《沙与沫》 ——黎巴嫩 纪伯伦
Sand and Foam —— by Kahlil Gibran
I AM FOREVER walking upon these shores,
Betwixt the sand and the foam,
The high tide will erase my foot-prints,
And the wind will blow away the foam.
But the sea and the shore will remainforever.
我永远走在这海岸上，在沙与沫之间
潮水涨起抹去我的足迹
海风吹走了泡沫
但永恒的是海与岸
Once I filled my hand with mist.
Then I opened it and lo, the mist was a worm.
And I closed and opened my hand again, and behold there was a
bird.
And again I closed and opened my hand, and in its hollow stood a
man with a sad face, turned upward.
And again I closed my hand, and when I opened it there was
naught but mist.
But I heard a song of exceeding sweetness.
曾经我的手中满是迷雾
我展开手时，迷雾是一条虫
我的手握了又展，看到的是一只鸟
我再次将手握了又展，空空之中伫立着一人，满面愁容，昂首向天
再一次，我握紧了手，张开却一无所有，只剩下迷雾
但，我听到了一首歌，温柔无比
It was but yesterday I thought myself a fragment quivering
without rhythm in the sphere of life.
Now I know that I am the sphere, and all life in rhythmic
fragments moves within me.
They say to me in their awakening, "You and the world you live
in are but a grain of sand upon the infinite shore of an infinite
sea."
And in my dream I say to them, "I am the infinite sea, and all
worlds are but grains of sand upon my shore."
Only once have I been made mute. It was when a man asked me,
"Who are you?"
就在昨天，我还以为我只是碎屑一片，颤抖在生命的苍穹之中，毫无节奏
而今我已明白，我就是苍穹，生命全然是律动的碎片，就在我之中
他们醒来时对我说：“你和你存在的世界，只是沙粒，在无边之岸，无涯之海。”
在睡梦中我对他们说：“我正是无涯之海，世上万物只不过是我岸上的万千沙粒。”
独独一次，我被迫沉默了。“你是谁？”那时一个人这样问我。
The first thought of God was an angel.
The first word of God was a man.
We were fluttering, wandering, longing creatures a thousand
thousand years before the sea and the wind in the forest gave us
words.
Now how can we express the ancient of days in us with only the
sounds of our yesterdays?
The Sphinx spoke only once, and the Sphinx said, "A grain of
sand is a desert, and a desert is a grain of sand; and now let us
all be silent again."
I heard the Sphinx, but I did not understand.
上帝的第一个念头是天使。
上帝的第一个词语是人。
在大海和林间的风带给我们语言之前的千万年中，我们只是一群生物，飘荡着，徘徊着，寻求着。
而今，仅用昨日之声，我们怎样才能描述我们心中的远古时光呢？
斯蒂芬斯只说过一次话，斯蒂芬斯说：“一粒沙是一个沙漠，一个沙漠是一粒沙。现在就让我们再次沉默吧。”
我听到了斯蒂芬斯的话，却不懂得。
Long did I lie in the dust of Egypt, silent and unaware of the
seasons.
Then the sun gave me birth, and I rose and walked upon the banks
of the Nile,
Singing with the days and dreaming with the nights.
And now the sun threads upon me with a thousand feet that I may
lie again in the dust of Egypt.
But behold a marvel and a riddle!
The very sun that gathered me cannot scatter me.
Still erect am I, and sure of foot do I walk upon the banks of
the Nile.
我长久地躺在埃及的尘埃中，沉默着，忘了季节。
直到太阳给我新生，我起身行走，沿着尼罗河之岸。和白昼一起歌唱，和黑夜一起做梦。如今太阳又用千万只脚把我践踏，我将再次躺在埃及的尘埃中。
但，请看吧，一个奇迹，一个谜。
将我凝聚的太阳无法将我驱散。
依然伫立是我，稳稳地行走，沿着尼罗河之岸。
Remembrance is a form of meeting.
Forgetfulness is a form of freedom.
回忆是一种相见。
忘却是一种自由。
We measure time according to the movement of countless suns; and
they measure time by little machines in their little pockets.
Now tell me, how could we ever meet at the same place and the
same time?
Space is not space between the earth and the sun to one who
looks down from the windows of the Milky Way.
Humanity is a river of light running from the ex-eternity to
eternity.
Do not the spirits who dwell in the ether envy man his pain?
我们按照太阳无穷的运动感知时间，他们依靠口袋里小小的仪器测量时间。
告诉我，我们如何相遇于同时同地？
在一个从银河之窗俯瞰的人眼中，宇宙不是地球和太阳之间的宇宙。
人性是一条光河，在不朽之前向着不朽流淌。
来往于上界的精灵们，难道不羡慕人世间的痛苦？
On my way to the Holy City I met another pilgrim and I asked
him, "Is this indeed the way to the Holy City?"
And he said, "Follow me, and you will reach the Holy City in a
day and a night."
And I followed him. And we walked many days and many nights, yet
we did not reach the Holy City.
And what was to my surprise he became angry with me because he
had misled me.
Make me, oh God, the prey of the lion, ere You make the rabbit
my prey.
One may not reach the dawn save by the path of the night.
在去往圣城的路上，我遇到另一个朝圣者，便问他：“这真的是去往圣城的路吗？”
他说：“跟着我，再过一个昼夜你将到达圣城。”
我跟着他，走了许多昼夜，然而我们并未抵达圣城。
而让我惊讶的是，他带我误入迷路，并迁怒于我。
神啊，就让我做狮子的猎物吧，不然就让兔子成为我的俘食。
除了黑夜之路，无人能抵达黎明。
My house says to me, "Do not leave me, for here dwells your
past."
And the road says to me, "Come and follow me, for I am your
future."
And I say to both my house and the road, "I have no past, nor
have I a future. If I stay here, there is a going in my staying;
and if I go there is a staying in my going. Only love and death
will change all things."
我的房子对我说：“不要离开我，这里住着你的过去。”
道路对我说：“来吧，跟着我，我正是你的未来。”
我对我的房子和道路说：“我既无过去，也无未来。若我停留，停留里有我的前行。若我前行，前行里有我的停留。唯有爱和死才能改变一切。”
How can I lose faith in the justice of life, when the dreams of
those who sleep upon feathers are not more beautiful than the
dreams of those who sleep upon the earth?
Strange, the desire for certain pleasures is a part of my
pain.
那些沉睡者，羽毛上之梦并不比泥土上之梦更美，我又怎能对生命的公正丧失信仰？
奇怪了，向往必然的愉悦正是我痛苦的一部分。
Seven times have I despised my soul:
The first time when I saw her being meek that she might attain
height.
The second time when I saw her limping before the crippled.
The third time when she was given to choose between the hard and
the easy, and she chose the easy.
The fourth time when she committed a wrong, and comforted
herself that others also commit wrong.
The fifth time when she forbore for weakness, and attributed her
patience to strength.
The sixth time when she despised the ugliness of a face, and
knew not that it was one of her own masks.
And the seventh time when she sang a song of praise, and deemed
it a virtue.
曾有七次我鄙视我的灵魂：
第一次，当我看到她可以升迁却退让时。
第二次，当我看到她在瘸者面前跛足前行时。
第三次，当她处在难易之间而选择了易时。
第四次，当她犯了错，却安慰自己说别人也会犯错时。
第五次，当她因为懦弱而忍耐，却自认为坚忍时。
第六次，当她鄙视一张人面的丑陋，却不知道那正是自己面具的一张时。
第七次，当她唱着颂歌并自以为是一种美德时。
I AM IGNORANT of absolute truth. But I am humble before my
ignorance and therein lies my honor and my reward.
何为绝对的真理我一无所知。但面对自己的无知我是谦卑的，这里面有我的荣光和奖赏。
There is a space between man's imagination and man's attainment
that may only be traversed by his longing.
Paradise is there, behind that door, in the next room; but I
have lost the key.
Perhaps I have only mislaid it.
You are blind and I am deaf and dumb, so let us touch hands and
understand.
The significance of man is not in what he attains, but rather in
what he longs to attain.
有一段时空就在人的幻想与成就之间，唯有渴望才能使其穿越。
天堂就在那里，在那扇门后，在紧邻的房间里，但我却丢失了钥匙。
或许，我只是将它放错了位置。
你是盲人，而我又聋又哑，那就让我们握着手相知吧。
人的意义不在于他得到什么，而在于他渴望得到什么。
Some of us are like ink and some like paper.
And if it were not for the blackness of some of us, some of us
would be dumb;
And if it were not for the whiteness of some of us, some of us
would be blind.
我们之中有人如墨，有人如纸。
若非有人如墨黑，他人就将成为哑巴。
若非有人如纸白，他人就将成为盲人。
Give me an ear and I will give you a voice.
Our mind is a sponge; our heart is a stream.
Is it not strange that most of us choose sucking rather than
running?
When you long for blessings that you may not name, and when you
grieve knowing not the cause, then indeed you are growing with all
things that grow, and rising toward your greater self.
When one is drunk with a vision, he deems his faint expression
of it the very wine.
You drink wine that you may be intoxicated; and I drink that it
may sober me from that other wine.
When my cup is empty I resign myself to its emptiness; but when
it is half full I resent its half-fulness.
The reality of the other person is not in what he reveals to
you, but in what he cannot reveal to you.
Therefore, if you would understand him, listen not to what he
says but rather to what he does not say.
Half of what I say is meaningless; but I say it so that the
other half may reach you.
给我一只耳朵，我会给你一种声音。
我们的思绪是一块海绵，我们的心怀是一条水流。我们大多宁肯啜饮而不愿奔涌，这不奇怪吗？
当你渴望无名的祝福，心怀莫名的悲伤，你便真的与万物同生，你便上升，向着更高的自我。
当一个人沉醉于幻象，他必将把他迷朦的神情视为真正的美酒。
你畅饮是为了醉，我喝酒是为了从另一种酒中醒来。
酒杯空空之时，我让自己消退于它的空空。酒杯半满之时，我却怨恨它的半满。
人的真实，不在于他向你展示的，而在于他没有向你展示的。
因而，如果你想懂他，别听他所说出的，而要听他没有说出的。
我所说的一半毫无意义，但我说出来，为的是你能领会另一半。
A sense of humour is a sense of proportion.
My loneliness was born when men praised my talkative faults and
blamed my silent virtues.
When Life does not find a singer to sing her heart she produces
a philosopher to speak her mind.
A truth is to be known always, to be uttered sometimes.
The real in us is silent; the acquired is talkative.
The voice of life in me cannot reach the ear of life in you; but
let us talk that we may not feel lonely.
When two women talk they say nothing; when one woman speaks she
reveals all of life.
Frogs may bellow louder than bulls, but they cannot drag the
plough in the field not turn the wheel of the winepress, and of
their skins you cannot make shoes.
Only the dumb envy the talkative.
幽默感即均衡感。
当人们称赞我冗言的过错，责怪我沉默的美德时，我的孤独之感油然而生。
当生命无法找到一个歌者歌唱自己的心灵时，她就会诞生一个哲人来说出自己的思绪。
真理总是被领会，有时才被说出的。
真实的自我沉默不语，后天的自我却喋喋不休。
我的生命之声不能抵达你的生命之耳。但是，让我们交谈吧，以免彼此孤独。
两个女人交谈时，什么也没说出。一个女人独语时，却揭示了生命的全部。
青蛙的叫声也许比牛更响亮，但它们却不能拉动田中的犁耕，不能转动酒坊里的碾磨，青蛙的皮张也无法制成靴子。
唯有哑巴才嫉妒健谈之人。
If winter should say, "Spring is in my heart," who would believe
winter?
Every seed is a longing.
Should you really open your eyes and see, you would behold your
image in all images.
And should you open your ears and listen, you would hear your
own voice in all voices.
如果冬天说“春天在我心中”，谁会相信它的话？
每一粒种子都是一种渴。
倘若你真的睁开眼睛去看，你将在所有的影象中看到你的影象。
倘若你真的打开耳朵去听，你将在所有的声音里听到你的声音。
It takes two of us to discover truth: one to utter it and one to
understand it.
Though the wave of words is forever upon us, yet our depth is
forever silent.
Many a doctrine is like a window pane. We see truth through it
but it divides us from truth.
Now let us play hide and seek. Should you hide in my heart it
would not be difficult to find you. But should you hide behind your
own shell, then it would be useless for anyone to seek you.
A woman may veil her face with a smile.
How noble is the sad heart who would sing a joyous song with
joyous hearts.
He who would understand a woman, or dissect genius, or solve the
mystery of silence is the very man who would wake from a beautiful
dream to sit at a breakfast table.
I would walk with all those who walk. I would not stand still to
watch the procession passing by.
真理需要我们两个人共同发现：一人叙述，一人领悟。
尽管语言的波涛永远缠绕着我们，但我们内心深处永远无声。
太多的教条如同窗格，我们透过它看到真理，但它却把我们和真理隔开。
我们来玩捉迷藏吧，倘若你藏到我的心里，就不难寻到你。
倘若你藏到自己的甲壳里，就没人能寻到你。
一个女人可能用微笑遮住自己的脸。
多么高贵啊，一颗悲伤的心，却能与欢乐的心共同唱一首欢乐的歌。
想了解女人，剖析天才，或者想解答沉默的奥秘的人，就是那个能从美梦中醒来，坐到早餐桌前的人。
我将与一切行走的人一起行走。我不愿安然站立，观看队伍从眼前晃过。
You owe more than gold to him who serves you. Give him of your
heart or serve him.
Nay, we have not lived in vain. Have they not built towers of
our bones?
Let us not be particular and sectional. The poet's mind and the
scorpion's tail rise in glory from the same earth.
Every dragon gives birth to a St. George who slays it.
对于服侍你的人，你欠下的远非金子。将你的心给他，不然就服侍他。
不，我们不曾活在空洞之中，他们不是已经造就了我们的骨骼之塔吗？
让我们别再斤斤计较了。诗人之心以及蝎子之尾，升腾于荣光里，来自同一片土地。
每一条毒龙都会诞生一个屠龙的圣 · 乔治。
Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky. We fell them
down and turn them into paper that we may record our emptiness.
Should you care to write (and only the saints know why you
should) you must needs have knowledge and art and music -- the
knowledge of the music of words, the art of being artless, and the
magic of loving your readers.
They dip their pens in our hearts and think they are
inspired.
Should a tree write its autobiography it would not be unlike the
history of a race.
If I were to choose between the power of writing a poem and the
ecstasy of a poem unwritten, I would choose the ecstasy. It is
better poetry.
But you and all my neighbors agree that I always choose
badly.
树是大地写在天空的诗，我们把树砍倒，变为纸张来记录我们的空虚。
如若你爱写（ 唯有圣人才知道你为何爱 ），你必得有知识、艺术和音乐——语言的音韵知识，朴实无华的艺术和热爱读者的魔力。
他们将笔浸在我们心里，以为获得了灵感。
如若一棵树能写出自传，那必将无异于一部种族的历史。
如果我可以在作诗的能力和诗篇未作的入迷之间选择，我将选择入迷。入迷是更好的诗歌。
然而你和我所有的邻居一致认定，我总是作出错误的选择。
Poetry is not an opinion expressed. It is a song that rises from
a bleeding wound or a smiling mouth.
Words are timeless. You should utter them or write them with a
knowledge of their timelessness.
A POET IS a dethroned king sitting among the ashes of his palace
trying to fashion an image out of the ashes.
Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the
dictionary.
In vain shall a poet seek the mother of the songs of his
heart.
Once I said to a poet, "We shall not know your worth until you
die."
And he answered saying, "Yes, death is always the revealer. And
if indeed you would know my worth it is that I have more in my
heart than upon my tongue, and more in my desire than in my
hand."
诗歌不是一种表达出来的见解。它是一首歌，从流血的伤口或微笑的嘴边升起。
语言是永恒的。你应当说出或写下它们，获知它们的永恒。
诗人是一个落魄的帝王，坐在宫殿的灰烬中，想造出一个图腾，出于残灰。
诗歌是许许多多的欢乐、痛苦和惊奇，交融于所有的词汇。
诗人心灵之歌的溯源必将是一场空。
曾经我对一个诗人说：“直到你死，我们才会懂得你的价值。”
他答道：“是的，死亡永远是一个启示者，如果你真想懂得我的价值，那便是：我所怀想的多于舌头之音，我所希冀的多于手中之物。
If you sing of beauty though alone in the heart of the desert
you will have an audience.
Poetry is wisdom that enchants the heart.
Wisdom is poetry that sings in the mind.
If we could enchant man's heart and at the same time sing in his
mind,
Then in truth he would live in the shadow of God.
Inspiration will always sing; inspiration will never
explain.
We often sing lullabies to our children that we ourselves may
sleep.
All our words are but crumbs that fall down from the feast of
the mind.
Thinking is always the stumbling stone to poetry.
A great singer is he who sings our silences.
How can you sing if your mouth be filled with food?
How shall your hand be raised in blessing if it is filled with
gold?
They say the nightingale pierces his bosom with a thorn when he
sings his love song.
So do we all. How else should we sing?
Genius is but a robin's song at the beginning of a slow
spring.
Even the most winged spirit cannot escape physical
necessity.
如果你歌唱美，即使孤身处于荒漠中心，你也能拥有聆听者。
诗歌是陶醉心灵的智慧。
智慧是心灵唱出的诗歌。
如果我们能令一个人的心灵陶醉，并在他的心中歌唱，那他定然活在了神的庇护中。
灵感总在歌唱，灵感从不辩解。
我们经常给孩子唱催眠曲，以便让自己入睡。
我们所有的言语，都是碎屑，脱落于心灵的盛宴。
思想总是诗歌的绊脚石。
伟大的歌者能唱出我们的沉默。
如果你口中满是食物，你如何能够歌唱？
如果你手里满握金子，你怎能举手祈福？
他们说夜莺唱出恋歌时，用荆棘刺穿自己的胸膛。
我们全都如是。不然我们又怎能歌唱？
天才只是知更鸟的一支歌，在迟来的春天之初。
即使那高高飞翔的灵魂，也无法脱离身体之需。
A madman is not less a musician than you or myself; only the
instrument on which he plays is a little out of tune.
The song that lies silent in the heart of a mother sings upon
the lips of her child.
No longing remains unfulfilled.
I have never agreed with my other self wholly. The truth of the
matter seems to lie between us.
Your other self is always sorry for you. But your other self
grows on sorrow; so all is well.
There is no struggle of soul and body save in the minds of those
whose souls are asleep and whose bodies are out of tune.
When you reach the heart of life you shall find beauty in all
things, even in the eyes that are blind to beauty.
We live only to discover beauty. All else is a form of
waiting.
Sow a seed and the earth will yield you a flower. Dream your
dream to the sky and it will bring you your beloved.
The devil died the very day you were born.
Now you do not have to go through hell to meet an angel.
疯人是一个音乐家，并不比你我逊色，只是他所弹奏的乐器微微走调。
母亲心中默默的歌谣，在孩子的双唇间响起。
没有长久不润的渴望。
我与另一个我从未完全统一过。事物的本质似乎横亘在我们之间。
另一个你总在为你难过。另一个你因悲伤而成长。因而一切都是好。
除非灵魂沉睡，躯体失调，灵魂和躯体之间才会没有纷争。
当你抵达生命之心，你将发现万物之美，即使在看不见美的眼睛里。
活着只为发现美，其他一切只是一种等待。
撒下一粒种子，大地会给你一朵花。向着天空梦你所梦，天空会带来你所爱。
魔鬼死于你诞生之日。
你无须穿越地狱就能遇见天使。
Many a woman borrows a man's heart; very few could possess
it.
If you would possess you must not claim.
When a man's hand touches the hand of a woman they both touch
the heart of eternity.
Love is the veil between lover and lover.
Every man loves two women; the one is the creation of his
imagination, and the other is not yet born.
Men who do not forgive women their little faults will never
enjoy their great virtues.
Love that does not renew itself every day becomes a habit and in
turn a slavery.
Lovers embrace that which is between them rather than each
other.
Love and doubt have never been on speaking terms.
Love is a word of light, written by a hand of light, upon a page
of light.
Friendship is always a sweet responsibility, never an
opportunity.
If you do not understand your friend under all conditions you
will never understand him.
许多女人能借得男人之心，但极少女人能够拥有它。
如果你希望拥有，千万别奢求。
当一个男人的手触摸到一个女人的手时，他们双双触摸到了永恒之心。
爱是爱人之间的面纱。
每个男人都爱着两个女人：一个是他想象之物，一个尚未出生。
男人如果不能原谅女人的小小过错，就永远不能欣赏女人的伟大美德。
爱如果不能日日自新，终将变成习惯，直至沦为奴隶。
恋人拥抱的是彼此之间的事物而非彼此。
爱情和猜疑永不交谈。
爱是光之字，被光之手写在光之纸上。
友谊永远是甜蜜的责任而非机会。
如果你不是在各种境况下了解你的朋友，你将永远无法了解他。
Your most radiant garment is of the other person's weaving;
You most savory meal is that which you eat at the other person's
table;
Your most comfortable bed is in the other person's house.
Now tell me, how can you separate yourself from the other
person?
Your mind and my heart will never agree until your mind ceases
to live in numbers and my heart in the mist.
We shall never understand one another until we reduce the
language to seven words.
How shall my heart be unsealed unless it be broken?
你最华丽的衣衫是他人编织的。
你最可口的饭菜是你在他人的餐桌上所吃的。
你最舒适的床铺就在他人的房屋里。
现在告诉我，你又如何能脱离于他人？
除非你的心志不再居于数字中，我的心灵不再活在云雾里，否则你的心志和我的心灵将永不
相通。
除非语言减至七个字，否则我们将永远不能懂得彼此。
除非我的心已经破碎，否则又如何能将它打开？
Only great sorrow or great joy can reveal your truth.
If you would be revealed you must either dance naked in the sun,
or carry your cross.
Should nature heed what we say of contentment no river would
seek the sea, and no winter would turn to Spring. Should she heed
all we say of thrift, how many of us would be breathing this
air?
You see but your shadow when you turn your back to the sun.
You are free before the sun of the day, and free before the
stars of the night;
And you are free when there is no sun and no moon and no
star.
You are even free when you close your eyes upon all there
is.
But you are a slave to him whom you love because you love
him,
And a slave to him who loves you because he loves you.
只有大悲大喜才能揭示真理。
如果你期望被揭露，就必须在阳光中赤裸而舞，不然就背起你的十字架吧。
倘若大自然听到了我们的满足之语，河流将不再追求大海，冬天将不再变为春天。倘若她听到了我们的俭约之说，我们之中又有多少人能呼吸到这空气？
背对太阳时，你看到的只有自己的影子。
你是自由的，面对白天的太阳，黑夜的星辰。
没有太阳，没有月亮，没有星辰，你也是自由的。
甚至你闭起双眼面对一切时，你仍然是自由的。
但是你是你所爱之人的奴隶，因为你爱他。
你也是爱你的人的奴隶，因为他爱你。
We are all beggars at the gate of the temple, and each one of us
receives his share of the bounty of the King when he enters the
temple, and when he goes out.
But we are all jealous of one another, which is another way of
belittling the King.
You cannot consume beyond your appetite. The other half of the
loaf belongs to the other person, and there should remain a little
bread for the chance guest.
If it were not for your guests all houses would be graves.
Said a gracious wolf to a simple sheep, "Will you not honor our
house with a visit?"
And the sheep answered, "We would have been honored to visit
your house if it were not in your stomach."
I stopped my guest on the threshold and said, "Nay, wipe not
your feet as you enter, but as you go out."
我们都是圣殿门前的乞丐，当王进出殿门时，分赏他的恩赐。
然而我们彼此妒忌，这是对王的另一种轻视。
你不可食之过甚。食粮的另一半属于他人，并且还得留下一点，以待意外之客。
如若不是为了接待你的客人，所有的房屋都是坟墓。
热情的狼对天真的羊说：“能否荣幸邀请你光临寒舍？”
羊答道：“如果贵府不是在你的肚子里，能拜访贵府将不胜荣幸。”
我在门口拦住我的客人说：“进门时不必将脚擦净，出门时再擦吧。”
Generosity is not in giving me that which I need more than you
do, but it is in giving me that which you need more than I do.
You are indeed charitable when you give, and while giving, turn
your face away so that you may not see the shyness of the
receiver.
The difference between the richest man and the poorest is but a
day of hunger and an hour of thirst.
We often borrow from our tomorrows to pay our debts to our
yesterdays.
慷慨并非把我比你更需要的东西给我，而是把你比我更需要的东西给我。
你的确是慈悲为怀。你施与，并在施与时别过拜脸去，以免看到受施者羞涩。
最富有的人与最贫穷的人之间的不同，不过是一天的饥饿和一个钟头的干渴。
我们常常借明日之债来尝还昨日之债。
I too am visited by angels and devils, but I get rid of
them.
When it is an angel I pray an old prayer, and he is bored;
When it is a devil I commit an old sin, and he passes me by.
After all this is not a bad prison; but I do not like this wall
between my cell and the next prisoner's cell;
Yet I assure you that I do not wish to reproach the warder not
the Builder of the prison.
天使和魔鬼都造访过我，但我摆脱了他们。
天使降临时，我祈愿旧日之愿，他厌倦了。
魔鬼现身时，我再犯旧日之罪，他走开了。
这毕竟不是一座糟糕的牢狱，只是我不喜欢我的囚房与隔壁囚房之间的这堵墙。
但我保证我并非想指责守狱人和造狱人。
Those who give you a serpent when you ask for a fish, may have
nothing but serpents to give. It is then generosity on their
part.
Trickery succeeds sometimes, but it always commits suicide.
You are truly a forgiver when you forgive murderers who never
spill blood, thieves who never steal, and liars who utter no
falsehood.
He who can put his finger upon that which divides good from evil
is he who can touch the very hem of the garment of God.
If your heart is a volcano how shall you expect flowers to bloom
in your hands?
A strange form of self-indulgence! There are times when I would
be wronged and cheated, that I may laugh at the expense of those
who think I do not know I am being wronged and cheated.
What shall I say of him who is the pursuer playing the part of
the pursued?
Let him who wipes his soiled hands with your garment take your
garment. He may need it again; surely you would not.
It is a pity that money-changers cannot be good gardeners.
那些你向他们索要鱼而给了你毒蛇的人，也许除了毒蛇之外无物可施。这对于他们而言，可谓之慷慨了。
欺骗有时得逞，然而始终是自杀。
如果你能宽恕不曾杀人的杀人犯，不曾偷窃的小偷，不曾骗人的骗子，你真正是一个宽容之人。
谁能伸手指出善恶交界之线，谁就能摸到神的圣袍之边。
如果你的心是一座火山，又怎能期待花儿绽放在你的手中？
多么奇怪的自欺欺人！有时候我宁愿受屈受骗，好让我嘲笑那些以为我不知道自己受屈受骗了的人。
我该说些什么呢，对于一个扮演被追求者的追求者？
让在你衣服上擦净双手的人拿走你的衣服吧。他可能还需要它，而你必定不再需要它。
遗憾，钱币兑换者无法做一个好园丁。
Please do not whitewash your inherent faults with your acquired
virtues. I would have the faults; they are like mine own.
How often have I attributed to myself crimes I have never
committed, so that the other person may feel comfortable in my
presence.
Even the masks of life are masks of deeper mystery.
You may judge others only according to your knowledge of
yourself.
Tell me now, who among us is guilty and who is unguilty?
The truly just is he who feels half guilty of your misdeeds.
Only an idiot and a genius break man-made laws; and they are the
nearest to the heart of God.
It is only when you are pursued that you become swift.
I have no enemies, O God, but if I am to have an enemy
Let his strength be equal to mine,
That truth alone may be the victor.
You will be quite friendly with your enemy when you both
die.
请不要用你后天的美德来粉饰你先天的缺陷。我宁愿拥有缺陷，它们像是我自己所有。
我常常把未犯之罪归加于自身，以便他人在我面前感觉舒服。
甚至生命的面具，也是难解之谜的面具。
你可能裁定别人，依靠的却仅仅是你自己的见识。
现在告诉我，我们之中，谁有罪？谁无罪？
真正正直的人们是那些感到你的罪之一半是他们之罪的人。
唯有白痴和天才打破了人为的定律，他们最接近上帝之心。
唯有在被追赶的时候，你才能真正地奔跑。
我没有敌人，噢，上帝，如果一定得有，就让他成为我的匹敌吧，也许唯有真理才能成为胜者。
你和你的敌人会彼此友爱，当你们都死去时。
Perhaps a man may commit suicide in self-defense.
Long ago there lived a Man who was crucified for being too
loving and too lovable.
And strange to relate I met him thrice yesterday.
The first time He was asking a policeman not to take a
prostitute to prison; the second time He was drinking wine with an
outcast; and the third time He was having a fist-fight with a
promoter inside a church.
If all they say of good and evil were true, then my life is but
one long crime.
Pity is but half justice.
THE ONLY ONE who has been unjust to me is the one to whose
brother I have been unjust.
When you see a man led to prison say in your heart, "Mayhap he
is escaping from a narrower prison."
And when you see a man drunken say in your heart, "Mayhap he
sought escape from something still more unbeautiful."
Oftentimes I have hated in self-defense; but if I were stronger
I would not have used such a weapon.
How stupid is he who would patch the hatred in his eyes with the
smile of his lips.
人可能会因自卫而自杀。
很久以前，有一个人因为太能爱人，太惹人爱而被钉死在十字架上。
奇怪的是，昨天我遇见过他三次。
第一次，他恳求警察不要把妓女送进监牢；第二次，他在和一个流氓喝酒；第三次，他在教堂里和一个执事人打斗。
如果他们所说的善恶皆真，那我的生命就是一次长久的罪。
怜悯只是公正的一半。
唯一对我不公正的人，就是那个我曾对他的兄弟不公正的人。
当你看到一个人被投进监狱时，你应在心中说：“但愿他正在逃离一个更窄的监狱。”
当你看到一个人喝醉时，你应在心中说：“但愿他正在寻求脱身于那些更丑的东西。”
我时常憎恨自卫。但是，如果我能更坚强，我便不会使用这样的武器。
多愚蠢啊这些人，用唇上的微笑来掩饰眼中的憎恨！
Only those beneath me can envy or hate me.
I have never been envied nor hated; I am above no one.
Only those above me can praise or belittle me.
I have never been praised nor belittled; I am below no one.
Your saying to me, "I do not understand you," is praise beyond
my worth, and an insult you do not deserve. How mean am I when life
gives me gold and I give you silver, and yet I deem myself
generous.
When you reach the heart of life you will find yourself not
higher than the felon, and not lower than the prophet.
Strange that you should pity the slow-footed and not the
slow-minded,
And the blind-eyed rather than the blind-hearted.
It is wiser for the lame not to break his crutches upon the head
of his enemy.
How blind is he who gives you out of his pocket that he may take
out of your heart.
只有那些在我之下的人才能妒忌我或憎恨我。
我不曾被妒忌或被憎恨，我不在任何人之上。
只有那些在我之上的人才能称赞我或轻视我。
我不曾被称赞或被轻视，我不在任何人之下。
你对我说：“我不理解你”，对我这是过分的赞扬，对你却是无故的侮辱。
我是何等的吝啬，生活赠我以黄金，我却赠你以白银，并自以为慷慨。
当你抵达生命之心，你将会发现自己并不比罪人崇高，也不比先知卑下。
多么奇怪啊，你同情的是脚步缓慢之人而非思想迟钝之人，是双眼失明之人而非心灵蒙蔽之人。
瘸子更为明智，没有在敌人头上打断自己的拐杖。
多么盲目啊，那个倾其所有来换取你心之人！
Life is a procession. The slow of foot finds it too swift and he
steps out;
And the swift of foot finds it too slow and he too steps
out.
If there is such a thing as sin some of us commit it backward
following our forefathers' footsteps;
And some of us commit it forward by overruling our children.
The truly good is he who is one with all those who are deemed
bad.
We are all prisoners but some of us are in cells with windows
and some without.
Strange that we all defend our wrongs with more vigor than we do
our rights.
Should we all confess our sins to one another we would all laugh
at one another for our lack of originality.
Should we all reveal our virtues we would also laugh for the
same cause.
An individual is above man-made laws until he commits a crime
against man-made conventions; After that he is neither above anyone
nor lower than anyone.
生命是一支长长的队伍。走得慢的人退出来了，因为他发现队伍太快。
走得快的人也退出来了，因为他发现队伍太慢。
如果真的存在罪孽，我们中一些人将沿着先祖的足迹重复罪过；另一些人则将因否决我们的孩子而再次犯错。
真正的良人，与公认的恶徒同行。
我们都是囚犯，只不过有些牢房有窗，有些无窗。
多么奇怪啊，我们为自己的罪行辩解，气力远甚于我们为自己的权利奋争。
倘若我们彼此承认罪过，我们将会因缺乏创意而相互嘲讽。
倘若我们彼此展示美德，我们也会因同样的缘由相互取笑。
除非触犯人为的规则，否则个人将在人为的律法之上。除非他既不超越任何人，也不可任何人卑下。
Government is an agreement between you and myself. You and
myself are often wrong.
Crime is either another name of need or an aspect of a
disease.
Is there a greater fault than being conscious of the other
person's faults?
If the other person laughs at you, you can pity him; but if you
laugh at him you may never forgive yourself.
If the other person injures you, you may forget the injury; but
if you injure him you will always remember.
In truth the other person is your most sensitive self given
another body.
How heedless you are when you would have men fly with your wings
and you cannot even give them a feather.
Once a man sat at my board and ate my bread and drank my wine
and went away laughing at me.
Then he came again for bread and wine, and I spurned him;
And the angels laughed at me.
zf是你我之间的协约，而你我却时常犯错。
罪行不是欲望的别名，就是疾病的症状。
还有比过分关注别人的过失更大的过失吗？
如果他人嘲笑你，你可以可怜他；但如果你嘲笑他人，你将永远无法自恕。
如果他人伤害你，你可以忘了它；但如果你伤害别人，你将永远无法释怀。
事实上，他人就是你最敏感的自我所在的另一个载体。
你是多么粗心啊，要求人们用你的双翅飞翔，却不曾给过他们一根羽毛。
曾经有人坐在我的桌前，吃我的面包，喝我的酒，然后离开之时却在嘲笑我。
后来他再度前来要面包要酒，我置之不理，天使就嘲笑我。
Hate is a dead thing. Who of you would be a tomb?
It is the honor of the murdered that he is not the murderer.
The tribune of humanity is in its silent heart, never its
talkative mind.
They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold;
And I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.
They spread before us their riches of gold and silver, of ivory
and ebony, and we spread before them our hearts and our
spirits.;
And yet they deem themselves the hosts and us the guests.
I would not be the least among men with dreams and the desire to
fulfill them, rather than the greatest with no dreams and no
desires.
The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into
silver and gold.
We are all climbing toward the summit of our hearts' desire.
Should the other climber steal your sack and your purse and wax fat
on the one and heavy on the other, you should pity him;
The climbing will be harder for his flesh, and the burden will
make his way longer.
And should you in your leanness see his flesh puffing upward,
help him a step; it will add to your swiftness.
You cannot judge any man beyond your knowledge of him, and how
small is your knowledge.
I would not listen to a conqueror preaching to the
conquered.
The truly free man is he who bears the load of the bond slave
patiently.
憎恨即死亡。谁愿意成为一座坟墓？
被杀者的荣耀在于他不是杀人者。
人性的法庭在它沉默的心里，而永不在它多话的脑海中。
他们认为我疯了，因为我不愿意拿光阴换黄金。
我认为他们疯了，因为他们以为我的光阴有价。
他们在我们面前展示财富，黄金和白银，象牙和黑檀；我们在他们面前展示心灵和精神。
但他们却认为他们是主人，我们是客人。
我宁愿是人们中最渺小的一个，心中有梦以及圆梦的渴望，也不愿成为最伟大的一个，没有梦，没有渴望。
最可怜的人是那些把梦想变为金银之人。
我们全都在攀登心灵欲望的高峰。如若有人偷了你的行囊和钱包却填满自己的行囊和钱包，你应当可怜他。
攀登对他的身躯而言将更为艰难，而重担则将延长他的路程。
如若轻快的你看到他气喘吁吁，帮他一把，这会使你更加敏捷。
你不能依靠自己的见识去判断他人，你的见识是多么浅薄。
我不愿听一个征服者对被一个被征服者大讲道理。
真正自由之人能够坚忍地背负着受缚奴隶的重负。
A thousand years ago my neighbor said to me, "I hate life, for
it is naught but a thing of pain."
And yesterday I passed by a cemetery and saw life dancing upon
his grave.
Strife in nature is but disorder longing for order.
Solitude is a silent storm that breaks down all our dead
branches;
Yet it sends our living roots deeper into the living heart of
the living earth.
Once I spoke of the sea to a brook, and the brook thought me but
an imaginative exaggerator;
And once I spoke of a brook to the sea, and the sea thought me
but a depreciative defamer.
How narrow is the vision that exalts the busyness of the ant
above the singing of the grasshopper.
The highest virtue here may be the least in another world.
The deep and the high go to the depth or to the height in a
straight line; only the spacious can move in circles.
If we are not for our conception of weights and measures we
would stand in awe of the firefly as we do before the sun.
千年以前，我的邻居对我说道：“我憎恶生命，因为它除了痛苦之外一无所有。”
昨天我路过一片墓地，看到生命在坟墓上跳舞。
自然界的纷争只不过是无序渴望有序。
孤独是一场无声的风暴，吹断我们的枯枝，却将我们的活着之根深深地植入生机盎然的大地那鲜活之心。
我曾对一条小溪说起大海，小溪认为我是彻底的臆想狂。
我也曾对大海说起过小溪，大海认为我是十足的诽谤者。
多么狭隘的见解啊，盛赞蚂蚁的忙碌高于蚱蜢的歌唱。
此处至高的美德，也许在别处最微不足道。
只有沿着直线，深才能达其深，高才能至其高。
只有广阔才能环行。
如果不是我们惯用重量和尺寸来衡量事物，我们将会敬畏萤火虫一如敬畏太阳。
A scientist without imagination is a butcher with dull knives
and out-worn scales.
But what would you, since we are not all vegetarians?
When you sing the hungry hears you with his stomach.
Death is not nearer to the aged than to the new-born; neither is
life.
If indeed you must be candid, be candid beautifully; otherwise
keep silent, for there is a man in our neighborhood who is
dying.
Mayhap a funeral among men is a wedding feast among the
angels.
A forgotten reality may die and leave in its will seven thousand
actualities and facts to be spent in its funeral and the building
of a tomb.
In truth we talk only to ourselves, but sometimes we talk loud
enough that others may hear us.
The obvious is that which is never seen until someone expresses
it simply.
If the Milky Way were not within me how should I have seen it or
known it?
Unless I am a physician among physicians they would not believe
that I am an astronomer.
一个没有想像力的科学家，一如屠夫手握钝刀和旧秤。
然而你又当如何，既然我们并非完全的素食者？
当你歌唱时，饥饿之人用他们的肚子聆听。
死亡距离老人并不比距离孩子更近；反之，生命亦然。
如果你必须坦白，就坦白得漂亮些；不然就保持沉默，因为我们的一位邻人正在离去。
但愿人间的葬礼正是天使的婚礼。
一个被忘却的真相也许会死去，然而遗嘱中留下的七千实况，却可作为出葬和造墓之用。
其实我们只是在自言自语，只不过有时声音大些以致别人也能听到。
显而易见的事物往往长久被忽略，直到有人把它们简单地表达。
如果银河不在我心中，我又如何能看到并认识它呢？
除非我是医生之医生，否则他们不会相信我是一个天文学家。
Perhaps the sea's definition of a shell is the pearl.
Perhaps time's definition of coal is the diamond.
Fame is the shadow of passion standing in the light.
A root is a flower that disdains fame.
There is neither religion nor science beyond beauty.
Every great man I have known had something small in his make-up;
and it was that small something which prevented inactivity or
madness or suicide.
The truly great man is he who would master no one, and who would
be mastered by none.
I would not believe that a man is mediocre simply because he
kills the criminals and the prophets.
也许，大海给贝壳的定义是珍珠。
也许，时间给煤炭的定义是钻石。
名誉是站立在光线中的激情的影子。
根是一朵花，对名誉不屑一顾。
超越了美，就无所谓宗教和科学。
我所见过的每个伟大之人，品格中都有渺小之处；正是这些渺小之处避免了懒散、疯狂和自杀。
真正伟大之人，既不控制任何人，也不受制于任何人。
我不会因一个人杀了罪犯和先知就认定他是平庸的。
Tolerance is love sick with the sickness of haughtiness.
Worms will turn; but is it not strange that even elephants will
yield?
A disagreement may be the shortest cut between two minds.
I am the flame and I am the dry bush, and one part of me
consumes the other part.
We are all seeking the summit of the holy moutain; but shall not
our road be shorter if we consider the past a chart and not a
guide?
Wisdom ceases to be wisdom when it becomes too proud to weep,
too grave to laugh, and too self-ful to seek other than itself.
Had I filled myself with all that you know what room should I
have for all that you do not know?
I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the
intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet strange, I am
ungrateful to these teachers.
A bigot is a stone-leaf orator.
容忍是患了狂傲症的爱。
即便是虫子也会反抗，大象也会屈服，难道这不奇怪吗？
分歧也许是两种思想之间最小的缺口。
我是烈火，也是干柴。我的一部分消耗着我的另一部分。
我们都在寻找圣峰之巅。但如果我们把过去当做一张地图而不是一位向导，我们的路途是否会变短？
当智慧因太过高傲而不会哭泣，太过严肃而不懂欢笑，太过自负而不去寻求他人时，智慧就不再是智慧。
倘若我已用你所知的一切来填满自己，那我还有什么空间来容纳你所不知的一切呢？
我已从健谈者那里学会了沉默，从狭隘者那里学会了宽容，从残忍者那里学会了仁爱。
但奇怪的是，对这些老师我心无感激。
顽固不化之人是全聋的演说家。
《先知》The Coming of the Ship
Almustafa, the chosen and the beloved, who was a dawn onto his
own day, had waited twelve years in the city of Orphalese for his
ship that was to return and bear him back to the isle of his
birth.
And in the twelfth year, on the seventh day of Ielool, the month
of reaping, he climbed the hill without the city walls and looked
seaward; and he beheld the ship coming with the mist.
Then the gates of his heart were flung open, and his joy flew
far over the sea. And he closed his eyes and prayed in the silences
of his soul.
But as he descended the hill, a sadness came upon him, and he
thought in his heart:
How shall I go in peace and without sorrow? Nay, not without a
wound in the spirit shall I leave this city.
Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and
long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain
and his aloneness without regret?
Too many fragments of the spirit have I scattered in these
streets, and too many are the children of my longing that walk
naked among these hills, and I cannot withdraw from them without a
burden and an ache.
It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear
with my own hands.
Nor is it a thought I leave behind me, but a heart made sweet
with hunger and with thirst.
Yet I cannot tarry longer.
The sea that calls all things unto her calls me, and I must
embark.
For to stay, though the hours burn in the night, is to freeze
and crystallize and be bound in a mould.
Fain would I take with me all that is here. But how shall I?
A voice cannot carry the tongue and the lips that give it wings.
Alone must it seek the ether.
And alone and without his nest shall the eagle fly across the
sun.
Now when he reached the foot of the hill, he turned again
towards the sea, and he saw his ship approaching the harbor, and
upon her prow the mariners, the men of his own land.
And his soul cried out to them, and he said:
Sons of my ancient mother, you riders of the tides,
How often have you sailed in my dreams. And now you come in my
awakening, which is my deeper dream.
Ready am I to go, and my eagerness with sails full set awaits
the wind.
Only another breath will I breathe in this still air, only
another loving look cast backward,
Then I shall stand among you, a seafarer among seafarers.
And you, vast sea, sleepless mother,
Who alone are peace and freedom to the river and the stream,
Only another winding will this stream make, only another murmur
in this glade,
And then shall I come to you, a boundless drop to a boundless
ocean.
And as he walked he saw from afar men and women leaving their
fields and their vineyards and hastening towards the city
gates.
And he heard their voices calling his name, and shouting from
the field to field telling one another of the coming of the
ship.
And he said to himself:
Shall the day of parting be the day of gathering?
And shall it be said that my eve was in truth my dawn?
And what shall I give unto him who has left his plough in
midfurrow, or to him who has stopped the wheel of his
winepress?
Shall my heart become a tree heavy-laden with fruit that I may
gather and give unto them?
And shall my desires flow like a fountain that I may fill their
cups?
Am I a harp that the hand of the mighty may touch me, or a flute
that his breath may pass through me?
A seeker of silences am I, and what treasure have I found in
silences that I may dispense with confidence?
If this is my day of harvest, in what fields have I sowed the
seed, and in what unremembered seasons?
If this indeed be the hour in which I lift up my lantern, it is
not my flame that shall burn therein.
Empty and dark shall I raise my lantern,
And the guardian of the night shall fill it with oil and he
shall light it also.
These things he said in words. But much in his heart remained
unsaid. For he himself could not speak his deeper secret.
And when he entered into the city all the people came to meet
him, and they were crying out to him as with one voice.
And the elders of the city stood forth and said:
Go not yet away from us.
A noontide have you been in our twilight, and your youth has
given us dreams to dream.
No stranger are you among us, nor a guest, but our son and our
dearly beloved.
Suffer not yet our eyes to hunger for your face.
And the priests and the priestesses said unto him:
Let not the waves of the sea separate us now, and the years you
have spent in our midst become a memory.
You have walked among us a spirit, and your shadow has been a
light upon our faces.
Much have we loved you. But speechless was our love, and with
veils has it been veiled.
Yet now it cries aloud unto you, and would stand revealed before
you.
And ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the
hour of separation.
And others came also and entreated him.
But he answered them not. He only bent his head; and those who
stood near saw his tears falling upon his breast.
And he and the people proceeded towards the great square before
the temple.
And there came out of the sanctuary a woman whose name was
Almitra. And she was a seeress.
And he looked upon her with exceeding tenderness, for it was she
who had first sought and believed in him when he had been but a day
in their city.
And she hailed him, saying:
Prophet of God, in quest for the uttermost, long have you
searched the distances for your ship.
And now your ship has come, and you must needs go.
Deep is your longing for the land of your memories and the
dwelling place of your greater desires; and our love would not bind
you nor our needs hold you.
Yet this we ask ere you leave us, that you speak to us and give
us of your truth.
And we will give it unto our children, and they unto their
children, and it shall not perish.
In your aloneness you have watched with our days, and in your
wakefulness you have listened to the weeping and the laughter of
our sleep.
Now therefore disclose us to ourselves, and tell us all that has
been shown you of that which is between birth and death.
And he answered,
People of Orphalese, of what can I speak save of that which is
even
now moving your souls?
船的到来
当代的曙光，被选而被爱戴的亚墨斯达法（Ａｌｍｕｓｔａｆａ），在阿法利斯（Ｏｒｐｈａｌｅｓｅ）城中等候了十二年，等他的船到来，好载他归回他生长的岛上去。
在第十二年绮露（Ｊｅｌｏｏｌ）收获之月的第七天，他出城登上山顶，向海凝望；他看见了他的船在烟雾中驶来。
他的心门砉然地开了，他的喜乐在海面飞翔。他合上眼，在灵魂的严静中祷告。
但当他上山的时候，忽然一阵悲哀袭来。他心里想：
我怎能这般宁静地走去而没有些悲哀？不，我要精神上不受创伤地离此城郭。
在这城围里，我度过了悠久的痛苦的日月和孤寂的深夜；谁能撇下这痛苦与孤寂没有一些悼惜？
在这街市上我曾撒下过多的零碎的精神，在这山中也有过多的赤裸着行走的我所爱怜的孩子，离开他们，我不能不觉得负担与痛心。
这不是今日我脱弃了一件衣裳，乃是我用自己的手撕下了自己的一块皮肤。
也不是我遗弃了一种思想，乃是遗弃了一个用饥和渴作成的甜蜜的心。
然而我不能再迟留了。
那召唤万物来归的大海，也在召唤我，我必须登舟了。
因为，若是停留下来，我的归思，在夜间虽仍灼热奋发，渐渐地却要冰冷变石了。
我若能把这里的一切都带了去，何等的快乐呵，但是我又怎能呢？
声音不能把付给他翅翼的舌头和嘴唇带走。他自己必须寻求“以太”。
鹰鸟也必须撇下窝巢，独自地飞过太阳。
现在他走到山脚，又转面向海，他看见他的船徐徐地驶入湾口，那些在船头的舟子，正是他的故乡人。
于是他的精魂向着他们呼唤，说：
弄潮者，我的老母的孩儿，
有多少次你们在我的梦中浮泛。现在你们在我的更深的梦中，也就是我苏醒的时候驶来了。
我已准备好要去了，我的热望和帆篷一同扯满，等着风来。
我只要在这静止的空气中再呼吸一口气，我只要再向后抛掷热爱的一瞥，
那时我要站在你们中间，一个航海者群中的航海者。
还有你，这无边的大海，无眠的慈母，只有你是江河和溪水的宁静与自由。
这溪流还有一次转折，一次林中的潺缓，
然后我要到你这里来，无量的涓滴归向这无量的海洋。
当他行走的时候，他看见从远处有许多男女离开田园，急速地赶到城边来。
他听见他们叫着他的名字，在阡陌中彼此呼唤，报告他的船来临。
他对自己说：
别离的日子能成为聚会的日子么？
我的薄暮实在可算是我的黎明么？
那些放下了耕田的犁耙，停止了榨酒的轮子的人们，我将给他们什么呢？
我的心能成为一棵累累结实的树，可以采撷了分给他们么？
我的愿望能奔流如泉水，可以倾满他们的杯么？
我是一个全能者的手可能弹奏的琴，或是一管全能者可以吹弄的笛么？
我是一个寂静的寻求者。在寂静中，我发现了什么宝藏，可以放心地布施呢？
倘若这是我收获的日子，那么，在何时何地我曾撒下了种子呢？
倘若这确是我举起明灯的时候，那么，灯内的火焰，不是我点上的。
我将空虚黑暗地举起我的灯，
守夜的人将要添上油，也点上火。
这些是他口中说出的，还有许多没有说出的存在心头。因为他说不出自己心中更深的秘密。
他进城的时候，众人都来迎接，齐声地向他呼唤。
城中的长老走上前来说：
你还不要离开我们。
在我们的朦胧里，你是正午的潮者，你青春的气度，给我们以梦想。
你在我们中间不是一个异乡人，也不是一个客人，乃是我们的儿子和亲挚的爱者。
不要使我们的眼睛因渴望你的脸面而酸痛。
一班道人和女冠对他说：
不要让海波在这时把我们分开，使你在我们中间度过的岁月，仅仅成为一种回忆。
你曾是一个在我们中间行走的神灵，你的影儿曾明光似地照亮我们的脸。
我们深深地爱了你。不过我们的爱没有声响，而又被轻纱蒙着。
但现在他要对你呼唤，要在你面前揭露。除非临到了别离的时候，爱永远不会知道自己的深浅。
别的人也来向他恳求。他没有答话。他只低着头；靠近他的人看见他的泪落在袜上。
他和众人慢慢地向殿前的广场走去。
有一个名叫爱尔美差的女子从圣殿里出来，她是一个预言者。
他以无限的温蔼注视着她，因为她是在他第一天进这城里的时候，最初寻找相信他的人中之一。
她庆贺他，说：
上帝的先知，至高的探求者，你曾常向远处寻望你的航帆。
现在你的船儿来了，你必须归去。
你对于那回忆的故乡和你更大愿望的居所的渴念，是这样地深，我们的爱，不能把你系住；我们的需求，也不能把你羁留。
但在你别离以前，我们要请你对我们讲说真理。
我们要把这真理传给我们的孩子，他们也传给他们的孩子，如此绵绵不绝。
在你的孤独里，你曾警守我们的白日；在你的清醒里，你曾倾听我们睡梦中的哭泣与欢笑。
现在请把我们的“真我”披露给我们，告诉我们你所知道的关于生和死中间的一切。
他回答说：
阿法利斯的民众呵，除了那现时在你们灵魂里鼓荡的之外，我还能说什么呢？
On Love
Then said Almitra, “Speak to us of Love.”
And he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there
fell a stillness upon them. And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays
waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he
is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest
branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their
clinging to the earth.
Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may become
sacred bread for God's sacred feast.
All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the
secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of
Life's heart.
But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's
pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass
out of love's threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of
your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from
itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.
When you love you should not say, “God is in my heart,” but
rather, “I am in the heart of God.”
And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it
finds you worthy, directs your course.
Love has no other desire but to fulfil itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your
desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the
night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another
day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love's ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart
and a song of praise upon your lips。
论爱
于是爱尔美差说：先知，请给我们谈爱。
他举头望着民众，他们一时静默了。他用洪亮的声音说：
当爱向你们召唤的时候，跟随着他，虽然他的路程艰险而陡峻。
当他的翅翼围卷你们的时候，屈服于他，虽然那藏在羽翮中间的剑刃许会伤毁你们。
当他对你们说话的时候，信从他，虽然他的声音也许会把你们的梦魂击碎，如同北风吹荒了林园。
爱虽给你加冠，他也要将你钉在十字架上。他虽栽培你，他也刈剪你。
他虽升到你的最高处，抚惜你在日中颤动的枝叶，
他也要降到你的根下，摇动你的根柢的一切关节，使之归土。
如同一捆稻粟，他把你束聚起来。
他舂打你使你赤裸。
他筛分你使你脱去皮壳。
他磨碾你直至洁白。他揉搓你直至柔韧；
然后他送你到他的圣火上去，使你成为上帝圣筵上的圣饼。
这些都是爱要给你们作的事情，使你知道自己心中的秘密，在这知识中你便成了生命心中的一屑。
假如你在你的疑惧中，只寻求爱的和平与逸乐，
那不如掩盖你的裸露，而躲过爱的筛打，
而走入那没有季候的世界，在那里你将欢笑，却不是尽情的笑悦；你将哭泣，却没有流干了眼泪。
爱除自身外无施与，除自身外无接受。
爱不占有，也不被占有。
因为爱在爱中满足了。
当你爱的时候，你不要说，“上帝在我的心中”，却要说，“我在上帝的心里。”
不要想你能导引爱的路程，因为若是他觉得你配，他就导引你。
爱没有别的愿望，只要成全自己。
但若是你爱，而且需求愿望，就让以下的做你的愿望罢：
溶化了你自己，象溪流般对清夜吟唱着歌曲。
要知道过度温存的痛苦。
让你对爱的了解毁伤了你自己；而且甘愿地喜乐地流血。
清晨醒起，以喜握的心来致谢这爱的又一日；
日中静息，默念爱的浓欢；
晚潮退时，感谢地回家；
然后在睡时祈祷，因为有被爱者在你的心中，有赞美之歌在你的唇上。
On Marriage
Then Almitra spoke again and said, “And what of Marriage,
master?”
And he answered saying:
You were born together, and together you shall be
forevermore.
You shall be together when white wings of death scatter your
days.
Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.
Love one another but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your
souls.
Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same
loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you
be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with
the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together, yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's
shadow.
论婚姻
爱尔美差又说，先知，婚姻怎样讲呢？
他回答说：
你们一块儿出世，也要永远合一。
在死的白翼隔绝你们的岁月的时候，他们也要合一。
噫，连在静默地忆想上帝之时，你们也要合一。
不过在你们合一之中，要有间隙。
让天风在你们中间舞荡。
彼此相爱，但不要做成爱的系链：
只让他在你们灵魂的沙岸中间，做一个流动的海。
彼此斟满了杯，却不要在同一杯中啜饮。
彼此递赠着面包，却不要在同一块上取食。
快乐地在一处舞唱，却仍让彼此静独，
连琴上的那些弦子也是单独的，虽然他们在同一的音调中颤动。
彼此赠献你们的心，却不要互相保留。
因为只有生命的手，才能把持你们的心。
要站在一处，却不要太密迩：
因为殿里的柱子，也是分立在两旁，
橡树和松柏，也不在彼此的荫中生长。
On Children
And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, “Speak to us
of Children.”
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for
itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot
visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like
you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are
sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He
bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the
bow that is stable.
论孩子
于是一个怀中抱着孩子的妇人说，先知请给我们谈孩子。
他说：
你们的孩子，都不是你们的孩子。
乃是生命为自己所渴望的儿女。
他们是凭借你们而来，却不是从你们而来，
他们虽和你们同在，却不属于你们。
你们可以给他们以爱，却不可给他们以思想。
因为他们有自己的思想。
你们可以荫庇他们的身体，却不能荫庇他们的灵魂。
因为他们的灵魂，是住在明日的宅中，那是你们在梦中也不能想见的。
你们可以努力去模仿他们，却不能使他们来象你们。
因为生命是不倒行的，也不与昨日一同停留。
你们是弓，你们的孩子是从弦上发出的生命的箭矢。
那射者在无穷之中看定了目标，也用神力将你们引满，使他的箭矢迅速而遥远地射了出去。
让你们在射者手中的弯曲成为喜乐罢；
因为他爱那飞出的箭，也爱了那静止的弓。
On Giving
Then said a rich man, “Speak to us of Giving.”
And he answered:
You give but little when you give of your possessions.
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
For what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for
fear you may need them tomorrow?
And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring to the overprudent dog
burying bones in the trackless sand as he follows the pilgrims to
the holy city?
And what is fear of need but need itself?
Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, thirst that is
unquenchable?
There are those who give little of the much which they have—and
they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their
gifts unwholesome.
And there are those who have little and give it all.
These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and
their coffer is never empty.
There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their
reward.
And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their
baptism.
And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do
they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;
They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance
into space.
Though the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind
their eyes He smiles upon the earth.
It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked,
through understanding;
And to the open-handed the search for one who shall receive is
joy greater than giving
And is there aught you would withhold?
All you have shall some day be given;
Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and
not your inheritors'.
You often say, “I would give, but only to the deserving.”
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your
pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.
Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights is
worthy of all else from you.
And he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life deserves
to fill his cup from your little stream.
And what desert greater shall there be than that which lies in
the courage and the confidence, nay the charity, of receiving?
And who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil
their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride
unabashed?
See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an
instrument of giving.
For in truth it is life that gives unto life—while you, who deem
yourself a giver, are but a witness.
And you receivers—and you are all receivers—assume no weight of
gratitude, lest you lay a yoke upon yourself and upon him who
gives.
Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on
wings;
For to be overmindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity
who has the free-hearted earth for mother, and God for father.
论施与
于是一个富人说，先知请给我们谈施与。
他回答说：
你把你的产业给人，那只算给了一点。
当你以身布施的时候，那才是真正的施与。
因为你的财产，岂不是你保留着的恐怕明日或许需要它们的东西么？
但是明日，那只过虑的犬，随着香客上圣城去，却把骨头埋在无痕迹的沙土里，明日能把什么给他呢？
除了需要的本身之外，需要还忧惧什么呢？
当你在井泉充溢的时候愁渴，那你的渴不是更难解么？
有人有许多财产，却只把一小部分给人——他们为求名而施与，那潜藏的欲念，使他们的礼物不完美。
有人只有一点财产，却全部都给人。
这些人相信生命和生命的丰富，他们的宝柜总不空虚。
有人喜乐地施与，那喜乐就是他们的酬报。
有人无痛地施与，那无痛就是他们的洗礼。
也有人施与了，而不觉出施与的无痛，也不寻求快乐，也不有心为善；
他们的施与，如同那边山谷里的桂花，香气在空际浮动。
从这些人的手中，上帝在说话；在他们的眼后，上帝在俯对大地微笑。
为有请求而施与的，固然是好；而未受请求，只因着默喻而施与的，是更好了。
对于乐善好施的人，去寻求需要他帮助的人的快乐，比施与的快乐还大。
有什么东西你必须保留的呢？
必有一天，你的一切都要交付出来；
趁现在施与罢，这施与的时机是你自己的，而不是你的后人的。
你常说：“我要施与，却只要舍给那些配受施与者。”
你果园里的树木，和牧场上的羊群，却不这样说。
他们为要生存而施与，因为保留就是毁灭。
凡是配接受白日和黑夜的人们，都配接受你施与的一切。
凡配在生命的海洋里啜饮的，都配在你的小泉里舀满他的杯。
还有什么德行比接受的勇气、信心和善意还大呢？
有谁能使人把他们的心怀敞露，把他们的狷傲揭开，使你能看出他们赤裸的价值和无惭的骄傲？
先省察你自己是否配做一个施与者，是否配做一个施与的器皿。
因为实在说，那只是生命给与生命——你以为自己是施主，其实也不过是一个证人。
你接受的人们——你们都是接受者——不要掮起报恩的重担，恐怕你要把轭加在你自己和施者的身上。
不如和施者在礼物上一齐展翅飞腾；
因为过于思量你们的欠负，就是怀疑了那以慈悲的大地为母、以上帝为父的人的仁心。
On Eating and Drinking
Then an old man, a keeper of an inn, said, “Speak to us of
Eating and Drinking.”
And he said:
Would that you could live on the fragrance of the earth, and
like an air plant be sustained by the light.
But since you must kill to eat, and rob the young of its
mother's milk to quench your thirst, let it then be an act of
worship,
And let your board stand an altar on which the pure and the
innocent of forest and plain are sacrificed for that which is purer
and still more innocent in many.
When you kill a beast say to him in your heart,
“By the same power that slays you, I to am slain; and I too
shall be consumed.
For the law that delivered you into my hand shall deliver me
into a mightier hand.
Your blood and my blood is naught but the sap that feeds the
tree of heaven.”
And when you crush an apple with your teeth, say to it in your
heart,
“Your seeds shall live in my body,
And the buds of your tomorrow shall blossom in my heart,
And your fragrance shall be my breath,
And together we shall rejoice through all the seasons.”
And in the autumn, when you gather the grapes of your vineyard
for the winepress, say in you heart,
“I to am a vineyard, and my fruit shall be gathered for the
winepress,
And like new wine I shall be kept in eternal vessels.”
And in winter, when you draw the wine, let there be in your
heart a song for each cup;
And let there be in the song a remembrance for the autumn days,
and for the vineyard, and for the winepress.
论饮食
一个开饭店的老人说，先知请给我们谈饮食。
他说：
我恨不得你们能依靠大地的香气而生存，如同植物受着阳光、空气的供养。
既然你们必须杀生为食，而且从新生的动物口中夺他的母乳来止渴，那就让他成为一个敬神的礼节罢。
让你的肴馔摆在祭坛上，那是丛林中和原野上的纯洁清白的物品，为更纯洁清白的人们而牺牲的。
当你杀生的时候，心里对他说：
“在宰杀你的权力之下，我同样地也被宰杀，我也要同样地被吞食。
那把你送到我手里的法律，也要把我送到那更伟大者的手里。
你和我的血都不过是浇灌天树的一种液汁。”
当你咬嚼着苹果的时候，心里对它说：
“你的子核要在我身中生长，
你来世的嫩芽要在我心中萌茁，
你的芬香要成为我的气息，
我们要终年地喜乐。”
在秋天，你在果园里摘葡萄榨酒的时候，心里说：
“我也是一座葡萄园，我的果实也要摘下榨酒。
和新酒一般，我也要被收存在永生的杯里。”
在冬日，当你斟酒的时候，你的心要对每一杯酒歌唱；
让那歌曲成为一首纪念秋天和葡萄园以及榨酒之歌。
On Work
Then a plowman said, “Speak to us of Work.”
And he answered, saying:
You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of
the earth.
For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons, and to
step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud
submission towards the infinite.
When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering
of the hours turns to music.
Which of you would be a reed, dumb and silent, when all else
sings together in unison?
Always you have been told that work is a curse and a labor, a
misfortune.
But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth's
furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born,
And in keeping yourself with labor you are in truth loving
life,
And to love life through labor is to be intimate with life's
inmost secret.
But if you in your pain call birth an affliction and the support
of the flesh a curse written upon your brow, then I answer that
naught but the sweat of your brow shall wash away that which is
written.
You have been told also life is darkness, and in your weariness
you echo what was said by the weary.
And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is
urge,
And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,
And all knowledge is vain save when there is work,
And all work is empty save when there is love;
And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and
to one another, and to God.
And what is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart,
even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection, even as if your beloved
were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with
joy, even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.
It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own
spirit,
And to know that all the blessed dead are standing about you and
watching.
Often have I heard you say, as if speaking in sleep, “he who
works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the stone,
is a nobler than he who ploughs the soil.
And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it on a cloth in the
likeness of man, is more than he who makes the sandals for our
feet.”
But I say, not in sleep but in the over-wakefulness of noontide,
that the wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the
least of all the blades of grass;
And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a
song made sweeter by his own loving.
Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is
better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the
temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread
that feeds but half man's hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge
distils a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you
muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the
night.
论工作
于是一个农夫说，先知请给我们谈工作。
他回答说：
你工作为的是要与大地和大地的精神一同前进。
因为情逸使你成为一个时代的生客，一个生命大队中的落伍者，这大队是庄严的，高傲而服从的，向着无穷前进的。
在你工作的时候，你是一管笛，从你心中吹出时光的微语，变成音乐。
你们谁肯做一根芦管，在万物合唱的时候，你独痴呆无声呢？
你们常听人说，工作是祸殃，劳动是不幸。
我却对你们说，你们工作的时候，你们完成了大地深远的梦之一部，他指示你那梦是从何时开头的。
而在你劳动不息的时候，你确实爱了生命。
在工作里爱了生命，就是通彻了生命最深的秘密。
倘然在你的辛苦里，将有身之苦恼和养身之诅咒，写上你的眉间，则我将回答你，只有你眉间的汗，能洗去这些字句。
你们也听见人说，生命是黑暗的。在你疲劳之中，你附和了那疲劳的人所说的话。
我说生命的确是黑暗的，除非是有了激励；
一切的激励都是盲目的，除非是有了知识；
一切的知识都是徒然的，除非是有了工作；
一切的工作都是空虚的，除非是有了爱。
当你仁爱地工作的时候，你便与自己、与人类、与上帝连系为一。
怎样才是仁爱地工作呢？
从你的心中抽丝织成布帛，仿佛你的爱者要来穿此衣裳。
热情地盖造房屋，仿佛你的爱者要住在其中。
温存地播种，欢乐地收刈，仿佛你的爱者要来吃这产物。
这就是用你自己灵魂的气息，来充满你所制造的一切。
要知道一切受福的古人，都在你上头看视着。
我常听见你们仿佛在梦中说：“那在蜡石上表现出他自己灵魂的形象的人，是比耕地的人高贵多了。
那捉住虹霓，传神地画在布帛上的人，是比织履的人强多了。”
我却要说，不在梦中，而在正午清醒的时候，风对大橡树说话的声音，并不比对纤小的草叶所说的更甜柔。
只有那用他的爱心，把风声变成甜柔的歌曲的人，是伟大的。
工作是眼能看见的爱。
倘若你不是欢乐地却厌恶地工作，那还不如撇下工作，坐在大殿的门边，去乞求那些欢乐地工作的人的周济。
倘若你无精打采地烤着面包，你烤成的面包是苦的，只能救半个人的饥饿。
你若是怨重地压榨着葡萄酒，你的怨望，在酒里滴下了毒液。
倘若你能象天使一般地唱，却不爱唱，那你就把人们能听到白天和黑夜的声音的耳朵都塞住了。
On Joy and Sorrow
Then a woman said, “Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.”
And he answered:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was
oftentimes filled with your tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you
can contain.
Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned
in the potter's oven?
And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that
was hollowed with knives?
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall
find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you
joy.
When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall
see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your
delight.
Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say,
“Nay, sorrow is the greater.”
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your
board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.
Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and
your joy.
Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.
When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his
silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.
论欢乐与悲哀
于是一个妇人说，先知请给我们讲欢乐与悲哀。
他回答说：
你的欢乐，就是你的去了面具的悲哀。
连你那涌溢欢乐的井泉，也常是充满了你的眼泪。
不然又怎样呢？
悲哀的创痕在你身上刻的越深，你越能容受更多的欢乐。
你的盛酒的杯，不就是那曾在陶工的窑中燃烧的坯子么？
那感悦你的心神的笛子，不就是曾受尖刀挖刻的木管么？
当你欢乐的时候，深深地内顾你的心中，你就知道只不过是曾使你悲哀的，又在使你欢乐。
当你悲哀的时候，再内顾你的心中，你就看出实在是那曾使你喜悦的，又在使你哭泣。
你们有些人说：“欢乐大于悲哀。”也有人说：“不，悲哀是更大的。”
我却要对你们说，它们是不能分开的。
它们一同来到，当这一个和你同席的时候，要记得那一个正在你床上酣眠。
真的，你是天平般悬在悲哀与欢乐之间。
只有在盘空的时候，你才能静止，持平。
当守库者把你提起来称他的金银的时候，你的哀乐就必需升降了。
On Houses
Then a mason came forth and said, “Speak to us of Houses.”
And he answered and said:
Build of your imaginings a bower in the wilderness ere you build a
house within the city walls.
For even as you have home-comings in your twilight, so has the
wanderer in you, the ever distant and alone.
Your house is your larger body.
It grows in the sun and sleeps in the stillness of the night; and
it is not dreamless. Does not your house dream? And dreaming, leave
the city for grove or hilltop?
Would that I could gather your houses into my hand, and like a
sower scatter them in forest and meadow.
Would the valleys were your streets, and the green paths your
alleys, that you might seek one another through vineyards, and come
with the fragrance of the earth in your garments.
But these things are not yet to be.
In their fear your forefathers gathered you too near together. And
that fear shall endure a little longer. A little longer shall your
city walls separate your hearths from your fields.
And tell me, people of Orphalese, what have you in these houses?
And what is it you guard with fastened doors?
Have you peace, the quiet urge that reveals your power?
Have you remembrances, the glimmering arches that span the summits
of the mind?
Have you beauty, that leads the heart from things fashioned of wood
and stone to the holy mountain?
Tell me, have you these in your houses?
Or have you only comfort, and the lust for comfort, that stealthy
thing that enters the house a guest, and becomes a host, and then a
master?
Ay, and it becomes a tamer, and with hook and scourge makes puppets
of your larger desires.
Though its hands are silken, its heart is of iron.
It lulls you to sleep only to stand by your bed and jeer at the
dignity of the flesh.
It makes mock of your sound senses, and lays them in thistledown
like fragile vessels.
Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and
then walks grinning in the funeral.
But you, children of space, you restless in rest, you shall not be
trapped nor tamed.
Your house shall be not an anchor but a mast.
It shall not be a glistening film that covers a wound, but an
eyelid that guards the eye.
You shall not fold your wings that you may pass through doors, nor
bend your heads that they strike not against a ceiling, nor fear to
breathe lest walls should crack and fall down.
You shall not dwell in tombs made by the dead for the living.
And though of magnificence and splendor, your house shall not hold
your secret nor shelter your longing.
For that which is boundless in you abides in the mansion of thesky,
whose door is the morning mist, and whose windows are the songs and
the silences of night.
论房子
于是一个泥水匠走上前来说，先知请给我们谈房子。
他回答说：
当你在城里盖一所房子之前，先在野外用你的想象盖一座凉亭。
因为你黄昏时有家可归，而你那更迷茫、更孤寂的漂泊的精魂，也有个归宿。
你的房屋是你的较大的躯壳。
他在阳光中发育，在夜的寂静中睡眠；而且不能无梦。你的房屋不做梦么？不梦见离开城市，登山入林么？
我愿能把你们的房子聚握在手里，撒种似地把他们洒落在丛林中与绿野上。
愿山谷成为你们的街市，绿径成为你们的里巷，使你们在葡萄园中相寻相访的时候，衣袂上带着大地的芬芳。
但这个还一时做不到。
在你们祖宗的忧惧里，他们把你们聚集得太近了。这忧惧还要稍微延长。你们的城墙，也仍要把你们的家庭和你们的田地分开的。
告诉我罢，阿法利斯的民众呵，你们的房子里有什么？你们锁门是为守护什么呢？
你们有和平，不就是那表现好魄力的宁静和鼓励么？
你们有回忆，不就是那连跨你心峰的灿烂的弓桥么？
你们有美，不就是那把你的心从木石建筑上引到圣山的么？
告诉我，你们的房屋里有这些东西么？
或者你只有舒适和舒适的欲念，那诡秘的东西，以客人的身分混了进来渐作家人，终作主翁的么？
噫，他变成一个驯兽的人，用钩镰和鞭笞，使你较伟大的愿望变成傀儡。
他的手虽柔软如丝，他的心却是铁打的。
他催眠你，只须站在你的床侧，讥笑你肉体的尊严。
他戏弄你健全的感官，把它们塞放在蓟绒里，如同脆薄的杯盘。
真的，舒适之欲，杀害了你灵性的热情，又哂笑地在你的殡仪队中徐步。
但是你们这些太空的儿女，你们在静中不息，你们不应当被网罗，被驯养。
你们的房子不应当做个锚，却应当做个桅。它不应当做一片遮掩伤痕的闪亮的薄皮，却应当做那保护眼睛的睫毛。
你不应当为穿门走户而敛翅，也不应当为恐触到屋顶而低头，也不应当为怕墙壁崩裂而停止呼吸。
你不应当住在那死人替活人筑造的坟墓里。
无论你的房屋是如何地壮丽与辉煌，也不应当使他隐住你的秘密，遮住你的愿望。
因为你里面的无穷性，是住在天宫里，那天宫是以晓烟为门户，以夜的静寂与歌曲为窗牖的。
On Clothes
And the weaver said, “Speak to us of Clothes.”
And he answered:
Your clothes conceal much of your beauty, yet they hide not the
unbeautiful.
And though you seek in garments the freedom of privacy you may
find in them a harness and a chain.
Would that you could meet the sun and the wind with more of your
skin and less of your raiment,
For the breath of life is in the sunlight and the hand of life
is in the wind.
Some of you say, “It is the north wind who has woven the clothes
to wear.”
But shame was his loom, and the softening of the sinews was his
thread.
And when his work was done he laughed in the forest.
Forget not that modesty is for a shield against the eye of the
unclean.
And when the unclean shall be no more, what were modesty but a
fetter and a fouling of the mind?
And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet
and the winds long to play with your hair.
论衣服
于是一个织工说，先知请给我们谈衣服。
他回答说：
你们的衣服掩盖了许多的美，却遮不住丑恶。
你们虽可在衣服里找到隐秘的自由，却也找到了橛饰与羁勒了。
我恨不得你们多用皮肤而少用衣服去迎接太阳和风。
因为生命的气息是在阳光中，生命的把握是在风里。
你们中有人说：“那纺织衣服给我们穿的是北风。”
我也说：对的，是北风，
但他的机杼是可羞的，那使筋肌软弱的是他的线缕。
当他的工作完毕时，他在林中喧笑。
不要忘却，羞怯只是遮挡不洁的眼目的盾牌。
在不洁完全没有了的时候，羞怯不是仅仅是心上的桎梏与束缚么？
也别忘了大地是欢喜和你的赤脚接触，风是希望和你的头发游戏的。
On Buying and Selling
And a merchant said, “Speak to us of Buying and Selling.”
And he answered and said:
To you the earth yields her fruit, and you shall not want if you
but know how to fill your hands.
It is in exchanging the gifts of the earth that you shall find
abundance and be satisfied.
Yet unless the exchange be in love and kindly justice, it will
but lead some to greed and others to hunger.
When in the market place you toilers of the sea and fields and
vineyards meet the weavers and the potters and the gatherers of
spices, -
Invoke then the master spirit of the earth, to come into your
midst and sanctify the scales and the reckoning that weighs value
against value.
And suffer not the barren-handed to take part in your
transactions, who would sell their words for your labor.
To such men you should say,
“Come with us to the field, or go with our brothers to the sea
and cast your net;
For the land and the sea shall be bountiful to you even as to
us.”
And if there come the singers and the dancers and the flute
players,—buy of their gifts also.
For they too are gatherers of fruit and frankincense, and that
which they bring, though fashioned of dreams, is raiment and food
for your soul.
And before you leave the marketplace, see that no one has gone
his way with empty hands.
For the master spirit of the earth shall not sleep peacefully
upon the wind till the needs of the least of you are satisfied.
论买卖
于是一个商人说，先知请给我们谈买卖。
他回答说：
大地贡献果实给你们，如果你们只晓得怎样独取，你们就不应当领受了。
在交易着大地的礼物时，你们将感到丰裕而满足。
然而若不是用爱和公平来交易，则必有人流为饕餮，有人流为饿殍。
当在市场上，你们这些海上、田中和葡萄园里的工人，遇见了织工、陶工和采集香料的——
就当祈求大地的主神，临到你们中间。来圣化天秤，以及那较量价值的核算。
不要容许游手好闲的人来参加你们的买卖，他们会以言语来换取你们的劳力。
你们要对这种人说：
“同我们到田间，或者跟我们的兄弟到海上去撒网；
因为海与陆地，对你们也和对我们一样地慈惠。”
倘若那吹箫的和歌舞的人来了，你们也应当买他们的礼物。
因为他们也是果实和乳香的采集者，他们带来的物事，虽系梦幻，却是你们灵魂上的衣食。
在你们离开市场以前，要看着没有人空手回去。
因为大地的主神，不到你们每人的需要全都满足了以后，他不能在风中宁静地睡眠。
On Crime and Punishment
Then one of the judges of the city stood forth and said, “Speak
to us of Crime and Punishment.”
And he answered saying:
It is when your spirit goes wandering upon the wind,
That you, alone and unguarded, commit a wrong unto others and
therefore unto yourself.
And for that wrong committed must you knock and wait a while
unheeded at the gate of the blessed.
Like the ocean is your god-self;
It remains for ever undefiled.
And like the ether it lifts but the winged.
Even like the sun is your god-self;
It knows not the ways of the mole nor seeks it the holes of the
serpent.
But your god-self does not dwell alone in your being.
Much in you is still man, and much in you is not yet man,
But a shapeless pygmy that walks asleep in the mist searching
for its own awakening.
And of the man in you would I now speak.
For it is he and not your god-self nor the pygmy in the mist,
that knows crime and the punishment of crime.
Oftentimes have I heard you speak of one who commits a wrong as
though he were not one of you, but a stranger unto you and an
intruder upon your world.
But I say that even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise
beyond the highest which is in each one of you,
So the wicked and the weak cannot fall lower than the lowest
which is in you also.
And as a single leaf turns not yellow but with the silent
knowledge of the whole tree,
So the wrong-doer cannot do wrong without the hidden will of you
all.
Like a procession you walk together towards your god-self.
You are the way and the wayfarers.
And when one of you falls down he falls for those behind him, a
caution against the stumbling stone.
Ay, and he falls for those ahead of him, who though faster and
surer of foot, yet removed not the stumbling stone.
And this also, though the word lie heavy upon your hearts:
The murdered is not unaccountable for his own murder,
And the robbed is not blameless in being robbed.
The righteous is not innocent of the deeds of the wicked,
And the white-handed is not clean in the doings of the
felon.
Yea, the guilty is oftentimes the victim of the injured,
And still more often the condemned is the burden-bearer for the
guiltless and unblamed.
You cannot separate the just from the unjust and the good from
the wicked;
For they stand together before the face of the sun even as the
black thread and the white are woven together.
And when the black thread breaks, the weaver shall look into the
whole cloth, and he shall examine the loom also.
If any of you would bring judgment the unfaithful wife,
Let him also weight the heart of her husband in scales, and
measure his soul with measurements.
And let him who would lash the offender look unto the spirit of
the offended.
And if any of you would punish in the name of righteousness and
lay the axe unto the evil tree, let him see to its roots;
And verily he will find the roots of the good and the bad, the
fruitful and the fruitless, all entwined together in the silent
heart of the earth.
And you judges who would be just,
What judgment pronounce you upon him who though honest in the
flesh yet is a thief in spirit?
What penalty lay you upon him who slays in the flesh yet is
himself slain in the spirit?
And how prosecute you him who in action is a deceiver and an
oppressor,
Yet who also is aggrieved and outraged?
And how shall you punish those whose remorse is already greater
than their misdeeds?
Is not remorse the justice which is administered by that very
law which you would fain serve?
Yet you cannot lay remorse upon the innocent nor lift it from
the heart of the guilty.
Unbidden shall it call in the night, that men may wake and gaze
upon themselves.
And you who would understand justice, how shall you unless you
look upon all deeds in the fullness of light?
Only then shall you know that the erect and the fallen are but
one man standing in twilight between the night of his pygmy-self
and the day of his god-self,
And that the corner-stone of the temple is not higher than the
lowest stone in its foundation.
论罪与罚
于是本城的法官中，有一个走上前来说，先知请给我们谈罪与罚。
他回答说：
当你的灵性随风飘荡的时候，
你孤零而失慎地对别人也就是对自己犯了过错。
为着所犯的过错，你必须去叩那受福者之门，要被怠慢地等待片刻。
你们的神性象海洋；
他永远纯洁不染，
又像以太，他只帮助有翼者上升。
他们的神性也像太阳；
他不知道田鼠的径路，也不寻找蛇虺的洞穴。
但是你们的神性，不是独居在你们里面。
在你们里面，有些仍是人性，有些还不成人性。
只是一个未成形的侏儒，睡梦中在烟雾里蹒跚，自求觉醒。
我现在所要说的，就是你们的人性。
因为那知道罪与罪的刑罚的，是他，而不是你的神性，也不是烟雾中的侏儒。
我常听见你们论议到一个犯了过失的人，仿佛他不是你们的同人，只象是个外人，是个你们的世界中的闯入者。
我却要说，连那圣洁和正直的，也不能高于你们每人心中的至善。
所以那奸邪的懦弱的，也不能低于你们心中的极恶。
如同一片树叶，除非得到全树的默许，不能独自变黄。
所以那作恶者，若没有你们大家无形中的怂恿，也不会作恶。
如同一个队伍，你们一同向着你们的神性前进。
你们是道，也是行道的人。
当你们中间有人跌倒的时候，他是为了他后面的人而跌倒，是一块绊脚石的警告。
是的，他也为他前面的人而跌倒，因为他们的步履虽然又快又稳，却没有把那绊脚石挪开。
还有这个，虽然这些话会重压你的心：
被杀者对于自己的被杀不能不负咎，被劫者对于自己的被劫不能不受责。
正直的人，对于恶人的行为，也不能算无辜。
清白的人，对于罪人的过犯，也不能算不染。
是的，罪犯往往是被害者的牺牲品，刑徒更往往为那些无罪无过的人肩负罪担。
你们不能把至公与不公，至善与不善分开；因为他们一齐站在太阳面前，如同织在一起的黑线和白线，
黑线断了的时候，织工就要视察整块的布，也要察看那机杼。
你们中如有人要审判一个不忠诚的妻子，
让他也拿天平来称一称她丈夫的心，拿尺来量一量他的灵魂。
让鞭挞扰人者的人，先察一察那被扰者的灵性。
你们如有人要以正义之名，砍伐一棵恶树，让他先察看树根；
他一定能看出那好的与坏的，能结实与不能结实的树根，
都在大地的沉默的心中，纠结在一处。
你们这些愿持公正的法官，
你们将怎样裁判那忠诚其外而盗窃其中的人？
你们又将怎样刑罚一个肉体受戮，而在他自己是心灵遭灭的人？
你们又将怎样控告那行为上刁猾、暴戾，
而事实上也是被威逼、被虐待的人呢？
你们又将怎样责罚那悔心已经大于过失的人？
忏悔不就是你们所喜欢奉行的法定的公道么？
然而你们却不能将忏悔放在无辜者的身上，也不能将它从罪人心中取出。
不期然地它要在夜中呼唤，使人们醒起，反躬自省。
你们这些愿意了解公道的人，若不在大光明中视察一切的行为，你们怎能了解呢？
只在那时，你们才知道那直立与跌倒的，只是一个站在侏儒性的黑夜与神性的白日的黄昏中的人，
也要知道那大殿的角石，也不高于那最低的基石。
On Laws
Then a lawyer said, “But what of our Laws, master?”
And he answered:
You delight in laying down laws,
Yet you delight more in breaking them.
Like children playing by the ocean who build sand-towers with
constancy and then destroy them with laughter.
But while you build your sand-towers the ocean brings more sand
to the shore,
And when you destroy them, the ocean laughs with you.
Verily the ocean laughs always with the innocent.
But what of those to whom life is not an ocean, and man-made
laws are not sand-towers,
But to whom life is a rock, and the law a chisel with which they
would carve it in their own likeness?
What of the cripple who hates dancers?
What of the ox who loves his yoke and deems the elk and deer of
the forest stray and vagrant things?
What of the old serpent who cannot shed his skin, and calls all
others naked and shameless?
And of him who comes early to the wedding-feast, and when
over-fed and tired goes his way saying that all feasts are
violation and all feasters law-breakers?
What shall I say of these save that they too stand in the
sunlight, but with their backs to the sun?
They see only their shadows, and their shadows are their
laws.
And what is the sun to them but a caster of shadows?
And what is it to acknowledge the laws but to stoop down and
trace their shadows upon the earth?
But you who walk facing the sun, what images drawn on the earth
can hold you?
You who travel with the wind, what weathervane shall direct your
course?
What man's law shall bind you if you break your yoke but upon no
man's prison door?
What laws shall you fear if you dance but stumble against no
man's iron chains?
And who is he that shall bring you to judgment if you tear off
your garment yet leave it in no man's path?
People of Orphalese, you can muffle the drum, and you can loosen
the strings of the lyre, but who shall command the skylark not to
sing?
论法律
于是一个律师说，但是先知，我们的法律怎么样呢？
他回答说：你们喜欢立法，
却也更喜欢犯法。
如同那在海滨游戏的孩子，勤恳地建造了沙塔，然后又嘻笑地将它毁坏。
但是当你们建造沙塔的时候，海洋又送许多的沙土上来，
到你们毁坏那沙塔的时候，海洋又与你们一同哄笑。
真的，海洋常和天真的人一同哄笑。
可是对于那班不以生命为海洋，不以人造的法律为沙塔的人又当如何？
对于那以生命为岩石，以法律为可以随意刻雕的凿子的人又当如何？
对于那憎恶跳舞者的跛人又当如何？
对于那喜爱羁轭，却以林中的麋鹿为流离颠沛的小牛的人又当如何？
对于自己不能蜕脱，却把一切蛇豸称为赤裸无耻的老蛇的人，又当如何？
对于那早赴婚筵，饱倦归来，却说“一切筵席都是违法，那些设筵的人都是犯法者”的人又当如何？
对于这些人，除了说他们是站在日中以背向阳之外，我能说什么呢？
他们只看见自己的影子。他们的影子，就是他们的法律。
太阳对于他们，不只是一个射影者么？
承认法律，不就是佝偻着在地上寻迹阴影么？
你们只向着阳光行走的人，地上哪种的映影能捉住你们呢？
你们这乘风遨游的人，哪种的风信旗能指示你们的路程呢？
如果你们不在任何人的囚室门前敲碎你们的镣铐，那种人造的法律能束缚你们么？
如果你们跳舞却不撞击任何人的铁链，你们还怕什么法律呢？
如果你们撕脱你们的衣囊，却不丢弃在任何人的道上，有谁能把你带去受审呢？
阿法利斯的民众呵，你们纵能闷住鼓音，松了琴弦，但有谁能禁止云雀不高唱？
On Freedom
And an orator said, “Speak to us of Freedom.”
And he answered:
At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate
yourself and worship your own freedom,
Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him
though he slays them.
Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel
I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a
handcuff.
And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even
the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when
you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.
You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care
nor your nights without a want and a grief,
But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise
above them naked and unbound.
And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you
break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have
fastened around your noon hour?
In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these
chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the
eyes.
And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard
that you may become free?
If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written
with your own hand upon your own forehead.
You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the
foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.
And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his
throne erected within you is destroyed.
For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a
tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?
And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been
chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.
And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is
in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.
Verily all things move within your being in constant half
embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the
cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.
These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that
cling.
And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers
becomes a shadow to another light.
And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself
the fetter of a greater freedom.
论自由
于是一个辩士说，先知请给我们谈自由。
他回答说：
在城门边，在炉火光前，我曾看见你们俯伏敬拜自己的“自由”，
甚至于像那些囚奴，在诛戮他们的暴君之前卑屈，颂赞。
噫，在庙宇的林中，在城堡的影里，我曾看见你们中之最自由者，把自由像枷铐似地戴上。
我心里忧伤，因为只有那求自由的愿望也成了羁饰，你们再不以自由为标竿、为成就的时候，你们才是自由了。
当你们的白日不是没有牵挂，你们的黑夜也不是没有愿望与忧愁的时候，你们才是自由了。
不如说是当那些事物包围住你的生命，而你却能赤裸地无牵挂地超腾的时候，你们才是自由了。
但若不是在你们了解的晓光中，折断了缝结你们昼气的锁链，你们怎能超脱你们的白日和黑夜呢？
实话说，你们所谓的自由，就是最坚牢的锁链，虽然那链环闪烁在日光中炫耀了你们的眼目。
自由岂不是你们自身的碎片？你们愿意将它抛弃换得自由么？
假如那是你们所要废除的一条不公平的法律，那法律却是你们用自己的手写在自己的额上的。
你们虽烧毁你们的律书，倾全海的水来冲洗你们法官的额，也不能把它抹掉。
假如那是个你们所要废黜的暴君，先看他的建立在你心中的宝座是否毁坏。
因为一个暴君怎能辖制自由和自尊的人呢？除非他们自己的自由是专制的，他们的自尊是可羞的。
假如那是一种你们所要抛掷的牵挂，那牵挂是你自取的，不是别人勉强给你的。
假如那是一种你们所要消灭的恐怖，那恐怖的座位是在你的心中，而不在你所恐怖的人的手里。
真的，一切在你里面运行的事物，愿望与恐怖，憎恶与爱怜，追求与退避，都是永恒地互抱着。
这些事物在你里面运行，如同光明与黑影成对地胶粘着。
当黑影消灭的时候，遗留的光明又变成另一种光明的黑影。
这样，当你们的自由脱去他的镣铐的时候，他本身又变成更大的自由的镣铐了。
On Reason and Passion
And the priestess spoke again and said:
“Speak to us of Reason and Passion.”
And he answered saying:
Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason
and your judgment wage war against passion and your appetite.
Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul, that I might
turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and
melody.
But how shall I, unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers,
nay, the lovers of all your elements?
Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of
your seafaring soul.
If either your sails or our rudder be broken, you can but toss
and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.
For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion,
unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.
Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of
passion; that it may sing;
And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion
may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix
rise above its own ashes.
I would have you consider your judgment and your appetite even
as you would two loved guests in your house.
Surely you would not honor one guest above the other; for he who
is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.
Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white
poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and
meadows—then let your heart say in silence, “God rests in
reason.”
And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest,
and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky,—then let
your heart say in awe, “God moves in passion.”
And since you are a breath In God's sphere, and a leaf in God's
forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.
论理性与热情
于是那女冠又说：先知请给我们讲理性与热情。
他回答说：
他们的心灵常常是战场。在战场上，你们的理性与判断和你们的热情与嗜欲开战。
我恨不能在你们的心灵中做一个调停者，使我可以让你们心中的分子从竞争与衅隙变成合一与共鸣。
但除了你们自己也做个调停者，做个你们心中的各分子的爱者之外，我又能做什么呢？
你们的理性与热情，是你们航行的灵魂的舵与帆。
假如你们的帆或舵破坏了，你们只能泛荡、飘流，或在海中停住。
因为理性独自治理，是一个禁锢的权力；热情，不小心的时候是一个自焚的火焰。
因此，让你们的心灵把理性升到热情的最高点，让它歌唱；
也让心灵用理性来引导你们的热情，让它在每日复活中生存，如同大鸾在它自己的灰烬上高翔。
我愿你们把判断和嗜欲当作你们家中的两位佳客。
你们自然不能敬礼一客过于另一客；因为过分关心于任一客，必要失去两客的友爱与忠诚。
在万山中，当你坐在白杨的凉荫下，享受那远田与原野的宁静与和平——你应当让你的心在沉静中说：“上帝安息在理性中。”
当飓暴卷来的时候，狂风振撼林木，雷电宣告穹苍的威严——你应当让你的心在敬畏中说：“上帝运行在热情里。”
只因你们是上帝大气中之一息，是上帝丛林中之一叶，你们也要同他一起安息在理性中，运行在热情里。On Pain
And a woman spoke, saying, “Tell us of Pain.”
And he said:
Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your
understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may
stand in the sun, so must you know pain.
And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of
your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your
joy;
And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have
always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.
And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your
grief.
Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals
your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence
and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender
hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been
fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own
sacred tears.
论痛苦
于是一个妇人说，先知请给我们谈痛苦。
他说：
你的痛苦是你那包裹知识的皮壳的破碎。
连果核也必须破碎，使果仁可以暴露在阳光中，所以你们也必须知道痛苦。
倘若你能使你的心时常赞叹日常生活的神妙，你的痛苦的神妙必不减于你的欢乐；你要承受你心天的季候，如同你常常承受从田野上度过的四时。
你要静守，度过你心里凄凉的冬日。
许多的痛苦是你自择的。
那是你身中的医士，医治你病躯的苦药。
所以你要信托这医生，静默安宁地吃他的药：
因为他的手腕虽重而辣，却是有冥冥的温柔之手指导着。
他带来的药杯，虽会焚灼你的嘴唇，那陶土却是陶工用他自己神圣的眼泪来润湿调搏而成的。
On Self-Knowledge
And a man said, “Speak to us of Self-Knowledge.”
And he answered, saying:
Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and the
nights.
But your ears thirst for the sound of your heart's
knowledge.
You would know in words that which you have always know in
thought.
You would touch with your fingers the naked body of your
dreams.
And it is well you should.
The hidden well-spring of your soul must needs rise and run
murmuring to the sea;
And the treasure of your infinite depths would be revealed to
your eyes.
But let there be no scales to weigh your unknown treasure;
And seek not the depths of your knowledge with staff or sounding
line.
For self is a sea boundless and measureless.
Say not, “I have found the truth,” but rather, “I have found a
truth.”
Say not, “I have found the path of the soul.” Say rather, “I
have met the soul walking upon my path.”
For the soul walks upon all paths.
The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a
reed.
The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.
论自知
于是一个男人说，先知请给我们讲自知。
他回答说：
在宁静中，你的心知道了白日和黑夜的奥秘。
但你的耳朵渴求听到你心的知识的声音。
你愿在意念中所了解的，能从语言中知道。
你愿能用手指去抚触你的赤裸的梦魂。
你要这样做是好的。
你的心灵隐秘的涌泉，必须升溢，吟唱着奔向大海；
你的无穷深处的宝藏，必须在你目前呈现。
但不要用秤来衡量你的未知的珍宝，
也不要用杖竿和响带去探测你的知识的浅深。
因为自我乃是一片无边无际的海。
不要说“我找到了真理”，只要说“我找到了一条真理”。
不要说“我找到了灵魂的道路”，只要说“我遇见了灵魂在我的道路上行走。”
因为灵魂在一切的道路上行走。
灵魂不只在一条道路上行走，也不是芦草似地生长。
灵魂如同一朵千瓣的莲花，自己开放着。
On Teaching
Then said a teacher, “Speak to us of Teaching.”
And he said:
No man can reveal to you aught but that which already lies half
asleep in the dawning of our knowledge.
The teacher who walks in the shadow of the temple, among his
followers, gives not of his wisdom but rather of his faith and his
lovingness.
If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of
wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind.
The astronomer may speak to you of his understanding of space,
but he cannot give you his understanding.
The musician may sing to you of the rhythm which is in all
space, but he cannot give you the ear which arrests the rhythm nor
the voice that echoes it.
And he who is versed in the science of numbers can tell of the
regions of weight and measure, but he cannot conduct you
thither.
For the vision of one man lends not its wings to another
man.
And even as each one of you stands alone in God's knowledge, so
must each one of you be alone in his knowledge of God and in his
understanding of the earth.
论教育
于是一位教师说，先知请给我们讲教育。
他说：
除了那已经半睡着，躺卧在你知识的晓光里的东西之外，没有人能向你启示什么。
那在殿宇的荫影里，在弟子群中散步的教师，他不是在传授他的智慧，而是在传授他的忠信与仁慈。
假如他真是大智，他就不命令你进入他的智慧之堂，却要引导你到你自己心灵的门口。
天文家能给你讲述他对于太空的了解，他却不能把他的了解给你。
音乐家能给你唱出那充满太空的韵调，他却不能给你那聆受韵调的耳朵和应和韵调的声音。
精通数学的人能说出度量衡的方位，他却不能引导你到那方位上去。
因为一个人不能把他理想的翅翼借给别人。
正如上帝对于你们每个人的了解都是不相同的，所以你们对于上帝和大地的见解也应当是不相同的。
On Friendship
And a youth said, “Speak to us of Friendship.”
Your friend is your needs answered.
He is your field which you sow with love and reap with
thanksgiving.
And he is your board and your fireside.
For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for
peace.
When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the ‘nay’ in your
own mind, nor do you withhold the ‘ay.’
And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his
heart;
For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all
expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.
When you part from your friend, you grieve not;
For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his
absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the
plain.
And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of
the spirit.
For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery
is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is
caught.
And let your best be for your friend.
If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood
also.
For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to
kill?
Seek him always with hours to live.
For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness.
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and
sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and
is refreshed.
论友谊
于是一个青年说，先知请给我们谈友谊。
他回答说：
你的朋友是你的有回答的需求。
他是你用爱播种，用感谢收获的田地。
他是你的饮食，也是你的火炉。
因为你饥渴地奔向他，你向他寻求平安。
当你的朋友向你倾吐胸臆的时候，你不要怕说出心中的“否”，也不要瞒住你心中的“可”。
当他静默的时候，你的心仍要倾听他的心；
因为在友谊里，不用言语，一切的思想，一切的愿望，一切的希冀，都在无声的欢乐中发生而共享了。
当你与朋友别离的时候，不要忧伤；
因为你感到他的最可爱之点，当他不在时愈见清晰，正如登山者从平原上望山峰，也加倍地分明。
愿除了寻求心灵的加深之外，友谊没有别的目的。
因为那只寻求着要泄露自身的神秘的爱，不算是爱，只算是一个撒下的网，只网住一些无益的东西。
让你的最美好的事物，都给你的朋友。
假如他必须知道你潮水的退落，也让他知道你潮水的高涨。
你找他只为消磨光阴的人，还能算是你的朋友么？
你要在生长的时间中去找他。
因为他的时间是满足你的需要，不是填满你的空腹。
在友谊的温柔中，要有欢笑和共同的欢乐。
因为在那微末事物的甘露中，你的心能找到他的清晓而焕发精神。
On Talking
And then a scholar said, “Speak of Talking.”
And he answered, saying:
You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts;
And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart
you live in your lips, and sound is a diversion and a pastime.
And in much of your talking, thinking is half murdered.
For thought is a bird of space, that in a cage of words many
indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly.
There are those among you who seek the talkative through fear of
being alone.
The silence of aloneness reveals to their eyes their naked
selves and they would escape.
And there are those who talk, and without knowledge or
forethought reveal a truth which they themselves do not
understand.
And there are those who have the truth within them, but they
tell it not in words.
In the bosom of such as these the spirit dwells in rhythmic
silence.
When you meet your friend on the roadside or in the market
place, let the spirit in you move your lips and direct your
tongue.
Let the voice within your voice speak to the ear of his ear;
For his soul will keep the truth of your heart as the taste of
the wine is remembered
When the color is forgotten and the vessel is no more.
论谈话
于是一个学者说，先知请你讲讲谈话。
他回答说：
在你不安于你的思想的时候，你就说话。
在你不能再在你心的孤寂中生活的时候，你就要在你的唇上生活，而声音是一种消遣，一种娱乐。
在你许多的谈话里，思想半受残害。
思想是天空中的鸟，在语言的笼里，也许会展翅，却不会飞翔。
你们中间有许多人，因为怕静，就去找多话的人。
在独居的寂静里，会在他们眼中呈现出他们赤裸的自己，他们就想逃避。
也有些说话的人，并没有知识和考虑，却要启示一种他们自己所不明白的真理。
也有些人的心里隐存着真理，他们却不用言语来诉说。
在这些人的胸怀中，心灵居住在有韵调的寂静里。
当你在道旁或市场遇见你朋友的时候，让你的心灵，运用你的嘴唇，指引你的舌头。
让你声音里的声音，对他耳朵的耳朵说话：
因为他的灵魂要噙住你心中的真理。
如同酒光被忘却，酒杯也不存留，而酒味却永远被记念。
On Time
And an astronomer said, “Master, what of Time?”
And he answered:
You would measure time the measureless and the immeasurable.
You would adjust your conduct and even direct the course of your
spirit according to hours and seasons.
Of time you would make a stream upon whose bank you would sit
and watch its flowing.
Yet the timeless in you is aware of life's timelessness,
And knows that yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is
today's dream.
And that that which sings and contemplates in you is still
dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the
stars into space.
Who among you does not feel that his power to love is
boundless?
And yet who does not feel that very love, though boundless,
encompassed within the center of his being, and moving not form
love thought to love thought, nor from love deeds to other love
deeds?
And is not time even as love is, undivided and paceless?
But if in you thought you must measure time into seasons, let
each season encircle all the other seasons,
And let today embrace the past with remembrance and the future
with longing.
论时间
于是一个天文家说，先知，关于时间怎样讲呢？
他回答说：
你要测量那不可量、不能量的时间。
你要按照时辰与季候来调节你的举止，引导你的精神。
你要把时间当做一条溪水，您要坐在岸旁，看它流逝。
但那在你里面无时间性的我，却觉悟到生命的无穷。
也知道昨日只是今日的回忆，而明日只是今日的梦想。
那在你里面歌唱着、默想着的，仍住在那第一刻在太空散布群星的圈子里。
你们中间谁不感到他的爱的能力是无穷的呢？
又有谁不感到那爱虽是无穷，却是在他本身的中心绕行，不是从这爱的思念移到那爱的思念，也不是从这爱的行为移到那爱的行为么？
而且时间岂不是也象爱，是不可分析，没有罅隙的么？
但若是在你的意想里，你定要把时间分成季候，那就让每一季候围绕住其他的季候。
也让今日用回忆拥抱着过去，用希望拥抱着将来。
On Good and Evil
And one of the elders of the city said, “Speak to us of Good and
Evil.”
And he answered:
Of the good in you I can speak, but not of the evil.
For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and
thirst?
Verily when good is hungry it seeks food even in dark caves, and
when it thirsts, it drinks even of dead waters.
You are good when you are one with yourself.
Yet when you are not one with yourself you are not evil.
For a divided house is not a den of thieves; it is only a
divided house.
And a ship without rudder may wander aimlessly among perilous
isles yet sink not to the bottom.
You are good when you strive to give of yourself.
Yet you are not evil when you seek gain for yourself.
For when you strive for gain you are but a root that clings to
the earth and sucks at her breast.
Surely the fruit cannot say to the root, “Be like me, ripe and
full and ever giving of your abundance.”
For to the fruit giving is a need, as receiving is a need to the
root.
You are good when you are fully awake in your speech,
Yet you are not evil when you sleep while your tongue staggers
without purpose.
And even stumbling speech may strengthen a weak tongue.
You are good when you walk to your goal firmly and with bold
steps.
Yet you are not evil when you go thither limping.
Even those who limp go not backward.
But you who are strong and swift, see that you do not limp
before the lame, deeming it kindness.
You are good in countless ways, and you are not evil when you
are not good,
You are only loitering and sluggard.
Pity that the stags cannot teach swiftness to the turtles.
In your longing for your giant self lies your goodness: and that
longing is in all of you.
But in some of you that longing is a torrent rushing with might
to the sea, carrying the secrets of the hillsides and the songs of
the forest.
And in others it is a flat stream that loses itself in angles
and bends and lingers before it reaches the shore.
But let not him who longs much say to him who longs little,
“Wherefore are you slow and halting?”
For the truly good ask not the naked, “Where is your garment?”
nor the houseless, “What has befallen your house?”
论善与恶
于是一位城中的长老说，先知请给我们谈善恶。
他回答说：
我能谈你们的善性，却不能谈你们的恶性。
因为，什么是“恶”，不只是“善”被他自身的饥渴所困苦么？
的确，在“善”饥饿的时候，他肯向黑洞中览食，渴的时候，他也肯喝死水。
当你与自己合一的时候便是“善”。
当你不与自己合一的时候，却也不是“恶”。
因为一个隔断的院宇，不是贼窝，只不过是个隔断的院宇。
一只船失了舵，许会在礁岛间无目的地飘荡而却不至于沉到海底。
当你努力要牺牲自己的时候便是“善”。
当你想法自利的时候，却也不是“恶”。
因为当你设法自利的时候，你不过是土里的树根，在大地的胸怀中啜吸。
果实自然不能对树根说：“你要像我，丰满成熟，永远贡献出你最丰满的一部分。”
因为，在果实，贡献是必需的，正如吸收是树根所必需的一样。
当你在言谈中完全清醒的时候，你是“善”的。
当你在睡梦中，舌头无意识地摆动的时候，却也不是“恶”。
连那失错的言语，有时也能激动柔弱的舌头。
当你勇敢地走向目标的时候，你是“善”的。
你颠顿而行，却也不是“恶”。
连那些跛者，也不倒行。
但你们这些勇健而迅速的人，要警醒，不要在跛者面前颠顿，还自以为仁慈。
在无数的事上，你是“善”的；在你不善的时候，你也不是“恶”的。
你只是流连，荒亡。
可怜那糜鹿不能教给龟鳖快跑。
在你冀求你的“大我”的时候，便隐存着你的善性：
这种冀求是你们每人心中都有的。
但是对于有的人，这种冀求是奔越归海的急湍，挟带着山野的神秘与林木的讴歌。
在其他的人，是在转弯曲折中迷途的缓流的溪水，在归海的路上滞留。
但是不要让那些冀求深的人，对冀求浅的人说：“你为什么这般迟钝？”
因为那真善的人，不问赤裸的人：“你的衣服在那里？”也不问那无家的人：“你的房子怎样了？”
On Prayer
Then a priestess said, “Speak to us of Prayer.”
And he answered, saying:
You pray in your distress and in your need; would that you might
pray also in the fullness of your joy and in your days of
abundance.
For what is prayer but the expansion of yourself into the living
ether?
And if it is for your comfort to pour your darkness into space,
it is also for your delight to pour forth the dawning of your
heart.
And if you cannot but weep when your soul summons you to prayer,
she should spur you again and yet again, though weeping, until you
shall come laughing.
When you pray you rise to meet in the air those who are praying
at that very hour, and whom save in prayer you may not meet.
Therefore let your visit to that temple invisible be for naught
but ecstasy and sweet communion.
For if you should enter the temple for no other purpose than
asking you shall not receive.
And if you should enter into it to humble yourself you shall not
be lifted:
Or even if you should enter into it to beg for the good of
others you shall not be heard.
It is enough that you enter the temple invisible.
I cannot teach you how to pray in words.
God listens not to your words save when He Himself utters them
through your lips.
And I cannot teach you the prayer of the seas and the forests
and the mountains.
But you who are born of the mountains and the forests and the
seas can find their prayer in your heart,
And if you but listen in the stillness of the night you shall
hear them saying in silence,
“Our God, who art our winged self, it is thy will in us that
willeth.
It is thy desire in us that desireth.
It is thy urge in us that would turn our nights, which are
thine, into days which are thine also.
We cannot ask thee for aught, for thou knowest our needs before
they are born in us:
Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest
us all.”
论祈祷
于是一个女冠说，先知请给我们谈祈祷。
他回答说：
你们总在悲痛或需要的时候祈祷，我愿你们也在完满的欢乐中和丰富的日子里祈祷。
因为祈祷不就是你们的自我在活的以太中的开展么？
假若向太空倾吐出你们心中的黑夜是个安慰，那么倾吐出你们心中的晓光也是个欢乐。
假若在你的灵魂命令你祈祷的时候，你只会哭泣，她也要从你的哭泣中反复地鼓励你，直到你笑悦为止。
在你祈祷的时候，你超凡高举，在空中你遇到了那些和你在同一时辰祈祷的人，那些除了祈祷时辰之外你不会遇到的人。
那么，让你那冥冥的殿宇的朝拜，只算个欢乐和甜柔的聚会罢。
因为假如你进入殿宇，除了请求之外，没有别的目的，你将不能接受。
假如你进入殿宇，只为要卑屈自己，你也并不被提高。
甚至于你进入殿宇，只为他人求福，你也不被嘉纳。
只要你进到了那冥冥的殿宇，这就够了。
我不能教给你们怎样用言语祈祷。
除了它通过你的嘴唇所说的它自己的言语之外，上帝不会垂听你的言语。
而且我也不能传授给你那大海、丛林和群山的祈祷。
但是你们生长在群山、丛林和大海之中的人，能在你们心中默会它们的祈祷。
假如你在夜的肃默中倾听，你会听见它们在严静中说：
“我们自己的‘高我’的上帝，您的意志就是我们的意志。
您的愿望就是我们的愿望。
您的神力将您赐给我们的黑夜转为白日。
我们不能向您祈求什么，因为在我们动念之前，您已知道了我们的需要。
我给您的是我们的需要。在您把自己多赐予我们的时候，您把一切都赐予我们了。”
On Pleasure
Then a hermit, who visited the city once a year, came forth and
said, “Speak to us of Pleasure.”
And he answered, saying:
Pleasure is a freedom song,
But it is not freedom.
It is the blossoming of your desires,
But it is not their fruit.
It is a depth calling unto a height,
But it is not the deep nor the high.
It is the caged taking wing,
But it is not space encompassed.
Ay, in very truth, pleasure is a freedom-song.
And I fain would have you sing it with fullness of heart; yet I
would not have you lose your hearts in the singing.
Some of your youth seek pleasure as if it were all, and they are
judged and rebuked.
I would not judge nor rebuke them. I would have them seek.
For they shall find pleasure, but not her alone:
Seven are her sisters, and the least of them is more beautiful
than pleasure.
Have you not heard of the man who was digging in the earth for
roots and found a treasure?
And some of your elders remember pleasures with regret like
wrongs committed in drunkenness.
But regret is the beclouding of the mind and not its
chastisement.
They should remember their pleasures with gratitude, as they
would the harvest of a summer.
Yet if it comforts them to regret, let them be comforted.
And there are among you those who are neither young to seek nor
old to remember;
And in their fear of seeking and remembering they shun all
pleasures, lest they neglect the spirit or offend against it.
But even in their foregoing is their pleasure.
And thus they too find a treasure though they dig for roots with
quivering hands.
But tell me, who is he that can offend the spirit?
Shall the nightingale offend the stillness of the night, or the
firefly the stars?
And shall your flame or your smoke burden the wind?
Think you the spirit is a still pool which you can trouble with
a staff?
Oftentimes in denying yourself pleasure you do but store the
desire in the recesses of your being.
Who knows but that which seems omitted today, waits for
tomorrow?
Even your body knows its heritage and its rightful need and will
not be deceived.
And your body is the harp of your soul,
And it is yours to bring forth sweet music from it or confused
sounds.
And now you ask in your heart, “How shall we distinguish that
which is good in pleasure from that which is not good?”
Go to your fields and your gardens, and you shall learn that it
is the pleasure of the bee to gather honey of the flower,
But it is also the pleasure of the flower to yield its honey to
the bee.
For to the bee a flower is a fountain of life,
And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love,
And to both, bee and flower, the giving and the receiving of
pleasure is a need and an ecstasy.
People of Orphalese, be in your pleasures like the flowers and
the bees.
论快乐
于是有个每年进城一次的隐士，走上前来说：先知请给我们谈谈快乐。
他回答说：快乐是一阕自由的歌，却不是自由。
是你的愿望开出的花朵，却不是结下的果实。
是从深处到高处的招呼，却不是深，也不是高。
是关闭在笼中的翅翼，却不是被围绕住的太空。
噫，实话说，快乐只是一阕自由的歌。
我愿意你们全心全意地歌唱，我却不愿你们在歌唱中迷恋。
你们中间有些年轻的人，寻求快乐，似乎这便是世上的一切。他们已被裁判、被谴责了。
我不要裁判、谴责他们，我要他们去寻求。
因为他们必会找到快乐，但不止找到她一个人；
快乐有七个姊妹，她们中最小的也比她还要柔美。
你们没听见过有人因为要挖掘树根却发现了宝藏么？
你们中间有些老人，想起快乐时总带些懊悔，如同想起醉中所犯的过失。
然而，懊悔只是心灵的蒙蔽，而不是心灵的惩罚。
你们想起快乐时应当带着感谢，如同秋收对于夏季的感谢。但是假如懊悔能予他们以安慰，就让他们得到安慰罢。
你们中间有的不是寻求的青年人，也不是追忆的老年人；
在他们的畏惧寻求与追忆之中，他们远离一切的快乐，他们深恐疏远了或触犯了心灵。
然而，他们的放弃就是快乐了。
这样，他们虽用震颤的手挖掘树根，他们也找到宝藏了。
告诉我，谁能触犯心灵呢？
夜莺能触犯静默么，萤火能触犯星辰么？
你们的火焰和烟气能使风感到负载么？
你们认为心灵是一池止水，你能用竿子去搅拨它么？
常常在你拒绝快乐的时候，你只是把欲望收藏在你心身的隐处。
谁知道在今日似乎避免了的事情，到明日不会再浮现呢？
连你的身体都知道他的遗传和正当的需要而不肯被欺骗。你的身体是你灵魂的琴，
无论他发出甜柔的音乐或嘈杂的声响，那都是你的。
现在你们在心中自问：“我们如何辨别快乐中的善与不善呢？”
到你的田野和花园里去，你就知道在花中采蜜是蜜蜂的快乐；但是，将蜜汁送给蜜蜂也是花的快乐。
因为对于蜜蜂，花是它生命的泉源，对于花，蜜蜂是它恋爱的使者，对于蜂和花，两下里，给予与接受的快乐是一种需要与狂喜的快乐。
阿法利斯的民众呵，在快乐中你们应当像花朵与蜜蜂。
On Beauty
And a poet said, “Speak to us of Beauty.”
Where shall you seek beauty, and how shall you find her unless
she herself be your way and your guide?
And how shall you speak of her except she be the weaver of your
speech?
The aggrieved and the injured say, “Beauty is kind and
gentle.
Like a young mother half-shy of her own glory she walks among
us.”
And the passionate say, “Nay, beauty is a thing of might and
dread.
Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us and the sky
above us.”
The tired and the weary say, “beauty is of soft whisperings. She
speaks in our spirit.
Her voice yields to our silences like a faint light that quivers
in fear of the shadow.”
But the restless say, “We have heard her shouting among the
mountains,
And with her cries came the sound of hoofs, and the beating of
wings and the roaring of lions.”
At night the watchmen of the city say, “Beauty shall rise with
the dawn from the east.”
And at noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say, “we have seen
her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset.”
In winter say the snow-bound, “She shall come with the spring
leaping upon the hills.”
And in the summer heat the reapers say, “We have seen her
dancing with the autumn leaves, and we saw a drift of snow in her
hair.”
All these things have you said of beauty.
Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied,
And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand stretched
forth,
But rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted.
It is not the image you would see nor the song you would
hear,
But rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a
song you hear though you shut your ears.
It is not the sap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing attached
to a claw,
But rather a garden for ever in bloom and a flock of angels for
ever in flight.
People of Orphalese, beauty is life when life unveils her holy
face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and your are the mirror.
论美
是一个诗人说，先知请给我们谈美。
他回答说：
你们到处追求美，除了她自己做了你的道路，引导着你之外，你如何能找到她呢？
除了她做了你的言语的编造者之外，你如何能谈论她呢？
冤抑的、受伤的人说：“美是仁爱的，和柔的，如同一位年轻的母亲，在她自己的光荣中半含着羞涩，在我们中间行走。”
热情的人说：“不，美是一种全能的可畏的东西。暴风似地，撼摇了上天下地。”
疲乏的，忧苦的人说：“美是温柔的微语，在我们心灵中说话。
她的声音传达到我们的寂静中，如同微晕的光，在阴影的恐惧中颤动。”
烦躁的人却说：“我们听见她在万山中叫号，与她的呼声俱来的，有兽蹄之声，振翼之音，与狮子之吼。”
在夜里守城的人说：“美要与晓暾从东方一同升起。”
在日中的时候，工人和旅客说：“我们曾看见她凭倚在落日的窗户上俯视大地。”
在冬日，阻雪的人说：“她要和春天一同来临，跳跃于山峰之上。”
在夏日的炎热里，刈者说：“我们曾看见她和秋叶一同跳舞，我们也看见她的发中有一堆白雪。”
这些都是他们关于美的谈说。
实际上，你却不是谈她，只是谈着你那未曾满足的需要。
美不是一种需要，只是一种欢乐。
她不是干渴的口，也不是伸出的空虚的手，却是发焰的心，陶醉的灵魂。
她不是那你能看到的形象，能听到的歌声，却是你虽闭目时也能看见的形象，虽掩耳时也能听见的歌声。
她不是犁痕下树皮中的液汁，也不是在兽爪间垂死的禽鸟。
却是一座永远开花的花园，一群永远飞翔的天使。
阿法利斯的民众呵，在生命揭露圣洁的面容的时候的美，就是生命。但你就是生命，你也是面纱。
美是永生揽镜自照。
但你就是永生，你也是镜子。
On Religion
And an old priest said, “Speak to us of Religion.”
And he said:
Have I spoken this day of aught else?
Is not religion all deeds and all reflection,
And that which is neither deed nor reflection, but a wonder and
a surprise ever springing in the soul, even while the hands hew the
stone or tend the loom?
Who can separate his faith from his actions, or his belief from
his occupations?
Who can spread his hours before him, saying, “This for God and
this for myself; This for my soul, and this other for my body?”
All your hours are wings that beat through space from self to
self.
He who wears his morality but as his best garment were better
naked.
The wind and the sun will tear no holes in his skin.
And he who defines his conduct by ethics imprisons his song-bird
in a cage.
The freest song comes not through bars and wires.
And he to whom worshipping is a window, to open but also to
shut, has not yet visited the house of his soul whose windows are
from dawn to dawn.
Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
Whenever you enter into it take with you your all.
Take the plough and the forge and the mallet and the lute,
The things you have fashioned in necessity or for delight.
For in revery you cannot rise above your achievements nor fall
lower than your failures.
And take with you all men:
For in adoration you cannot fly higher than their hopes nor
humble yourself lower than their despair.
And if you would know God be not therefore a solver of
riddles.
Rather look about you and you shall see Him playing with your
children.
And look into space; you shall see Him walking in the cloud,
outstretching His arms in the lightning and descending in rain.
You shall see Him smiling in flowers, then rising and waving His
hands in trees.
论宗教
于是一个老道人说，先知请给我们谈宗教。
他说：
这一天中我曾谈过别的么？
宗教岂不是一切的功德，一切的反省。
以及那不是功德，也不是反省，只是在凿石或织布时灵魂中永远涌溢的一种叹异，一阵惊讶么？
谁能把他的信心和行为分开，把他的信仰和事业分开呢？
谁能把时间展现在面前，说“这时间是为上帝的，那时间是为我自己的；这时间是为我灵魂的，那时间是为我肉体的”呢？
你的一切光阴都是那在太空中鼓动的翅翼，从自我飞到自我。
那穿上道德只如同穿上他的最美的衣服的人，还不如赤裸着，太阳和风不会把他的皮肤裂成洞孔。
把他的举止范定在伦理之内，是把善鸣之鸟囚在笼里。
最自由的歌声，不是从竹木弦线上发出的。
那以礼拜为窗户的人，开启而又关上，他还没有探访到他心灵之宫，那里的窗户是天天开启的。
你的日常生活，就是你的殿宇，你的宗教。
何时你进去，把你的一切都带了去。
带着犁耙和铁炉，木槌和琵琶，这些你为着需要或怡情而制造的物件。
因为在梦幻中，你不能超升到比你的成就还高，也不至于坠落到比你的失败还低。
你也要把一切的人都带着：
因为在钦慕上，你不能飞跃得比他们的希望还高，也不能卑屈得比他们的失望还低。
假如你要认识上帝，就不要做一个解谜的人。
不如举目四望，你将看见他同你的孩子们游戏。
也观望太空；你将看见他在云中行走，在电中伸臂，在雨中降临。
你将看见他在花中微笑，在树中举手挥动着。
On Death
Then Almitra spoke, saying, “We would ask now of Death.”
And he said:
You would know the secret of death.
But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heart of
life?
The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot
unveil the mystery of light.
If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart
wide unto the body of life.
For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are
one.
In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent
knowledge of the beyond;
And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of
spring.
Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to
eternity.
Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he
stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in
honor.
Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall
wear the mark of the king?
Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?
For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt
into the sun?
And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its
restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God
unencumbered?
Only when you drink form the river of silence shall you indeed
sing.
And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin
to climb.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly
dance.
论死
于是爱尔美差开口了，说，先知现在我们愿意问“死”。
他说：
你愿知道死的奥秘。
但是除了在生命的心中寻求以外，你们怎能寻见呢？
那夜中张目的枭鸟，他的眼睛在白昼是盲瞎的，不能揭露光明的神秘。
假如你真要瞻望死的灵魂，你应当对生的肉体大大地开展你的心。
因为生和死是同一的，如同江河与海洋也是同一的。
在你的希望和愿欲的深处，隐藏着你对于来生的默识；
如同种子在雪下梦想，你们的心也在梦想着春天。信赖一切的梦境吧，因为在那里面隐藏着永生之门。
你们的怕死，只是像一个牧人，当他站在国王的座前，被御手恩抚时的战栗。
在战栗之下，牧人岂不因为他身上已有了国王的手迹而喜悦么？
可是，他岂不更注意到他自己的战栗么？
除了在风中裸立，在日下消融之外，死还是什么呢？
除了把呼吸从不停的潮汐中解放，使他上升，扩大，无碍地寻求上帝之外，“气绝”又是什么呢？
只在你们从沉默的河中啜饮时，才真能歌唱。
只在你们达到山巅时，你们才开始攀援。
只在大地索取你们的四肢时，你们才真正地跳舞。
The Farewell
And Almitra the seeress said, “Blessed be this day and this
place and your spirit that has spoken.”
And he answered, “Was it I who spoke? Was I not also a
listener?”
Then he descended the steps of the Temple and all the people
followed him. And he reached his ship and stood upon the deck.
And facing the people again, he raised his voice and said:
People of Orphalese, the wind bids me leave you.
Less hasty am I than the wind, yet I must go.
We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way, begin no day where
we have ended another day; and no sunrise finds us where sunset
left us.
Even while the earth sleeps we travel.
We are the seeds of the tenacious plant, and it is in our
ripeness and our fullness of heart that we are given to the wind
and are scattered.
Brief were my days among you, and briefer still the words I have
spoken.
But should my voice fade in your ears, and my love vanish in
your memory, then I will come again,
And with a richer heart and lips more yielding to the spirit
will I speak.
Yea, I shall return with the tide,
And though death may hide me, and the greater silence enfold me,
yet again will I seek your understanding.
And not in vain will I seek.
If aught I have said is truth, that truth shall reveal itself in
a clearer voice, and in words more kin to your thoughts.
I go with the wind, people of Orphalese, but not down into
emptiness;
And if this day is not a fulfillment of your needs and my love,
then let it be a promise till another day.
Man's needs change, but not his love, nor his desire that his
love should satisfy his needs.
Know therefore, that from the greater silence I shall
return.
The mist that drifts away at dawn, leaving but dew in the
fields, shall rise and gather into a cloud and then fall down in
rain.
And not unlike the mist have I been.
In the stillness of the night I have walked in your streets, and
my spirit has entered your houses,
And your heart-beats were in my heart, and your breath was upon
my face, and I knew you all.
Ay, I knew your joy and your pain, and in your sleep your dreams
were my dreams.
And oftentimes I was among you a lake among the mountains.
I mirrored the summits in you and the bending slopes, and even
the passing flocks of your thoughts and your desires.
And to my silence came the laughter of your children in streams,
and the longing of your youths in rivers.
And when they reached my depth the streams and the rivers ceased
not yet to sing.
But sweeter still than laughter and greater than longing came to
me.
It was boundless in you;
The vast man in whom you are all but cells and sinews;
He in whose chant all your singing is but a soundless
throbbing.
It is in the vast man that you are vast,
And in beholding him that I beheld you and loved you.
For what distances can love reach that are not in that vast
sphere?
What visions, what expectations and what presumptions can
outsoar that flight?
Like a giant oak tree covered with apple blossoms is the vast
man in you.
His mind binds you to the earth, his fragrance lifts you into
space, and in his durability you are deathless.
You have been told that, even like a chain, you are as weak as
your weakest link.
This is but half the truth. You are also as strong as your
strongest link.
To measure you by your smallest deed is to reckon the power of
ocean by the frailty of its foam.
To judge you by your failures is to cast blame upon the seasons
for their inconsistency.
Ay, you are like an ocean,
And though heavy-grounded ships await the tide upon your shores,
yet, even like an ocean, you cannot hasten your tides.
And like the seasons you are also,
And though in your winter you deny your spring,
Yet spring, reposing within you, smiles in her drowsiness and is
not offended.
Think not I say these things in order that you may say the one
to the other, “He praised us well. He saw but the good in us.”
I only speak to you in words of that which you yourselves know
in thought.
And what is word knowledge but a shadow of wordless
knowledge?
Your thoughts and my words are waves from a sealed memory that
keeps records of our yesterdays,
And of the ancient days when the earth knew not us nor
herself,
And of nights when earth was upwrought with confusion,
Wise men have come to you to give you of their wisdom. I came to
take of your wisdom:
And behold I have found that which is greater than wisdom.
It is a flame spirit in you ever gathering more of itself,
While you, heedless of its expansion, bewail the withering of
your days.
It is life in quest of life in bodies that fear the grave.
There are no graves here.
These mountains and plains are a cradle and a
stepping-stone.
Whenever you pass by the field where you have laid your
ancestors look well thereupon, and you shall see yourselves and
your children dancing hand in hand.
Verily you often make merry without knowing.
Others have come to you to whom for golden promises made unto
your faith you have given but riches and power and glory.
Less than a promise have I given, and yet more generous have you
been to me.
You have given me deeper thirsting after life.
Surely there is no greater gift to a man than that which turns
all his aims into parching lips and all life into a fountain.
And in this lies my honor and my reward, -
That whenever I come to the fountain to drink I find the living
water itself thirsty;
And it drinks me while I drink it.
Some of you have deemed me proud and over-shy to receive
gifts.
To proud indeed am I to receive wages, but not gifts.
And though I have eaten berries among the hill when you would
have had me sit at your board,
And slept in the portico of the temple where you would gladly
have sheltered me,
Yet was it not your loving mindfulness of my days and my nights
that made food sweet to my mouth and girdled my sleep with
visions?
For this I bless you most:
You give much and know not that you give at all.
Verily the kindness that gazes upon itself in a mirror turns to
stone,
And a good deed that calls itself by tender names becomes the
parent to a curse.
And some of you have called me aloof, and drunk with my own
aloneness,
And you have said, “He holds council with the trees of the
forest, but not with men.
He sits alone on hill-tops and looks down upon our city.”
True it is that I have climbed the hills and walked in remote
places.
How could I have seen you save from a great height or a great
distance?
How can one be indeed near unless he be far?
And others among you called unto me, not in words, and they
said,
Stranger, stranger, lover of unreachable heights, why dwell you
among the summits where eagles build their nests?
Why seek you the unattainable?
What storms would you trap in your net,
And what vaporous birds do you hunt in the sky?
Come and be one of us.
Descend and appease your hunger with our bread and quench your
thirst with our wine.”
In the solitude of their souls they said these things;
But were their solitude deeper they would have known that I
sought but the secret of your joy and your pain,
And I hunted only your larger selves that walk the sky.
But the hunter was also the hunted:
For many of my arrows left my bow only to seek my own
breast.
And the flier was also the creeper;
For when my wings were spread in the sun their shadow upon the
earth was a turtle.
And I the believer was also the doubter;
For often have I put my finger in my own wound that I might have
the greater belief in you and the greater knowledge of you.
And it is with this belief and this knowledge that I say,
You are not enclosed within your bodies, nor confined to houses
or fields.
That which is you dwells above the mountain and roves with the
wind.
It is not a thing that crawls into the sun for warmth or digs
holes into darkness for safety,
But a thing free, a spirit that envelops the earth and moves in
the ether.
If this be vague words, then seek not to clear them.
Vague and nebulous is the beginning of all things, but not their
end,
And I fain would have you remember me as a beginning.
Life, and all that lives, is conceived in the mist and not in
the crystal.
And who knows but a crystal is mist in decay?
This would I have you remember in remembering me:
That which seems most feeble and bewildered in you is the
strongest and most determined.
Is it not your breath that has erected and hardened the
structure of your bones?
And is it not a dream which none of you remember having dreamt
that building your city and fashioned all there is in it?
Could you but see the tides of that breath you would cease to
see all else,
And if you could hear the whispering of the dream you would hear
no other sound.
But you do not see, nor do you hear, and it is well.
The veil that clouds your eyes shall be lifted by the hands that
wove it,
And the clay that fills your ears shall be pierced by those
fingers that kneaded it.
And you shall see
And you shall hear.
Yet you shall not deplore having known blindness, nor regret
having been deaf.
For in that day you shall know the hidden purposes in all
things,
And you shall bless darkness as you would bless light.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
After saying these things he looked about him, and he saw the
pilot of his ship standing by the helm and gazing now at the full
sails and now at the distance.
And he said:
Patient, over-patient, is the captain of my ship.
The wind blows, and restless are the sails;
Even the rudder begs direction;
Yet quietly my captain awaits my silence.
And these my mariners, who have heard the choir of the greater
sea, they too have heard me patiently.
Now they shall wait no longer.
I am ready.
The stream has reached the sea, and once more the great mother
holds her son against her breast.
Fare you well, people of Orphalese.
This day has ended.
It is closing upon us even as the water-lily upon its own
tomorrow.
What was given us here we shall keep,
And if it suffices not, then again must we come together and
together stretch our hands unto the giver.
Forget not that I shall come back to you.
A little while, and my longing shall gather dust and foam for
another body.
A little while, a moment of rest upon the wind, and another
woman shall bear me.
Farewell to you and the youth I have spent with you.
It was but yesterday we met in a dream.
You have sung to me in my aloneness, and I of your longings have
built a tower in the sky.
But now our sleep has fled and our dream is over, and it is no
longer dawn.
The noontide is upon us and our half waking has turned to fuller
day, and we must part.
If in the twilight of memory we should meet once more, we shall
speak again together and you shall sing to me a deeper song.
And if our hands should meet in another dream, we shall build
another tower in the sky.
So saying he made a signal to the seamen, and straightaway they
weighed anchor and cast the ship loose from its moorings, and they
moved eastward.
And a cry came from the people as from a single heart, and it
rose the dusk and was carried out over the sea like a great
trumpeting.
Only Almitra was silent, gazing after the ship until it had
vanished into the mist.
And when all the people were dispersed she still stood alone
upon the sea-wall, remembering in her heart his saying,
A little while, a moment of rest upon the wind, and another
woman shall bear me.”
船的归去
现在已是黄昏了。
于是那女预言者爱尔美差说：愿这一日，这地方，和你讲说的心灵都蒙福佑。
他回答说，说那话的是我么？我不也是一个听者么？
他走下殿阶，一切的人都跟着他，他上了船，站在舱面。
转面向着大众，他提高了声音说：
阿法利斯的民众呵，风命令我离开你们了。
我虽不像风那样地迅急，我也必须去了。
我们这些飘泊者，永远地寻求更寂寞的道路，我们不在安歇的时地起程，朝阳与落日也不在同一地方看见我们。
大地在睡眠中时，我们仍在行路。
我们是那坚牢植物的种子，在我们的心成熟丰满的时候，就交给大风纷纷吹散。
我在你们中间的日子是非常短促的，而我所说的话是更短了。
但等到我的声音在你们的耳中模糊，我的爱在你们的记忆中消灭的时候，我要重来。
我要以更丰满的心，更受灵感的嘴唇说话。
是的，我要随着潮水归来，虽然死要遮蔽我，更大的沉默要包围我，我却仍要寻求你们的了解。
而且我这寻求不是徒然的。
假如我所说的都是真理，这真理要在更清澈的声音中，更明白的言语里显示出来。
阿法利斯的民众呵，我将与风同去，却不是坠入虚空；
假如这一天不是你们的需要和我的爱的满足，那就让这个算是一个应许，直到践言的一天。
人的需要会变换，但他的爱是不变的，他的“爱必满足需要”的愿望，也是不变的。
所以你要知道，我将在更大的沉默中归来。
那在晓光中消散，只留下露水的田间的烟雾，要上升凝聚在云中，化雨下降。
我也不是不象这烟雾。
在夜的寂静中，我曾在你们的衔市上行走，我的心魂曾进入你们的院宅。
你们的心跳曾在我的心中，你们的呼吸曾在我的脸上，我都认识你们。
是的，我知道你们的喜乐与哀痛。在你们的睡眠中，你们的梦就是我的梦。
我在你们中间常像山间的湖水。
我照见了你们的高峰与危崖，以及你们思想和愿望的徘徊的云影。
你们的孩子的欢笑，和你们的青年的想望，都溪泉似地流到我的寂静之中。
当它流入我心之深处的时候，这溪泉仍是不停地歌唱。
但还有比欢笑还甜柔，比想望还伟大的东西流到我的心田。
那是你们身中的无穷性；
你们在这巨人里面，都不过是血脉与筋腱，
在他的吟诵中，你们的歌音只不过是无声的颤动。
只因为在这巨人里，你们才伟大。
我因为关心他，才关心你们，怜爱你们。
因为若不是在这阔大的空间里，爱能达到多远呢？
有什么幻像、什么期望、什么臆断能够无碍地高翔呢？
在你们本性中的巨人，如同一株缘满苹果花的大橡树。
他的神力把你缠系在地上，他的香气把你超升入高空，在他的永存之中，你永不死。
你们曾听说过，像一条锁链，你们是脆弱的链环中最脆弱的一环。
但这不完全是真的。你们也是坚牢的链环中最坚牢的一环。
用你最小的事功来衡量你，如同用柔弱的泡沫来核计大海的威权。
用你的失败来论断你，就是怨责四季之常变。
是呵，你们是像大海。
那重载的船舶，停在你的岸边待潮。你们虽像大海，也不能催促你的潮水。
你们也像四季。
虽然你们在冬天的时候，拒绝了春日。
你们的春日，和你们一同静息，它在睡中微笑，并不怨嗔。
不要想我说这话是要使你们彼此说：“他夸奖得好，他只看见我们的好处。”
我不过用言语说出你们意念中所知道的事情。
言语的知识不只是无言的知识的影子么？
你们的意念和我的言语，都是从封缄的记忆里来的波浪，这记忆是保存我们昨日的，大地还不认识我们也不认识他自己，正在混沌中受造的太古的白日和黑夜的记录。
哲人们曾来过，将他们的智慧给你们。我来却是领取你们的智慧：
要知道我找到了比智慧更伟大的东西。
那就是你们心里愈聚愈旺的火焰似的心灵。
你却不关心它的发展，只哀悼你岁月的凋残。
那是生命在宇宙的大生命中寻求扩大，而躯壳却在恐惧坟墓。
这里没有坟墓。
这些山岭和平原只是摇篮和垫脚石，
无论何时你从祖宗坟墓上走过，你若留意，你就会看见你们自己和子女们在那里携手跳舞。
真的，你们常在不知不觉中作乐。
别人曾来到这里，为了他们在你们信仰上的黄金般的应许，你们所付与的只是财富、权力与光荣。
我所给予的还不及应许，而你们待我却更慷慨。
你们将生命的更深的渴求给予了我。
真的，对那把一切目的变作枯唇，把一切生命变作泉水的人，没有比这个更大的礼物了。
这便是我的荣誉和报酬——
当我到泉边饮水的时候，我觉得那流水也在渴着；
我饮水的时候，水也饮我。
你们中有人责备我对于领受礼物上太狷傲、太羞怯了。
在领受劳金上我是太骄傲了，在领受礼物上却不如此。
虽然在你们请我赴席的时候，我却在山中采食浆果。
在你们款留我的时候，我却在庙宇的廊下睡眠。
但岂不是你们对我的日夜的关怀，使我的饮食有味，使我的魂梦甜美么？
为此我正要祝福你们：
“你们给予了许多，却不知道你们已经给与。
真的，慈悲自己看镜的时候，变成石像。
善行自诩嘉名的时候，变成了咒诅的根源。”
你们中有人说我高蹈，与我自己的‘孤独’对饮。
你们也说过：“他和山林谈论却不和人说话。
他独自坐在山巅，俯视我们的城市。”
我确会攀登高山，孤行远地。
但除了在更高更远之处，我怎能看见你们呢？
除了相远之外，人们怎能相近呢？
还有人在无言中对我呼唤，他们说：“异乡人，异乡人，‘至高’的爱慕者，为什么你住在那鹰鸟作巢的山峰上呢？
为什么你要追求那不能达到的事物呢？
在你的窝巢中，你要网罗甚样的风雨，
要捕取天空中哪一种虚幻的飞鸟呢？
加入我们罢。
你下来用我们的面包充饥，用我们的醇酒解渴罢。”
在他们灵魂的静默中，他们说了这些话；但是他们若再静默些，他们就知道我所要网罗的，只是你们的欢乐和哀痛的奥秘。
我所要捕取的，只是你们在天空中飞行的大我。
但是猎者也曾是猎品。
因为从我弓上射出的箭儿，有许多只是瞄向我自己的心胸的。
并且那飞翔者也曾是爬行者；
因为我的翅翼在日下展开的时候，在地上的影儿是一个龟鳖。
我是信仰者也曾是怀疑者；
因为我常常用手指抚触自己的伤痕，使我对你们有更大的信仰和认识。
凭着这信仰和认识，我说：
你们不是幽闭在躯壳之内，也不是禁锢在房舍与田野之中。
你们的真我是住在云间，与风同游。
你们不是在日中匍匐取暖，在黑暗里钻穴求安的一只动物，却是一件自由的物事，一个包涵大地在以太中运行的魂灵。
如果这是模棱的言语，就不必寻求把这些话弄明白。
模糊和混沌是万物的起始，却不是终结。
我愿意你们把我当作个起始。
生命，和一切有生，都隐藏在烟雾里，不在水晶中。
谁知道水晶就是凝固的云雾呢？
在忆念我的时候，我愿你们记着这个：
你们心中最软弱、最迷乱的，就是那最坚决、最刚强的。
不是你的呼吸使你的骨骼竖立坚强么？
不是一个你觉得从未做过的梦，建造了你的城市，形成了城中的一切么？
你如能看见你呼吸的潮汐，你就看不见别的一切。
你如能听见那梦想的微语，你就听不见别的声音。
你看不见，也听不见，这却是好的。
那蒙在你眼上的轻纱，也要被包扎这纱的手揭去；
那塞在你耳中的泥土，也要被那填塞这泥土的手指戳穿。
你将要看见。
你将要听见。
你也不为曾经聋聩而悲悔。
因为在那时候，你要知道万物的潜隐的目的，你要祝福黑暗，如同祝福光明一样。
他说完这些话，望着四周，他看见他船上的舵工凭舵而立，凝视着那胀满的风帆，又望着无际的天末。
他说：
耐心的，我的船主是太耐心的了。
大风吹着，帆篷也烦燥了；连船舵也急要起程；
我的船主却静候着我说完话。
我的水手们，听见了那更大的海的啸歌，他们也耐心地听着我。
现在他们不能再等待了。
我预备好了。
山泉已流入大海，那伟大的母亲又把他的儿子抱在胸前。
别了，阿法利斯的民众呵。
这一天完结了。
他在我们心上闭合，如同一朵莲花在她自己的明日上合闭。
在这里所付与我们的，我们要保藏起来。
如果这还不够，我们还必须重聚，齐向那给与者伸手。
不要忘了我还要回到你们这里来。
一会儿的工夫，我的愿望又要聚些泥土，形成另一个躯壳。
一会儿的工夫，在风中休息片刻，另一个妇人又要孕怀着我，
我向你们，和我曾在你们中度过的青春告别了。
不过是昨天，我们曾在梦中相见。
在我的孤寂中，你们曾对我歌唱。为了你们的渴慕，我曾在空中建立了一座高塔。
但现在我们的睡眠已经飞走，我们的梦想已经过去，也不是破晓的时候了。
中天的日影正照着我们，我们的半醒已变成了完满的白日，我们必须分手了。
如果在记忆的朦胧中，我们再要会见，我们再在一起谈论，你们也要对我唱更深沉的歌曲。
如果在另一个梦中，我们要再握手，我们要在空中再建一座高塔。
说着话，他向水手们挥手作势，他们立刻拔起锚儿，放开船儿，向东驶行。
从人民口里发出的同心的悲号，在尘沙中飞扬，在海面上奔越，如同号角的声响。
只有爱尔美差静默着，凝望着，直至那船渐渐消失在烟雾之中。
大众都星散了，她仍独自站在海岸上，在她的心中忆念着他所说的：
“一会儿的工夫，在风中休息片刻，另一个妇人又要孕怀着我。”
