激情晨读英语美文50篇-双语7-11

Chapter Two To See a World in a Grain of Sand 一花一世界

To see a world in a grain of sand

一花一世界

And a heaven in a wild flower,

一沙一天国

Hold infinity in the palm of your hand

君掌盛无边

And eternity in an hour.

刹那含永劫

——William Blake

7. Two Truths to Live by人生的两条真理

By Alexander M. Schindler

The art of living is to know when to hold fast and when to let go. For life is paradox: it enjoins us to cling to its many gifts even while it ordains their eventual relinquishment. The rabbis of Old put it this way:" A man comes to this world with his fist clenched, but when he dies, his hand is open. 生活的艺术是要懂得何时紧紧抓住，何时学会放弃。因为人生就是一对矛盾，它促使我们牢牢抓住人生的很多赐予，但同时又注定了我们对这些给予最终的放弃。老一辈犹太学者是这样说的：人来到这个世界的时候拳头是紧握的，而当离开的时候，手却是松开的。

Surely we ought to hold fast to life, for it is wondrous, and full of a beauty that breaks through every pore of God’s own earth. We know that this is so, but all too often we recognize this truth only in our backward glance when we remember what it was and then suddenly realize that it is no more. 当然，我们应该仅仅抓住生活，因为生活是神奇的，是充满着美的——上帝创造的大地的每一个空间都充斥着至美。我们都知道这点，但我们却常常在回首往事之时才明白这个道理，然后突然意识到逝去的时光已经一去不复返了。

We remember a beauty that faded, a love that waned. But we remember with far greater pain that we did not see that beauty when it flowered, that we failed to respond with love when it was tendered. 我们追忆逝去的美丽，残缺的爱情，但是更令人痛心的回忆是当繁花盛开之时错过了欣赏它的美丽；当爱情眷顾之时却未能做出回应。

This not an easy lesson to learn, especially when we are young and think that the world is ours to command, that whatever we desire with the full force of our passionate being can, nay, will, be ours.

学会（珍爱美好的事物）是不容易做到的。尤其是我们年轻时，认为世界是由我们掌握的，只要我们自己满腔热情，全力以赴的去追求，我们想要的东西就能够——不，是一定能够得到。

But then life moves along to confront us with realities, and slowly but surely this second truth

dawns upon us. At every stage of life we sustain losses—and grow in the process.And ultimately, as the parable of the open and closed hand suggests, we must confront the inevitability of our own demise, losing ourselves as it were, all that we were or dreamed to be.

随着我们的成长，生活使我们不得不面对现实，而第二种真理逐渐被我们所感知，所理解。在人生的每一个阶段，我们都要承受损失，在这个过程中我们慢慢的长大. 最终，正如松手和握拳的比喻那样：我们自己也得走向不可抗拒的死亡，失去了原有的自我，失去了以往的或梦想过的一切。

The insight gleaned from that experience is really as commonplace as was the experience itself: life’s gifts are precious--but we are too heedless of them.

我们在阅历中所积累起来的洞察力就像我们的经历本身一样的平凡生活的赐予是可贵的，可是我们却常常忽视了它们的存在。

Here then is the first pile of life's paradoxical demands on us: Never too busy for the wonder and the awe of life. Be reverent before each dawning day. Embrace each hour. Seize each golden minute.

生命中有太多似非而是的矛盾，以下是第一种矛盾给我们的启迪：不要过于忙碌而忽略领悟生命的神奇，失掉对生命的敬畏。在破晓时分怀抱虔诚心情迎接每一天，拥抱每一个时辰，把握好黄金般的每一分钟。

Hold fast to life... but not so fast that you cannot let go. This is the second side of life's coin, the opposite pole of its paradox: we must accept our losses, and learn how to let go.

紧紧抓住生命……但是不要过于执着而不懂得放手。这是生命之道的另一个层面，矛盾的另一极：我们必须接受失去，并且学会放弃。

8. My Favorite Fruit我钟爱的水果

By Alan Alexander Milne

In the first place it is a perennial—if not in actual fact, at least in the greengrocer's shop. On the days when dessert is a name given to a handful of chocolates and a little preserved ginger, when macedoine de fruits is the title bestowed on two prunes and a piece of rhubarbs, then the orange, however sour, comes nobly to the rescue; and on those other days of plenty when cherries and strawberries and raspberries, and gooseberries riot together upon the table, the orange, sweeter than ever, is still there to hold its own. Bread and butter, beef and mutton, eggs and bacon, are not more necessary to an order existence than the orange.

首先，柑橘常年都有——即使不是在树上，至少是在水果店里。有的时候，只用几块巧克力和一点蜜饯生姜充当餐后的甜点，两块李子干加一片大黄便被冠以蔬果什锦美名时，这是仍带酸味的柑橘便前来慷慨救驾；其他时候，水果丰盈，樱桃、草莓、木莓、醋栗在餐桌上相互争艳时，此时比往日更加甜美的柑橘依然能坚守自己的岗位。对于人们的日常生活，面包和黄油、牛肉和羊肉、鸡蛋和咸肉，都未必像柑橘那样不可或缺。

It is well that the commonest fruit should be also the best. Of the virtues of the orange I have not room fully to speak. It has properties of health giving, as that it cures influenza and establishes the complexion. It is clean, for whoever handles it on its way to your table, but handles its outer