英語美文欣賞勵(lì)志篇摘抄
勵(lì)志座右銘:人生是美麗的,人生是甜密的,并不代表人生是一帆風(fēng)順的。下面小編整理了英語美文欣賞勵(lì)志篇,希望大家喜歡!
英語美文欣賞勵(lì)志篇摘抄
什么使我胸懷寬廣
What Makes Me Feel Big
J. Frank Dobie
“My mind is big when I look at you and talk to you,” Chief Eagle of the Pawnees said to George Bird Grinnell when, after years of absence, that noble writer appeared at his friend’s tepee.
It is very difficult in drawing up a credo to be severely honest about one’s self, to avoid all traditional cant. We actually believe in what we value most. Outside of the realms of carnality and property, which men appearing in public generally pretend not to notice, I believe in and draw nourishment from whatever makes me feel big.
I believe in a Supreme Power, unknowable and impersonal, whose handiwork the soul-enlarging firmament declares. However, I believe in questionings, doubtings, searchings, skepticism, and I discredit credulity or blind faith. The progress of man is based on disbelief of the commonly accepted. The noblest minds and natures of human history have thought and sung, lived and died, trying to budge the status quo towards a larger and fuller status.
I am sustained by a belief in evolution—the increasing purpose of life in which the rational is, with geological slowness, evolving out of the irrational. To believe that goodness and wisdom and righteousness, in Garden of Eden perfection, lie somewhere far ahead instead of farther and farther behind, gives me hope and somewhat explains existence. This is a long view. I do not pretend that it is a view always present in me. It does raise me when I have it, however.
I feel no resentment so strongly as that against forces which make men and women afraid to speak out forthrightly. The noblest satisfaction I have is in witnessing the up movement of suppressed individuals and people. I make no pretense to having rid myself of all prejudices, but at times when I have discovered myself freed from certain prejudices, I have felt rare exhilaration.
For me, the beautiful resides in the physical, but it is spiritual. I have never heard a sermon as spiritual in either phrase or fact as, “Waters on a starry night are beautiful and free.” No hymn lifts my heart higher than the morning call of the bobwhite or the long fluting cry of sandhill cranes out of the sky at dusk. I have never smelled incense in a church as refining to the spirit as a spring breeze laden with aroma from a field of bluebonnets.
Not all hard truths are beautiful, but beauty is truth. It incorporates love and is incorporated by love. It is the goal of all great art. Its presence everywhere makes it free to all. It is not so abstract as justice, but beauty and intellectual freedom and justice, all incorporating truth and goodness, are constant sustainers to my mind and spirit.
并非所有堅(jiān)定的真理都是美好的,但“美即是真”。所有偉大的藝術(shù)都追求這樣的目標(biāo),即美融合愛,也被愛所融合。它無處不在,唾手可得。
在離開朋友波尼族印第安人首領(lǐng)雄鷹的獸皮帳篷幾年后,作家喬治.伯德.格林又回到那里。這位首領(lǐng)對(duì)他高尚的朋友說:“凝視著你,與你交談,讓我感到心胸寬廣。”
我們很難為自己擬出一個(gè)既能嚴(yán)格遵守又能避免傳統(tǒng)教條的信念。事實(shí)上,我們最為珍視的東西便是我們的信仰。除了人們?cè)诠矆龊峡倳?huì)假裝視而不見的俗念與財(cái)產(chǎn)之外,所有能讓我胸懷寬廣的都是我的信仰,它們是我力量的源泉。
我相信有一種至高無上且無法控制的未知力量,它的創(chuàng)造,宣告了靈魂擁有無限伸展的空間。然而,我也相信詢問、質(zhì)疑、探索與懷疑,但拒絕輕信或盲從的信仰。人類的進(jìn)步是基于對(duì)普遍接受的質(zhì)疑。人類歷史上,擁有最高尚思想的人們?cè)?jīng)思考過,歌唱過,生活過,最終離去,他們也曾努力擴(kuò)展并充實(shí)現(xiàn)狀。我始終相信進(jìn)化論,即生活目的在不斷增加,而其中從非理性到理性的進(jìn)化時(shí)間就像地質(zhì)變化一樣漫長。我相信,伊甸園中完美的善良、智慧與正義就在遙遠(yuǎn)的前方,給予我希望,并或多或少地解釋了生存的意義。這是一個(gè)長遠(yuǎn)的觀點(diǎn)。我不會(huì)假裝認(rèn)為,自己始終擁有這樣的觀點(diǎn)。然而,當(dāng)我擁有它時(shí),我的靈魂的確得到了升華。
使人不敢坦誠言論的勢(shì)力,是我最為憎恨的。當(dāng)看到受壓迫的個(gè)人與民族奮起反抗時(shí),我便會(huì)心生敬慕,感到滿足。我并不偽稱自己已經(jīng)摒棄了所有的偏見,但有時(shí)當(dāng)我發(fā)現(xiàn)自己擺脫了某些偏見時(shí),我就會(huì)狂喜不已。
我認(rèn)為,美雖然存在于肉體,但卻屬于精神。我從未聽說過,有哪句布道詞能從言辭或事實(shí)上表現(xiàn)出這樣的精神美:
“夜晚繁星點(diǎn)點(diǎn),湖水自由蕩漾。”
北美鳩清晨的鳴唱或黃昏時(shí)天空中沙丘鶴笛鳴般的長吟,是任何贊美詩都無法媲美的。柔和的春風(fēng)中彌漫著田野間矢車菊的芳香,讓我的靈魂也更加高尚,這是教堂中任何焚香都無法比擬的。并非所有堅(jiān)定的真理都是美好的,但“美即是真”。所有偉大的藝術(shù)都追求這樣的目標(biāo),即美融合愛,也被愛所融合。它無處不在,唾手可得。它不像正義那樣抽象,但美、心智的自由及正義,都與真與善融合,這便是我思想與精神的永恒支柱。
英語美文欣賞勵(lì)志篇鑒賞
失敗的額外收益和想象力的重要性
The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.
經(jīng)歷了挫折,你變得更加智慧,更加堅(jiān)強(qiáng),這意味著你有獨(dú)立生存的能力。只有經(jīng)過了逆境的考驗(yàn),你才能真正了解自己,才能真正知道周圍的人所賦予你的力量。這種認(rèn)識(shí)是真正的財(cái)富,雖然歷經(jīng)千辛萬苦,但這比我以前獲得的任何資格證書都有價(jià)值。
So given a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone’s total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.
如果我有一臺(tái)時(shí)光轉(zhuǎn)換器,我會(huì)告訴21歲的自己,一個(gè)人的幸福在于知道人生不只是一份只有收獲和成就的表單。資格證書和個(gè)人簡歷不是你們的生活,雖然你們將會(huì)遇到很多與我同齡或年齡比我大的人將二者混為一談,生活艱辛而復(fù)雜,是任何人都無法完全掌控 的。謙恭地了解了這一點(diǎn),你才能從容面對(duì)人生的變遷。
You might think I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so. Though I personally will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense. Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.
至于為什么選擇第二個(gè)主題——想象力的重要性,你們可能會(huì)認(rèn)為是因?yàn)樗鼘?duì)我重建生活所起的作用,但事實(shí)并非完全如此。雖然我堅(jiān)持睡前故事對(duì)孩子的想象力有很大的價(jià)值,但我學(xué)會(huì)了在更廣泛的意義上去理解想象力。想象力不僅僅是人類特有的設(shè)想不存在的事物的能力,還是所有發(fā)明和創(chuàng)新的源泉。毋庸置疑,想象力是最富轉(zhuǎn)換性和啟發(fā)性的力量,這種力量能使我們與有著不同經(jīng)歷的人們產(chǎn)生共鳴。
英語美文欣賞勵(lì)志篇賞析
Growth that Starts from Thinking
在思考中成長
It seems to me a very difficult thing to put into words the beliefs we hold and what they make you do in your life. I think I was fortunate because I grew up in a family where there was a very deep religious feeling. I don’t think it was spoken of a great deal. It was more or less taken for granted that everybody held certain beliefs and needed certain reinforcements of their own strength and that that came through your belief in God and your knowledge of prayer.
我的信念是什么,它在我的人生中起到了什么作用------這些問題我覺得很難用言語解釋清楚。我認(rèn)為自己很幸運(yùn),因?yàn)槲页錾谝粋€(gè)篤信宗教的家庭。家里人對(duì)宗教談?wù)摰貌⒉欢唷C總€(gè)人心中或多或少都有某些信仰,都希望通過某種方式獲得力量,而這力量就來自信奉上帝并懂得如何祈禱。
But as I grew older I questioned a great many of the things that I knew very well my grandmother who had brought me up had taken for granted. And I think I might have been a quite difficult person to live with if it hadn’t been for the fact that my husband once said it didn’t do you any harm to learn those things, so why not let your children learn them? When they grow up they’ll think things out for themselves.
我是在祖母身邊長大的。隨著年齡的增長,我對(duì)許多祖母視作理所當(dāng)然的事產(chǎn)生了懷疑。我甚至拒絕讓孩子們接觸這些東西,似乎成了一個(gè)不近情理的人。直到有一次我丈夫勸我,這些東西你年少時(shí)也接觸過,對(duì)你也并無壞處。既然如此,何不讓孩子們也有了解它們的機(jī)會(huì)呢?他們長大以后會(huì)獨(dú)立思考這些問題的。
And that gave me a feeling that perhaps that’s what we all must do—think out for ourselves what we could believe and how we could live by it. And so I came to the conclusion that you had to use this life to develop the very best that you could develop.
他的話使我感到或許我們每個(gè)人都應(yīng)該這樣做------獨(dú)立思考自己應(yīng)該信仰什么以及如何在生活中堅(jiān)守自己的的信仰。我認(rèn)為人一生就應(yīng)該盡全力做最好的自己------我想這就是我的信仰。
I don’t know whether I believe in a future life. I believe that all that you go through here must have some value, therefore there must be some reason. And there must be some “going on.” How exactly that happens I’ve never been able to decide. There is a future—that I’m sure of. But how, that I don’t know. And I came to feel that it didn’t really matter very much because whatever the future held you’d have to face it when you came to it, just as whatever life holds you have to face it exactly the same way. And the important thing was that you never let down doing the best that you were able to do—it might be poor because you might not have very much within you to give, or to help other people with, or to live your life with. But as long as you did the very best that you were able to do, then that was what you were put here to do and that was what you were accomplishing by being here.
我不知道自己是否相信未來。我相信的是我們現(xiàn)在經(jīng)歷的一切一定有價(jià)值,因此必有某些道理,也必然預(yù)示著有些事情“將要發(fā)生”。但這些事情如何發(fā)生,我卻不能決定。一定有未來------對(duì)此我深信不疑。但它會(huì)怎樣降臨。我不知道,然而著一點(diǎn),我漸漸感到并不重要。因?yàn)闊o論未來如何,我們到時(shí)候總得面對(duì),正如無論生活中發(fā)生了什么,我們都必須面對(duì)一樣。真正重要的是要傾盡自己的全力。也許你能力有限、貢獻(xiàn)不多,無法給予他人更多的幫助,或者無法活得那么精彩,但只要你能傾盡自己的全力,你就能完成來到人世間的使命,能體現(xiàn)人生的價(jià)值。
And so I have tried to follow that out—and not to worry about the future or what was going to happen. I think I am pretty much of a fatalist. You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.
這就是我一直奉行的生活原則------不擔(dān)心未來的事,也不為下一刻發(fā)生的事操心。我想我算是一個(gè)相信宿命的人吧。無論發(fā)生什么,我們都得勇敢面對(duì),關(guān)鍵是面對(duì)的時(shí)候我們要勇敢,要傾盡自己的全力。