and most people would need something more vigorous.For most people, the pursuit of happiness, unless supplemented in various ways, is too abstract and theoretical to be adequate as a personal rule of life. But I think that whatever personal rule of life you may choose it should not, except in rare and heroic cases, be incompatible with you look around at the men and women whom you can call happy, will see that they all have certain things in common. The most important of these things is an activity which at most gradually builds up something that you are glad to see coming into existence.Women who take an instinctive pleasure in their children can get this kind of satisfaction out of bringing up a family. Artists and authors and men of science get happiness in this way if their own work seems good to them. 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 gardens, and when the spring comes, they experience all the joys of having created beauty.The whole subject of happiness has, in my opinion, been treated too solemnly. It had been thought 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 recover, just as you 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 delights 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 hand, he finds his wife fateful, his children’s noise unendurable, and the office a nightmare; if in the daytime 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.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 would increase their happiness more by walking six miles every day than by any conceivable change of philosophy.Six Famous Words“To be or not to be.〞Outside the Bible, these six words are the most famous in all the literature of the world. They were spoken by Hamlet when he was thinking aloud, and they are the most famous words in Shakespearebecause Hamlet was speaking not only for himself but also for every thinking man and woman.To be or not to be, to live or not to live, to live richly and abundantly and eagerly, or to live dully and meanly and scarcely. A philosopher once wanted to know whether he was alive or not, which is a good question for everyone to put to himself occasionally. He answered it by saying: “I think, therefore I am.〞But the best definition of existence I ever saw was one written by another philosopher who said: “To be is to be in relations.〞If this is true, then the more relations a living thing has, the more it is alive.To live abundantly means simply to increase the range and intensity of our relations. Unfortunately we are so constituted that we get to love our routine. But apart from our regular occupation how much are we alive? If you are interested only in your regular occupation, you are alive only to that extent. So far as other things are concerned—poetry and prose, music, pictures, sports, unselfish friendships, politics, international affairs—you are dead. Contrariwise, it is true that every time you acquire a new interest—even more, a new accomplishment—you increase your power of life.No one who is deeply interested in a large variety of subjects can remain unhappy, the real pessimist is the person who has lost interest. Bacon said that a man dies as often as he loses a friend. But we gain new life by contacts and new friends.What is supremely true of living objects is only less true of ideas, which are also alive. Where your thoughts are, there will your life be also. If your thoughts are confined only to your business, only to your physical welfare, only to the narrow circle of the town in which you live, then you live in a narrow-circled life. But if you are interested in what is going on in China, then you are living in China—if you’re inter ested in the characters of a good novel, then you are living with those highly interesting people, if you listen intently to fine music, you are away from your immediate surroundings and living in a world of passion and imagination.To be or not to be—to live intensely and richly, merely to exist, that depends on ourselves. Let widen and intensify our relations. While we live, let live!Write Your Own LifeSuppose someone gave you a pen—a sealed, solid-colored pen. You couldn’t see how much ink it had. It might run dry after the first few tentative words or last just long enough tocreate a masterpiece (or several) that would last forever and make a difference in the scheme of things. You don’t know before you begin. Under the rules of the game, you really never know. You have to take a chance!Actually, no rule of the game states you must do anything. Instead of picking up and using the pen, you could leave it on a shelf or in a drawer where it will dry up, unused. But if you do decide to use it, what would you do with it?How would you play the game?Would you plan and plan before you ever wrote a word? Would your plans be so extensive that you never even got to the writing? Or would you take the pen in hand, plunge right in and just do it, struggling to keep up with the twists and turns of the torrents of words that take you where they take you? Would you write cautiously and carefully, as if the pen might run dry the next moment, or would you pretend or believe (or pretend to believe) that the pen will write forever and proceed accordingly?And of what would you write: Of love? Hate? Fun? Misery? Life? Death? Nothing? Everything?Would you write to please just yourself?Or others? Or yourself by writing for others?Would your strokes be tremblingly timid or brilliantly bold? Fancy with a flourish or plain?Would you even write? Once you have the pen, no rule says you have to write.Would you sketch? Scribble? Doodle or draw?Would you stay in or on the lines, or see no lines at all, even if they were there? Or are they?There’s a lot to think about here, isn’t there? Now, suppose someone gave you a life…。
晨读英语美文100篇前20篇之欧阳法创编
星火书业晨读英语美文100篇六级Passage1. Knowledge and VirtueKnowledge is one thing, virtue is another; good sense is not conscience, refinement is not humility, nor is largeness and justness of view faith. Philosophy, however enlightened, however profound, gives no command over the passions, no influential motives, no vivifying principles.Liberal Education makes not the Christian, not the Catholic, but the gentleman. It is well to be a gentleman, it is well to have a cultivated intellect, a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind, a noble and courteous bearing in the conduct of life—these are the connatural qualities of a large knowledge; they are the objects of a University. I am advocating, I shall illustrate and insist uponthem;but still, I repeat, they are no guarantee for sanctity or even for conscientiousness, and they may attach to the man of the world, to the profligate, to the heartless, pleasant, alas, and attractive as he shows when decked out in them. Taken by themselves, they do but seem to be what they are not; they look like virtue at a distance, but they are detected by close observers, and in the long run;and hence it is that they are popularly accused of pretense and hypocrisy, not, I repeat, from their own fault, but because their professors and their admirers persist in taking them for what they are not,and are officious in arrogating for them a praise to which they have no claim. Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk, then may you hope with such keen and delicateinstruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants,the passion and the pride of man.Passage2. “Packing” a PersonA person, like a commodity, needs packaging. But going too far is absolutely undesirable. A little exaggeration, however, does no harm when it shows the person's unique qualities to their advantage. To display personal charm in a casual and natural way, it is important for one to have a clear knowledge of oneself. A master packager knows how to integrate art and nature without any traces of embellishment, so that the person so packaged is no commodity but a human being, lively and lovely. A young person, especially a female, radiant with beauty and full of life, has all the favor granted by God. Any attempt to makeup would be self-defeating. Youth, however, comes and goes in a moment of doze. Packaging for the middle-aged is primarily to conceal the furrows ploughed by time. If you still enjoy life's exuberance enough to retain self-confidence and pursue pioneering work, you are unique in your natural qualities, and your charm and grace will remain. Elderly people are beautiful if their river of life has been, through plains, mountains and jungles, running its course as it should. You have really lived your life which now arrives at a complacent stage of serenity indifferent to fame or wealth. There is no need to resort to hair-dyeing；the snow-capped mountain is itself a beautiful scene of fairyland. Let your looks change from young to old synchronizing with the natural ageing process so as to keep in harmony with nature, for harmony itself is beauty, while the other way round will only end in unpleasantness. To be in the elder's company is like reading a thick book of deluxe edition that fascinates one so much as to be reluctant to part with. As long as one finds where one stands, one knows how to package oneself, just as acommodity establishes its brand by the right packaging. Passage3. Three Passions I Have Lived for Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy —ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness —that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life, this is what—at last—I have found. With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the heartsof men. I have wished to know why the stars shine ... A little of this, but not much, I have achieved. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people —a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.Passage4. A Little GirlSitting on a grassy grave, beneath one of the windows of the church, was a little girl. With her head bent back she was gazing up at the sky and singing, while one of her little hands was pointing to a tiny cloud that hovered like a golden feather above her head. The sun, which had suddenly become very bright, shining on her glossy hair,gave it a metallic luster, and it was difficult to say what was the color, dark bronze or black. So completely absorbed was she in watching the cloud to which her strange song or incantation seemed addressed, that she did not observe me when I rose and went towards her. Over her head, high up in the blue, a lark that was soaring towards the same gauzy cloud was singing, as if in rivalry. As I slowly approached the child, I could see by her forehead, which in the sunshine seemed like a globe of pearl, and especially by her complexion, that she uncommonly lovely. Her eyes, which at one moment seemed blue-gray, at another violet, were shaded by long black lashes, curving backward in a most peculiar way, and these matched in hue her eyebrows, and the tresses that were tossed about her tender throat were quivering in the sunlight. All this I did not take in at once; for at first I could see nothing but those quivering, glittering, changeful eyes turned up into my face. Gradually the other features, especially the sensitive full-lipped mouth, grew upon me as I stood silently gazing. Here seemed to me a more perfect beauty than had ever come to me in myloveliest dreams of beauty. Yet it was not her beauty so much as the look she gave me that fascinated me, melted me.Passage5 Declaration of Independence When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Libertyand the pursuit of Happiness. —That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institutenew Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience has shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment ofan absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.Passage6. A Tribute to the DogThe best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it most.A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is his dog. A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow andthe snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer; he will lick the wounds and sores that come from encounter with the roughness of the world. He will guard the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journeys through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth, an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless，the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him, to guard him against danger, to fight against his enemies. And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace, and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the grave will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death.Passage7. Knowledge and Progress Why does the idea of progress loom so large in the modernworld? Surely because progress of a particular kind is actually taking place around us and is becoming more and more manifest. Although mankind has undergone no general improvement in intelligence or morality, it has made extraordinary progress in the accumulation of knowledge. Knowledge began to increase as soon as the thoughts of one individual could be communicated to another by means of speech. With the invention of writing， a great advance was made, for knowledge could then be not only communicated but also stored. Libraries made education possible, and education in its turn added to libraries: the growth of knowledge followed a kind of compound interest law, which was greatly enhanced by the invention of printing. All this was comparatively slow until, with the coming of science,the tempo was suddenly raised. Then knowledge began to be accumulated according to a systematic plan. The trickle became a stream; the stream has now become a torrent. Moreover, as soon as new knowledge is acquired, it is now turned to practical account. What is called “modern civilization” is not the result ofa balanced development of all man's nature, but of accumulated knowledge applied to practical life. The problem now facing humanity is: What is going to be done with all this knowledge? As is so often pointed out, knowledge is a two-edged weapon which can be used equally for good or evil. It is now being used indifferently for both. Could any spectacle, for instance, be more grimly weird than that of gunners using science to shatter men's bodies while, close at hand, surgeons use it to restore them? We have to ask ourselves very seriously what will happen if this twofold use of knowledge, with its ever-increasing power, continues.Passage8. Address by Engels On the 14th of March, at a quarter to three in the afternoon, the greatest living thinker ceased to think. He had been left alone for scarcely two minutes, and when we came back we found him in his armchair,peacefully gone to sleep—but forever. An immeasurable loss has been sustained both by the militant proletariat of Europe and America, and by historical science, in the death of this man.The gap that has been left by the departure of this mighty spirit will soon enough make itself felt. Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic nature, so Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology,that mankind must first of all eat, drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, art, religion, etc.; that therefore the production of the immediate material means of subsistence and consequently the degree of economic development attained by a given people or during a given epoch form the foundation upon which the state institutions, the legal conceptions, art, and even the ideas on religion, of the people concerned have been evolved, and in the light of which they must, therefore, be explained, instead of vice versa, as had hitherto been the case. But that is not all. Marx also discovered the special law of motion governing the present-day capitalist mode of production and the bourgeois society that this mode of production has created. The discovery of surplus value suddenly threw light on theproblem, in trying to solve which all previous investigations, of both bourgeois economists and socialist critics, had been groping in the dark. Two such discoveries would be enough for one lifetime. Happy the man to whom it is granted to make even one such discovery. But in every single field which Marx investigated—and he investigated very many fields, none of them superficially—in every field, even in that of mathematics, he made independent discoveries.Passage9. Relationship that Lasts If somebody tells you,“ I’ll love you for ever,” will you believe it? I don’t think there’s any reason not to. We are ready to believe such commitment at the moment, whatever change may happen afterwards. As for the belief in an everlasting love, that’s another thing. Then you may be asked whether there is such a thing as an everlasting love. I’d answer I believe in it, but an everlasting love is not immutable.You may unswervingly love or be loved by a person. But love will change its composition with the passage of time. It will not remain the same. In the courseof your growth and as a result of your increased experience, love will become something different to you. In the beginning you believed a fervent love for a person could last definitely. By and by, however, “fervent” gave way to “prosaic”. Precisely because of this change it became possible for love to last. Then what was meant by an everlasting love would eventually end up in a sort of interdependence. We used to insist on the difference between love and liking. The former seemed much more beautiful than the latter. One day, however, it turns out there’s really no need to make such difference. Liking is actually a sort of love. By the same token, the everlasting interdependence is actually an everlasting love. I wish I could believe there was somebody who would love me for ever. That’s, as we all know, too romantic to be true. Instead, it will more often than not be a case of lasting relationship.Passage10. Rush Swallows may have gone, but there is a time of return; willow trees may have died back, but there is a time ofregreening; peach blossoms may have fallen, but they will bloom again. Now, you the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? If they had been stolen by someone, who could it be? Where could he hide them? If they had made the escape themselves, then where could they stay at the moment? I don’t know how many days I have been given to spend, but I do feel my hands are getting empty. Taking stock silently, I find that more than eight thousand days have already slid away from me. Like a drop of water from the point of a needle disappearing into the ocean, my days are dripping into the stream of time, soundless, traceless. Already sweat is starting on my forehead, and tears welling up in my eyes. Those that have gone have gone for good, those to come keep coming; yet in between, how fast is the shift, in such a rush? When I get up in the morning, the slanting sun marks its presence in my small room in two or three oblongs. The sun has feet, look, he is treading on, lightly and furtively; and I am caught, blankly, in his revolution. Thus —the day flows away through the sink when I wash my hands, wears off inthe bowl when I eat my meal, and passes away before my day-dreaming gaze as reflect in silence. I can feel his haste now, so I reach out my hands to hold him back, but he keeps flowing past my withholding hands. In the evening, as I lie in bed, he strides over my body, glides past my feet, in his agile way. The moment I open my eyes and meet the sun again, one whole day has gone. I bury my face in my hands and heave a sigh. But the new day begins to flash past in the sigh. What can I do, in this bustling world, with my days flying in their escape? Nothing but to hesitate, to rush. What have I been doing in that eight-thousand-day rush, apart from hesitating? Those bygone days have been dispersed as smoke by a light wind, or evaporated as mist by the morning sun. What traces have I left behind me? Have I ever left behind any gossamer traces at all? I have come to the world, stark naked; am I to go back, in a blink, in the same stark nakedness? It is not fair though: why should I have made such a trip for nothing! You the wise, tell me, why should our days leave us, never to return? Passage11. A Summer DayOne day thirty years ago Marseilles lay in the burning sun.A blazing sun upon a fierce August day was no greater rarity in southern Francethan at any other time before or since. Everything in Marseilles and about Marseilles had stared at the fervid sun, and had been stared at in return, until a staring habit had become universal there. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away. The only things to be seen not fixedly staring and glaring were the vines drooping under their loads of grapes. These did occasionally wink a little, as the hot air barely moved their faint leaves.The universal stare made the eyes ache. Towards the distant blue of the Italian coast, indeed, it was a little relieved by light clouds of mist slowly rising from the evaporation of the sea, but it softened nowhere else. Far away the dusty vines overhanging wayside cottages, and the monotonous wayside avenues of parched trees without shade, dropped beneath the stare of earth and sky. So did the horses with drowsy bells, in long files of carts, creeping slowly towardsthe interior; so did their recumbent drivers, when they were awake, which rarely happened; so did the exhausted laborers in the fields. Everything that lived or grew was oppressed by the glare; except the lizard, passing swiftly over rough stone walls, and cicada, chirping its dry hot chirp, like a rattle. The very dust was scorched brown, and something quivered in the atmosphere as if the air itself were panting. Blinds, shutters, curtains, awnings, were all closed and drawn to deep out the stare. Grant it but a chink or a keyhole, and it shot in like a white-hot arrow. Passage12. NightNight has fallen over the country. Through the trees rises the red moon and the stars are scarcely seen. In the vast shadow of night, the coolness and the dews descend. I sit at the open window to enjoy them; and hear only the voice of the summer wind. Like black hulks, the shadows of the great trees ride at anchor on the billowy sea of grass. I cannot see the red and blue flowers, but I know that they are there. Far away in the meadow gleams the silver Charles. The tramp of horses' hoofs sounds from thewooden bridge. Then all is still save the continuous wind or the sound of the neighboring sea. The village clock strikes; and I feel that I am not alone. How different it is in the city! It is late, and the crowd is gone. You step out upon the balcony, and lie in the very bosom of the cool, dewy night as if you folded her garments about you. Beneath lies the public walk with trees, like a fathomless, black gulf. The lamps are still burning up and down the long street. People go by with grotesque shadows, now foreshortened, and now lengthening away into the darkness and vanishing, while a new one springs up behind the walker, and seems to pass him revolving like the sail of a windmill. The iron gates of the park shut with a jangling clang. There are footsteps and loud voices; —a tumult; —a drunken brawl; —an alarm of fire; —then silence again. And now at length the city is asleep, and we can see the night. The belated moon looks over the roofs, and finds no one to welcome her. The moonlight is broken. It lies here and there in the squares and the opening of the streets—angular like blocks of white marble.Passage13. Peace and Development: the Themes of Our TimesPeace and development are the themes of the times. People across the world should join hands in advancing the lofty cause of peace and development of mankind. A peaceful environment is indispensable for national, regional and even global development. Without peace or political stability there would be no economic progress to speak of. This has been fully proved by both the past and the present. In today’s world, the international situation is, on the whole, moving towards relaxation. However, conflicts and even local wars triggered by various factors have kept cropping up, and tension still remains in some areas. All this has impeded the economic development of the countries and regions concerned, and has also adversely affected the world economy. All responsible statesmen and governments must abide by the purposes of the UN Charter and the universally acknowledged norms governing international relations, and work for a universal, lasting and comprehensive peace. Nobody should be allowed to causetension or armed conflicts against the interests of the people. There are still in this world a few interest groups, which always want to seek gains by creating tension here and there. This is against the will of the majority of the people and against the trend of the times. An enormous market demand can be created and economic prosperity promoted only when continued efforts are made to advance the cause of peace and development, to ensure that people around the world live and work in peace and contentment and focus on economic development and on scientific and technological innovation. I hope that all of us here today will join hands with all other peace-loving people and work for lasting world peace and the common development and prosperity of all nations and regions. Passage14. Self-Esteem Self-esteem is the combination of self-confidence and self-respect—the conviction that you are competent to cope with life’s challenges and are worthy of happiness. Self-esteem is the way you talk to yourself about yourself. Self-esteem has two interrelated aspects; it entails a sense ofpersonal efficacy and a sense of personal worth. It is the integrated sum of self-confidence and self-respect. It is the conviction that one is competent to live and worthy of living. Our self-esteem and self-image are developed by how we talk to ourselves. All of us have conscious and unconscious memories of all the times we felt bad or wrong—they are part of the unavoidable scars of childhood. This is where the critical voice gets started. Everyone has a critical inner voice. People with low self-esteem simply have a more vicious and demeaning inner voice. Psychologists say that almost every aspect of our lives—our personal happiness, success, relationships with others, achievement, creativity, dependencies—are dependent on our level of self-esteem. The more we have, the better we deal with things. Positive self-esteem is important because when people experience it, they feel good and look good, they are effective and productive, and they respond to other people and themselves in healthy, positive, growing ways. People who have positive self-esteem know that they are lovable and capable, and theycare about themselves and other people.They do not have to build themselves up by tearing other people down or by patronizing less competent people. Our background largely determines what we will become in personality and more importantly in self-esteem. Where do feelings of worthlessness come from? Many come from our families, since more than 80% of our waking hours up to the age of eighteen are spent under their direct influence. We are who we are because of where we’ve been. We build our own brands of self-esteem from four ingredients: fate, the positive things life offers, the negative things life offers and our own decisions about how to respond to fate, the positives and the negatives. Neither fate nor decisions can be determined by other people in our own life. No one can change fate. We can control our thinking and therefore our decisions in life.Passage15. Struggle for Freedom It is not possible for me to express all that I feel of appreciation for what has been said and given to me. I accept, for myself, with the conviction of having receivedfar beyond what I have been able to give in my books. I can only hope that the many books which I have yet to write will be in some measure a worthier acknowledgment than I can make tonight. And, indeed, I can accept only in the same spirit in which I think this gift was originally given—that it is a prize not so much for what has been done, as for the future. Whatever I write in the future must, I think, be always benefited and strengthened when I remember this day. I accept,too, for my country,the United States of America. We are a people still young and we know that we have not yet come to the fullest of our powers. This award, given to an American, strengthens not only one, but the whole body of American writers, who are encouraged and heartened by such generous recognition. And I should like to say, too, that in my country it is important that this award has been given to a woman. You who have already so recognized your own Selma Lagerlof, and have long recognized women in other fields, cannot perhaps wholly understand what it means in many countries that it is a woman who stands here at thismoment. But I speak not only for writers and for women, but for all Americans, for we all share in this. I should not be truly myself if I did not, in my own wholly unofficial way, speak also of the people of China,whose life has for so many years been my life also, whose life,indeed, must always be a part of my life. The minds of my own country and China, my foster country, are alike in many ways, but above all, alike in our common love of freedom.And today more than ever, this is true, now when China's whole being is engaged in the greatest of all the struggles, the struggle for freedom. I have never admired China more than I do now, when I see her uniting as she has never before, against the enemy who threatens her freedom. With this determination for freedom, which is in so profound a sense the essential quality of her nature, I know that she is unconquerable. Freedom—it is today more than ever the most precious human possession. We—Sweden and the United States—we have it still. My country is young—but it greets you with a peculiar fellowship, you whose earth is ancient and free.。
高中英语晨读英语美文60篇41OlympicEconomy_AHugeTemptation素材
Olympic Economy-A Huge TemptationFro m 2001 to 2008,Beijing will invest 280 billion yuan in the Olympic Games project,of which 180 billion will go to the construction of infrastructure.Such a huge investment will be a stimulus to the economic development of Beijing and the country as a whole. According to the spokesman of the National Bureau of Statistics,during the 7 years from 2001 to 2008,the average annual GDP growth,driven by "Olympic economy",is expected to increase 0.3 to 0.4 percentage point.Economic experts have predicted that the 2008 Olympic Games will exert an extensive and far-reaching influence on China's economic and social development and that the influence on su ch specific industries as sports,tourism,construction,building materials,communication a nd commercial services will be more direct.Olympic Economy will be a new growth factor for China's economy,which will create over 1 million job opportunities.Motiveated by the Olympic Games,China will witness a high-speed development in its economy during the first decade of the 21st century.By hosting the Olympic Games,Beijing will earn a direct income of approximately US$3 billion from the TV relay rights,the Olympic Partners program of the international Olympic Committee subsides from the Central Government and the Beijing Municipal Government,support from businesses and franchises,and sales of commemorative coins and sta mps and admission tickets to the games.It is estimated that the indirect income to be gained by Beijing will reach US$5.4 billion,and it is impossible to work out a correct figure of the derivative income to be brought to Beijing and the whole country.The Beijing Olympic Games will help to improve Beijing's environment and enhance its scientific and technological levels.In the coming five years,Beijing will earmark 45 billion yuan for environmental improvement,and 30 billion yuan for the building for its information industry,laying a foundation for a"digital Beijing" that initially fertures e-government,e-business and distanceeducation.Meanwhile,Beijing will accomplish the task of demolishing more than 9 million square meters of dilapidated houses and building new homes for the relocated resdents,making available living space of 18 square meters per capita.The Olympic Games will greatly speed up the pace of building Beijing into a modern international metropolis.Beijing has worked out this strategic plan for its development in the new century:by 2010.Beijing will be the first city in the country in realizing ini tial modernization,forming a basic framework for a modern international metropolis;by 2020,it will have developed into a modern international metro polis;and by the mid-21st century,the city will have been completely modernized and become a first-class modern international metropolis i n the world.。
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名著诗歌节选1. The Gift of the Magi (1)导读：《麦琪的礼物》是美国著名作家欧·亨利的著名短篇小说。
吉姆和黛拉生活窘迫，但都深爱着对方。
圣诞节前一天，他们都想送对方一件特别的礼物，结果阴差阳错，两人珍贵的礼物都变成了无用的东西，而他们却得到了比任何实物都宝贵的东西——爱。
Della finished her crying and dried her face. She stood by the window and looked out unhappily at a gray cat walking along a gray fence in a gray back yard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only one dollar and eighty-seven cents to buy her husband Jim a gift. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result.There was a tall glass mirror between the windows of the room. Suddenly Della turned from the window and stood before the glass mirror and looked at herself. Her eyes were shining, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Quickly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.Della and Jim had two possessions which they valued. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair. So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, shining like a brown waterfall. It reached below her knees and made itself almost like a covering for her. And then quickly she①put it up again. She stood still while a few tears fell on the floor.She②put on her coat and her old brown hat.With a quick motion and brightness still in her eyes, she danced out the door and down the street. Where she stopped the sign read: "Madame Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds." Della ran up the steps to the shop,③out of breath."Will you buy my hair?" asked Della."I buy hair," said Madame. "④Take your hat off and let us have a look at it.”⑤Down came the beautiful brown waterfall of hair."Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the hair with an experienced hand."Give it to me quick," said Della.The next two hours went by as if they had wings. Della looked in all the stores to choose a gift for Jim. She found it at last. It was a chain —simple round rings of silver. It was perfect for Jim’s gold watch. She gave the shopkeeper twenty-one dollars and she hurried home with the eighty-seven cents that was left.When Della arrived home she began to repair what was left of her hair. The hair had been ruined by her love and her desire to give a special gift. Repairing the damage was a very big job. Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny round curls of hair that made her look wonderfully like a schoolboy. She looked at herself in theglass mirror long and carefully.麦琪的礼物（1）黛拉停止了哭泣，擦干了脸。
她站在窗前，忧伤地看着灰蒙蒙的后院里一只灰色的猫正沿着灰色的篱笆行走。
明天就是圣诞节了，而她只有一块八毛七分钱来给她的丈夫吉姆买礼物。
这已经是她省吃俭用攒了好几个月的结果。
房间的两个窗户之间有一面高高的镜子。
突然，黛拉从窗边转过身来，站到镜子前，看着镜中的自己。
她的双眼闪着晶亮的光，可是二十秒内，她的面色猛然间变了。
她迅速地把头发解开，放下来。
黛拉和吉姆用有两件视若珍宝的东西：一件是吉姆的祖父和父亲传给他的金表，另一件就是黛拉的长发。
现在，黛拉美丽的长发披散在她的身上，就像棕色的瀑布闪耀着光泽。
头发一直垂到她的膝下，简直就是一件天然的外套。
随后她又快速地把头发扎好。
她一动不动，几滴眼泪滴落在地板上。
她穿上外套，戴上那顶棕色的旧帽子。
眼里仍然闪烁着光芒，她翩然走出房门，跑到大街上。
在一个写着“索夫罗涅太太——经营各种头发制品”的招牌前面，黛拉停了下来。
她气喘吁吁地跑上台阶。
“您愿意买我的头发吗？”黛拉问。
“我买头发，”太太说。
“把帽子摘下来让我看看吧。
”棕色的瀑布倾泻而下。
“二十块，”夫人说，用她老练的手抓起头发。
“快给我钱，”黛拉说。
接下来的两个小时如长了翅膀一般飞逝而过。
黛拉一家商店接一家商店地为吉姆搜寻合适的礼物。
她终于找到了。
那是一条表链——白银质地、款式简单，和吉姆的金表简直就是绝配。
她付给店主二十一块钱，然后拿着剩下的八毛七分，匆匆忙忙赶回自己的家。
黛拉回到家后，赶紧开始打理一头短发。
由于对吉姆的爱，由于她想送给他一件特别的礼物的渴望，她牺牲了自己的头发。
修复这些短发可相当不易。
不到四十分钟，她的头上便盖满了细小的发卷，这使得她看上去就像个小男生。
她对着镜子，久久地、小心翼翼地看着自己的新造型。
重点单词:1. motion ['məʊʃ(ə)n] n. 动作；移动2. curl [kɜːl]n. 卷曲；卷发重点短语/ 亮点句式：1. put up束起(头发)；建造。
如：She's put her hair up.她把头发挽在头上。
Many blocks of flats were put up in the 1990's.许多公寓式建筑群都是20世纪90年代建的。
2. put on 穿上；上演。
如：On New Year’s Eve，the children put on their new clothes.除夕夜，孩子们都穿上了新衣服。
They are able to put on a good show.他们有能力上演一出好戏。
3. out of breath喘不过气来，上气不接下气。
如：By the time I got to the top of the hill, I was quite out of breath.等我爬到山顶的时候，已经是上气不接下气了。
4. take off 脱下；起飞。
如：Take off your old coat and try on this one.脱下你的旧外套，试穿这一件。
The police boarded the plane shortly before it was to take off and took the two men into custody.警方是在飞机临起飞前登机并拘捕两人的。
5. Down came the beautiful brown waterfall of hair.棕色的瀑布倾泻而下。
这是一个倒装句。
表示运动方向的副词或地点状语置于句首，而且主语是名词时，句子要使用完全倒装。
如：Out rushed the children as soon as the class was over.刚一下课，孩子们就冲了出去。
名句背诵：No one can degrade us except ourselves; that if we are worthy, no influence can defeat us. （Washington, American educator)除了我们自己以外，没有人能贬低我们。
如果我们坚强，就没有什么不良影响能够打败我们。
(美国教育家华盛顿)2. The Gift of the Magi (2)At seven o'clock that night, the door opened and Jim stepped in. He looked thin and very serious.Jim stopped inside the door.①His eyes were fixed upon Della. There was an expression in them that she could not read, and it frightened her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor fear, nor any of the feelings that she had been prepared for. He simply looked at her with a strange expression on his face."You have②cut off your hair?" asked Jim, slowly, as if he had not accepted the information even after his mind worked very hard."Cut it off and sold it," said Della. "Do you not like me just as well? I am the same person without my hair, right?"It is sold, sold and gone, too. It is Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it was cut for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered, but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the meat on, Jim?" said Della.Jim seemed to awaken quickly and put his arms around Della. Then he took a packag e from his coat and threw it on the table."Do not make any mistake about me, Dell," he said. "I do not think there is any haircut that could make me like my girl any less.③But if you will open that package you may see why you had me frightened at first."White fingers quickly tore at the string and paper. There was a scream of joy; and then, alas! a change to tears and cries, requiring the man of the house to use all his skill to calm his wife.For there were the combs —the special set of objects to hold her hair that Della had wanted ever since she saw them in a shop window. Beautiful combs, made of shells, with jewels at the edge —just the color to wear in the beautiful hair that was no longer hers.④And now, the beautiful combs were hers, but the hair that should have touched them was gone. But she held the combs to herself, and soon she was able to⑤look up with a smile and say, "My hair grows so fast, Jim!"Then Della jumped up like a little burned cat and cried, "Oh, oh!" Jim had not yet seen his beautiful gift. She happily held it out to him in her open hands. The silver chain seemed so bright."Isn't it wonderful, Jim? I looked all over town to find it. You will have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it."Instead of obeying, Jim fell on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled. "Dell," said he, "let us put our Christmas gifts away and keep them a while. They are too nice to use just right now. I sold my gold watch to get the money to buy the set of combs for your hair.⑥And now, why not put the meat on？"麦琪的礼物（2）晚上七点钟，屋门打开，吉姆走了进来。