英语PK台 第299期:马克·吐温致青年人的忠告

 　　Being told I would be expected to talk here, I inquired what sort of talk I ought to make. They said it should be something suitable to youth-something didactic, instructive, or something in the nature of good advice. Very well.

　　“我接收到通知将到这里来做演说时，我就询问我应该讲些什么。他们说应该讲些适合年轻人的--有教育性的，有意义的，或者一些好的建议。非常好！”
　　I have a few things in my mind which I have often longed to say for the instruction of the young, for it is in one's tender early years that such things will best take root and be most enduring and most valuable. First, then, I will say to you — my young friends, and I say it beseechingly 1, urgently;
　　我心里有些话一直想一吐为快，好用以指导青年人。因为只有在一个人年轻的时候，这些话才能更好地在内心扎根，产生最为持久的影响，同时也最具价值。年轻的朋友们，首先我要对你们说，我也要诚恳，急切地告诫你们：
　　Always obey your parents when they are present. This is the best policy in the long run, because if you don't, they will make you. Most parents think they know better than you do, and you can generally make more by humoring that superstition 2 than you can by acting 3 on your own better judgment 4.
　　当着父母的面，要永远服从父母。如果从长计议，这是最佳选择，因为即使你不服从，他们也会迫使你服从。大多数的家长都认为他们比你懂得多，而你如果顺从他们，假装也认为的确是他们比你更有经验，则往往要比按照自己更正确的判断行事，更容易取得好的结果。
　　Be respectful to your superiors, if you have any, also to strangers, and sometimes to others. If a person offend you, and you are in doubt as to whether it was intentional 5 or not, do not resort to extreme measures; simply watch your chance and hit him with a brick. That will be sufficient. If you shall find that he had not intended any offense 6, come out frankly 7 and confess yourself in the wrong when you struck him, acknowledge it like a man and say you didn't mean to. Yes, always avoid violence; in this age of charity and kindliness 8, the time has gone by for such things. Leave dynamite 9 to the low and unrefined.
　　尊敬你的上司，如果你有的话；你也应该尊敬陌生人；有时还要尊敬其他人，如果有人冒犯你，而你不确定这种冒犯行为是否是有意的，那就不要采取极端措施。你只需要瞅准机会，狠狠地给他来一下，那就够了。万一发现他并非故意冒犯，你就要坦诚地站出来，承认自己的错误，像个男子汉一样坦白自己对他的报复，并说明自己绝非有意如此。对，要始终避免暴力。在这个宽容友好的年代，盛行的是仁爱和宽容。将炸药留给那些低俗的、没教养的人。
　　Go to bed early, get up early — this is wise. Some authorities say get up with the sun; some others say get up with on thing, some with another. But a lark 10 is really the best thing to get up with. It gives you a splendid reputation with everybody to know that you get up with the lark; and if you get the right kind of lark, and work at him right, you can easily train him to get up at half past nine, every time — it is no trick at all.
　　要早睡早起——这是明智之举。有权威人士说要日出而起；也有人说应该与这个或那个同起。但我觉得最好是和云雀同起。如果大家知道你和云雀同起，名声自然会好。不妨弄一只机灵的能够接受训练的云雀，悉心调教，准能轻易让它每天九点半起床——这可算不上什么复杂的伎俩。
　　Now as to the matter of lying, you want to be very careful about lying; otherwise you are nearly sure to get caught. Once caught, you can never again be in the eyes to the good and the pure, what you were before. Many a young person has injured himself permanently 11 through a single clumsy and ill finished lie, the result of carelessness born of incomplete training. Some authorities hold that the young ought not to lie at all.
　　“现在来谈谈说谎的事。你们要非常小心地对待说谎；否则几乎一定会被抓到。一旦被抓，在那些善良纯洁的人眼中，你就不可能再与原来的你一样了。许多年轻人都这样；用一个简单笨拙而又草草结尾的谎言，用那天生缺乏训练的疏忽所导致的结果来伤害自己。有些权威人士认为，年轻人绝不应该撒谎。”
　　That of course, is putting it rather stronger than necessary; still while I cannot go quite so far as that, I do maintain, and I believe I am right, that the young ought to be temperate 12 in the use of this great art until practice and experience shall give them that confidence, elegance 13, and precision which alone can make the accomplishment 14 graceful 15 and profitable. Patience, diligence, painstaking 16 attention to detail — these are requirements; these in time, will make the student perfect; upon these only, may he rely as the sure foundation for future eminence 17.
　　“当然，这要求过于苛刻，我的观点没那么绝对，我坚持认为，同时我也相信我的想法是正确的；年轻人在运用这项伟大艺术时一定要节制，直到他们的实践与经验可以让他们自信、优雅并精确地使谎言漂漂亮亮地成功。耐心、勤奋、对细节的认真洞察力，这些都需要具备；这些迟早会让学习者变得完美；仅仅靠这些，就会为将来变得出众打下坚实基础。”
　　For the history of our race, and each individual's experience, are sewn thick with evidences that a truth is not hard to kill, and that a lie well told is immortal 18. There is in Boston a monument of the man who discovered anesthesia; many people are aware, in these latter days, that that man didn't discover it at all, but stole the discovery from another man. Is this truth mighty，and will it prevail. Ah no, my hearers, the monument is made of hardy 19 material, but the lie it tells will outlast 20 it a million years.
　　“我们人类的历史及每个人的经历都清清楚楚地证明：事实不难毁掉，编得好的谎言可以长存不朽。波士顿有个纪念碑，是为了纪念一个发明麻醉术的人；后来许多人都知道，根本不是他发现的，而是他偷了另一个人的发明成果。这个事实有力量吗？它会流传吗？哦，不会的，我的听众们。纪念碑是用坚硬的材料做的，而它所记述的谎言会比它多活一百万年。”
　　An awkward, feeble, leaky lie is a thing which you ought to make it your unceasing study to avoid; such a lie as that has no more real permanence than an average truth. Why ,you might as well tell truth at once and be done with it. A feeble, stupid, preposterous 21 lie will not live two years — except it be a slander 22 upon somebody. It is indestructible, then of course, but that is no merit of yours. A final word: begin your practice of this gracious and beautiful art early — begin now. If I had begun earlier, I could have learned now.
　　“笨拙、无力、有漏洞的谎言是你们应该通过不断学习来避免的；这样的谎言不会比一个普通的事实更真实永久。你们何不一次说出事实并自此再不提起。一个软弱无力，愚蠢荒谬的谎言流传不到两年--除非那是对某个人的诽谤。当然，它不可毁灭，但这样对你也没有好处。总之一句话：现在趁早就开始实践这项高尚美丽的艺术吧。如果我早开始，我现在一定会学会了。”
　　There are many sorts of books, but good ones are the sort for the young to read. Remember that. They are a great, an inestimable and unspeakable means of improvement. Therefore be careful in your selection, my young friends; be very careful; confine yourselves exclusively to Robertson's Sermons, Baxter's Saint's Rest, The Innocents Abroad, and works of that kind.
　　书有很多种，但适合青年人看的书才算是好书。记住这一点。好书是难以估量的巨大财富，读好书是一种绝佳的、难以言表的进步方式。因此，年轻的朋友们，要谨慎选择图书，要非常谨慎才行，把自己看书的范围限定于罗宾逊的《布道辞》、巴克斯特的《圣徒的信息》和《傻子国外旅行记》等诸如此类的作品。
　　Never handle firearms carelessly. The sorrow and suffering that have been caused through the innocent but heedless handling of firearms by the young ! Only for days ago, right in the next farm house to the one where I am spending the summer, a grandmother, old and gray and sweet, one of the loveliest spirits in the land, was sitting at her work, when her young grandson crept in and got down an old, battered 23, rusty 24 gun which had not been touched for many years and was supposed not to be loaded, and pointed 25 it at her, laughing and threatening to shoot. In her fright she ran screaming and pleading toward the door on the other side of the room; but as she passed him he placed the gun almost against her very breast and pulled the trigger!
　　“绝不轻意地用武器。由于年轻人无知，轻率地拿起武器而引起的悲痛有多少！仅仅四天前，就在我过夏天那家农屋的隔壁，有一位头发灰白，和蔼可亲的老奶奶，当地最可爱的人物之一，正坐着她的活，她年幼的孙子蹑手蹑脚进来取下那只破旧、已被敲扁了的生锈的枪。这支枪已多年未被动过，可能没有装填弹药。惊骇中，她边跑边尖叫着恳求着到了屋子另一边的门。就在她经过他时，他几乎把枪正对着她的胸膛，并拉动了扳机。”
　　He had supposed it was not loaded. And he was right — it wasn't. So there wasn't any harm done. It is the only case of that kind I ever heard meddle 26 with old unloaded firearms; they are the most deadly and unerring things that have ever been created by man. You don't have to take any pains at all with them; you don't have to have a rest, you don't have to have any sights on the gun, you don't have to take aim, even. No, you just pick out a relative and bang away，and you are sure to get him.
　　“他以为里面没装子弹，他对了--是的，是没装，所以没造成任何伤害。这是我所听过的惟一一个没有造成伤害的例子。因此，同样别去摆弄那些旧了的卸了膛的武器，他们是人类创造的武器中最准确最致命的了。使用它们你不用费任何力气，也不需要休息，不用枪瞄准，甚至都不用选取目标。都不用，你就找个亲戚呼地一声，就一定能击中他。”
　　But I have said enough. I hope you will treasure up the instructions which I have given you, and make them a guide to your feet and a light to your understanding. Build your character thoughtfully and painstakingly 27 upon these precepts 28, and by and by, when you have got it built, you will be surprised and gratified to see how nicely and sharply it resembles everybody else's.
　　我已经说得差不多了。希望你们将我的教诲铭记在心，作为自己的行动指南、指路明灯。大家要修身养性、奋力进取，这样，等到最终修成正果，你会惊喜地发现，你的品行和周围其他人的是多么惊人地相似。