雙語散文|胡 適——不要拋棄學(xué)問
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- 英文
不要拋棄學(xué)問
諸位畢業(yè)同學(xué)：你們現(xiàn)在要離開母校了，我沒有什么禮物送你們，只好送你們一句話罷。這一句話是：“不要拋棄學(xué)問。”以前的功課也許有一大部分是為了這張畢業(yè)文憑，不得已而做的，從今以后，你們可以依自己的心愿去自由研究了。趁現(xiàn)在年富力強(qiáng)的時(shí)候，努力做一種專門學(xué)問。少年是一去不復(fù)返的，等到精力衰時(shí)，要做學(xué)問也來不及了。即為吃飯計(jì)，學(xué)問決不會(huì)辜負(fù)人的。吃飯而不求學(xué)問，三年五年之后，你們都要被后來少年淘汰掉的。到那時(shí)再想做點(diǎn)學(xué)問來補(bǔ)救，恐怕已太晚了。
有人說：“出去做事之后，生活問題急需解決，哪有工夫去讀書？即使要做學(xué)問，既沒有圖書館，又沒有實(shí)驗(yàn)室，哪能做學(xué)問？”
我要對(duì)你們說：凡是要等到有了圖書館方才讀書的，有了圖書館也不肯讀書。凡是要等到有了實(shí)驗(yàn)室方才做研究的，有了實(shí)驗(yàn)室也不肯做研究。你有了決心要研究一個(gè)問題，自然會(huì)撙衣節(jié)食去買書，自然會(huì)想出法子來設(shè)置儀器。
至于時(shí)間，更不成問題。達(dá)爾文一生多病，不能多做工，每天只能做一點(diǎn)鐘的工作。你們看他的成績(jī)！每天花一點(diǎn)鐘看10頁有用的書，每年可看3,600多頁書，30年可讀11萬頁書。
諸位，11萬頁書可以使你成一個(gè)學(xué)者了?？墒?，每天看三種小報(bào)也得費(fèi)你一點(diǎn)鐘的工夫，四圈麻將也得費(fèi)你一點(diǎn)半鐘的光陰?？葱?bào)呢？還是打麻將呢？還是努力做一個(gè)學(xué)者呢？全靠你們自己的選擇！
易卜生說：“你的最大責(zé)任是把你這塊材料鑄造成器。”
學(xué)問便是鑄器的工具。拋棄了學(xué)問便是毀了你們自己。
再會(huì)了！你們的母校眼睜睜地要看你們十年之后成什么器。
Never Give up the Pursuit of Learning
Dear Students of the Graduating Class,As you are leaving your alma mater, I have nothing to offer you as a gift except a word of advice.
My advice is, "Never give up the pursuit of learning." You have perhaps finished your college courses mostly for obtaining the diploma, or, in other words, out of sheer necessity. However, from now on you are free to follow your own bent in the choice of studies. While you are in the prime of life, why not devote yourselves to a special field of study? Youth will soon be gone never to return. And it will be too late for you to go into scholarship when in your declining years. Knowledge will do you a good turn even as a means of subsistence. If you give up studies while holding a job, you will in a couple of years have had yourselves replaced by younger people. It will then be too late to remedy the situation by picking up studies again.
Some people say, "Once you have a job, you'll come up against the urgent problem of making a living. How can you manage to find time to study? Even if you want to, will it be possible with no library or laboratory available?"
Now let me tell you this. Those who refuse to study for lack of a library will most probably continue to do so even though there is a library. And those who refuse to do research for lack of a laboratory will most probably continue to do so even though a laboratory is available. As long as you set your mind on studies, you will naturally cut down on food and clothing to buy books or do everything possible to acquire necessary instruments.
Time is no object. Charles Darwin could only work one hour a day due to ill health. Yet what a remarkable man he was! If you spend one hour a day reading 10 pages of a book, you can finish more than 3,600 pages a year, and 110,000 pages in 30 years.
Dear students, 110,000 pages will be quite enough to make a learned man of you. It will take you one hour to read three tabloids a day, and one and half hours to finish four rounds of mah-jong a day. Reading tabloids, playing mah-jong or striving to be a learned man, the choice lies with you. Henrik Ibsen says, "It is your supreme duty to cast yourself into a useful implement."
Learning is the casting mould. Forsake learning, and you will ruin yourself.
Farewell! Your alma mater is watching eagerly to see what will become of you ten years from now.
胡適是中國(guó)現(xiàn)代史上一個(gè)頗有影響而又相當(dāng)復(fù)雜的學(xué)者。除學(xué)術(shù)著作外，他寫過很多富于洞察力和啟發(fā)性的文章?！恫灰獟仐墝W(xué)問》是他1928—1930年在上海任中國(guó)公學(xué)校長(zhǎng)時(shí)為畢業(yè)生所作贈(zèng)言，至今仍有參考價(jià)值。
