名人励志英语演讲 第159期:奏出生命中最美的乐曲(6)

 　　Well to me betraying the age means exposing its conceits¹, its foibles; its phony moral certitudes. It means telling the secrets of the age and facing harsher truths. Every age has its massive moral blind spots. We might not see them, but our children will. Slavery was one of them and the people who best served that age were the ones who called it as it was--which was ungodly and inhuman². Ben Franklin called it when he became president of the Pennsylvania Abolition³ Society.

　　对我来说，背叛时代意味着揭露它的自负、缺点和伪善的道德信条；它意味着揭露时代的秘密，直面更为残酷的事实。每个时代都有许多道德盲点。我们也许看不到，但我们的下一代却能看到。奴隶制就是一个盲点，只有为那个时代做出伟大贡献的人们才会如此称呼它，因为他们了解这种制度的荒唐和野蛮。本·富兰克林成为宾夕法尼亚废除奴隶制委员会主席时就称其为奴隶制。

　　Segregation⁴. There was another one. America sees this now but it took a civil rights movement to betray their age. And 50 years ago the U.S. Supreme⁵ Court betrayed the age. May 17, 1954, it says here, Brown vs. Board of Education came down and put the lie to the idea that separate can ever really be equal. Amen to that.

　　种族隔离，这是另一个盲点。现在美国已经意识到了这一点，但却是从全国的民权运动开始背叛那个时代的。50年前，美国最高法院背叛了时代。1954年5月17日，布朗诉求教育委员会案胜诉，揭穿了“隔离但平等”这一谎言。阿门。

　　Fast forward 50 years.--May 17, 2004. What are the ideas right now worth betraying? What are the lies we tell ourselves now? What are the blind spots of our age? What's worth spending your post-Penn lives trying to do or undo⁶? It might be something simple. It might be something as simple as our deep down refusal to believe that every human life has equal worth. Could that be it? Could that be it? Each of you will probably have your own answer, but for me that is it. And for me the proving ground has been Africa.

　　50年很快就过去了。今天——2004年5月17日，我们要背叛哪些思想呢？我们对自己说了什么谎呢？我们这个时代的盲点是什么？离开宾夕法尼亚大学后，什么值得去做什么不值得去做？答案也许非常简单，就像我们在内心深处拒绝相信每一个生命都有相同的价值一样简单。是我说的那样吗？是那样吗？你们每个人也许都将会有自己的答案，但对我来说确实是这样的。非洲就是最好的证明。

1 conceits   

高傲( conceit的名词复数 )； 自以为； 巧妙的词语； 别出心裁的比喻

参考例句：

• He jotted down the conceits of his idle hours. 他记下了闲暇时想到的一些看法。
• The most grotesque fantastic conceits haunted him in his bed at night. 夜晚躺在床上的时候，各种离奇怪诞的幻想纷至沓来。

2 inhuman   

adj.残忍的，不人道的，无人性的

参考例句：

• We must unite the workers in fighting against inhuman conditions.我们必须使工人们团结起来反对那些难以忍受的工作条件。
• It was inhuman to refuse him permission to see his wife.不容许他去看自己的妻子是太不近人情了。

3 abolition   

n.废除，取消

参考例句：

• They declared for the abolition of slavery.他们声明赞成废除奴隶制度。
• The abolition of the monarchy was part of their price.废除君主制是他们的其中一部分条件。

4 segregation   

n.隔离，种族隔离

参考例句：

• Many school boards found segregation a hot potato in the early 1960s.在60年代初，许多学校部门都觉得按水平分班是一个棘手的问题。
• They were tired to death of segregation and of being kicked around.他们十分厌恶种族隔离和总是被人踢来踢去。

5 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

6 undo   

vt.解开，松开；取消，撤销

参考例句：

• His pride will undo him some day.他的傲慢总有一天会毁了他。
• I managed secretly to undo a corner of the parcel.我悄悄地设法解开了包裹的一角。