雙語對照 ● Youth and Age 年輕與年老
Youth and Age 年輕與年老
◎ Robert Louis Stevenson
As we grow old, a sort of equable jog-trot of feeling is substituted for the violent ups and downs of passion and disgust; the same influence that restrains our hopes, quiets our apprehensions[24]; if the pleasures are less intense, the troubles are milder and more tolerable; and in a word, this period for which we are asked to hoard up everything as for a time of famine, is, in its own right, the richest, easiest, and happiest of life. Nay, by managing its own work and following its own happy inspiration, youth is doing the best it can to endow the leisure of age. A full, busy youth is your only prelude to a self-contained and independent age; and the muff inevitably develops into the bore. There are not many Doctor Johnsons, to set forth upon their first romantic voyage at sixty-four. If we wish to scale Mont Blanc or go down in a diving dress or up in a balloon, we must be about it while we are still young. It will not do to delay until we are clogged with prudence and limping with rheumatism[25]and people begin to ask us: “What does Gravity out of bed?” Youth is the time to go flashing from one end of the world to the other both in mind and body; to try the manners of different nations; to hear the chimes at midnight; to see sunrise in town and country; to be converted at a revival; to circumnavigate the metaphysics, write halting verses, run a mile to see a fire, and wait all day long in the theatre to applaud HERNANI.
當(dāng)我們慢慢變老時，一種平淡而緩慢的感覺代替了強(qiáng)烈的愛憎沉浮。同樣，這種感覺讓我們克制自己的希望，消除心中的憂慮。如果快樂不再那么熱烈，那么煩惱就能變得微不足道，更容易忍受?？偠灾?，在這段時間里，我們必須備好一切，以備不時之需。這段時間是整個生命中最豐富多彩、最輕松、最幸福的。不但如此，通過管理自己的行為，隨著快樂的靈感律動，年輕人盡力讓自己的時代變得閑適安逸。充實(shí)忙碌的年輕時代是獨(dú)立自主的老年生活的唯一前奏。而那些年輕時碌碌無為的人，他們的晚年注定是沉悶無聊的。世上的約翰遜博士并不多——在64歲那年才開啟人生中的首次浪漫之旅。如果我們想要丈量勃朗峰，或者穿上潛水衣潛水，或者坐著熱氣球飛上高空，我們必須趁年輕時去做，不要拖到自己變得小心謹(jǐn)慎、腿腳不便時才去。那時，人們就會問我們：“為何如此不安分？”年輕時代就是周游世界的時代，不論是精神游歷還是身體力行；去體驗不同國家的不同風(fēng)情；去聆聽午夜的鐘聲；去欣賞城市和鄉(xiāng)間的日出；去為了重生而虔誠悔過；去博覽玄學(xué)，寫一些差強(qiáng)人意的詩句，跑一英里的路看篝火，等上一整天只是為了給《艾那尼》喝彩。
