經典勵志英文美文摘抄
你只有換着法子地激勵自己,直到它變成你血液的一部分。你只有不停跌倒,才能學會怎樣用自己的力量站在大地上。下面小編整理了勵志英文美文，希望大家喜歡!
You Have to Water the Plant你得澆灌理解之花
by Leland Stowe
利蘭•斯托
For the things I believe in, I must give a reporter’s answer. Like everyone else, it’s out of my own experience.
身爲記者，我必須從職業的角度來說說何謂信仰。跟其他人一樣，我也會從自身的經歷談起。
For twenty-four years I’ve been up to my neck in the world’s troubles; meeting people in dozens of foreign countries; watching other nations drift into war—and America too. It’s convinced me that one of the most important things in life, for every one of us, is understanding—trying to see the other fellow’s point of view. I’ve often thought: If I could really put myself in the other person’s shoes, see things the way he sees them, feel what he feels, how much more tolerant and fair I’d be.
24年來，我始終在與世界上的各種麻煩打着交道……接觸來自不同國家的人們……目睹其他國家(包括美國)陷入戰亂。這讓我堅信，對我們每個人而言，人生最重要的事情之一就是理解並努力去了解他人的想法。我常常想，如果我能夠真正站在別人的角度來看他們所看，感他們所感，那我將會是多麼的寬容公正。
I remember, back in the twenties, the bitter arguments between Europeans and Americans about reducing the war debts.
20年代，歐洲與美國之間關於縮減戰爭債務的那場激烈爭議，我記憶猶新。
I had to explain what the Europeans felt, and why. I learned then that there’s almost always some right, and some wrong, on both sides.
當時，我不得不爲歐洲方面的想法與原因予以解釋。我明白當時雙方都有對與錯，但我們都沒有站在對方的立場上考慮。
We didn’t think enough about ours. When lack of understanding becomes pronounced, it leads to hatred and war.
當理解的匱乏變得顯而易見時，就導致了仇恨與戰爭。而這一點在我們的日常生活中也能體現出來。
But it’s like that in our daily life, too. If I talk disparagingly about any racial group, I promote hatred—dissension in our society. I haven’t thought how I would feel if I belonged to that group.
如果我以輕蔑的口吻談論任何種族，就會增加我們社會上的仇恨與紛爭。如果我屬於那個種族，我會有怎樣的想法，這一點我卻不曾考慮過。
In Berlin I saw Hitler’s thugs beating up helpless Jews. Then, back home, sometimes I heard people say: “Well, it’s their affair.”
如果我以輕蔑的口吻談論任何種族，就會增加我們社會上的仇恨與紛爭。如果我屬於那個種族，我會有怎樣的想法，這一點我卻不曾考慮過。
They forgot that freedom and fair play belong to all human beings—not to lucky Americans only. They forgot that people are people—of whatever creed, color, or nationality.
他們忘記了自由與公平的行事的權利屬於全人類，而並非只屬於幸運的美國人。他們忘記了無論信仰、膚色和國籍有何不同，人都是人。
I remember the poor Spanish and Greek peasants who shared their bread and cheese with me—all they had; the old Russian woman who made me take her bed, while she slept on the floor. So many simple people who couldn’t speak my language but spoke with their hearts.
我記得，貧窮的西班牙和希臘農民曾讓我分享他們最後的麪包和奶酪;年老的俄羅斯婦人把她的牀讓給了我，自己卻睡在地板上。那麼，多純樸的人們，他們雖然與我在言語不通，但卻是在用心與我溝通。
One of the happiest things in my life is this: My best friends are like a roster of the United Nations—Europeans, Asians, Latin Americans, North Americans—just people, from all over the world.
正如聯合國的成員名單一樣，我也可以列出我最好的朋友們——他們來自歐洲、亞洲、拉丁美洲、北美洲，來自世界各地。
The best part is discovering how much we have in common; the constant reminder that friendship has no national barriers, the knowledge that all kinds of people really can understand each other.
我最大的發現就是我們擁有很多共同之處——這一點常常提醒我：友誼沒有國界，也讓我認識到不同國界的人們真的可以互相瞭解。
We all have to live in this world, but we are all a mixture of good and bad. But I’ve found more of the good than the bad in most people—in every country.
我們都必須在這個世界上生活，而我們每個人都有優點與缺點。但我發現，無論哪個國家的人們都是優點多於缺點的。
I think you only have to look— Understanding is a flower blossoming. But you have to water the plant.
我想，只要用心去看，你也會發現的。理解就像盛開的花朵，你必須去澆灌它。
Then, when it blossoms, what a wonderful feeling! You feel that way when you make a new friend. I guess understanding really is charity and love.
當它綻放時，那是一種多麼美妙的感覺啊。當你擁有新朋友時，你就會明白這種感覺了。
I know it gives a new meaning to our lives. When I die, I wish people might say: “He helped people to understand each other better.” Of course, I often fail. But just trying makes living seem worthwhile.
我認爲，理解其實就是仁慈與愛心，它能爲我們的生活帶來嶄新的意義。當我死去時，我希望人們可以說：“他曾爲人們的相互理解做出了努力。”當然，我也常常會失敗。但我的生活因這種努力似乎也充滿了價值。
勵志英文美文鑑賞Growing in the Middle Ground在探索中成長
Anne Phipps
安妮.菲普斯
I believe that my beliefs are changing. Nothing is positive. Perhaps I’m in a stage of metamorphosis, which will one day have me emerging complete, sure of everything. Perhaps, I shall spend my life searching.
我堅信，自己的信仰一直在改變。沒有什麼事情是絕對的。或許，我還只是處在幼體的發育階段，總有一天我會發育完全，就會對一切深信不疑;或許，我將用一生的時間去探索。
Until this winter, I believed in outward things, in beauty as I found it in nature and art. Beauty past—swift and sure—from the outside to the inside, bringing intense emotion. I felt a formless faith when I rode through summerwoods, when I heard the counterpoint of breaking waves, when I held a flower in my hand.
在這個冬天以前，我信仰外界的事物，信仰在自然與藝術中所發現的美。美麗總會稍縱即逝，從外到內，給人留下無盡的感傷。當我騎馬穿過夏日的樹林，當我聆聽着浪花翻滾的韻律，當我手中握着一朵鮮花時，我感覺到一種無形的信念。
There was the same inspiration from art, here and there in flashes; in seeing for the first time the delicacy of a green jade vase, or the rich beauty of a rug; in hearing a passage of music played almost perfectly; in watching Markov dance Giselle; most of all, in reading.
同樣的靈感也來源於藝術——它無處不在，轉瞬即逝。當我初次看到一隻精妙的白玉花瓶時，或者看到一塊華麗的地毯，聽到一段演奏得近乎完美的音樂，看到馬爾科娃在《吉賽爾》中優美的舞姿時，都會有這種靈感。然而，最多的靈感卻是來自於閱讀。
Other people’s creations, their sensitivity to emotion, color, sound, their feeling for form, instructed me. The necessity for beauty, I found to be the highest good, the human soul’s greatest gift. But there were moments when I wasn’t sure. There was an emptiness inside, which beauty could not fill.
他人的思想，對情感、顏色、聲音的敏銳，以及對形式的感知，都會給我帶來啓迪。我發現，對美的需求是人類最崇高的善舉，是人類靈魂最偉大的天賦。但是，我想它並非一切。今年冬天，我開始了大學生活。我所面臨的問題也有所改變。很多事實與那些“誰拉着誰徘徊在哪個牆邊?”的問題已變得毫無意義。相反，一些永恆的問題出現在我的面前，比如，何爲美?何爲真?
This winter, I came to college. The questions put to me changed. Lists of facts—and who dragged whom how many times around the walls of what—lost importance. Instead, I was asked eternal question: what is beauty, what is truth, what is God? I talked about faith with other students. I read St. Augustine and Tolstoy. I wondered if I hadn’t been worshipping around the edges. Nature and art were the edges, and inner faith was the center. I discovered—really discovered—that I had a soul.
何爲上帝?我與其他學生探討信仰的問題，我閱讀聖奧古斯丁與亞里士多德的著作。我想知道，自己是否一直徘徊在信仰的邊緣。自然與藝術皆爲邊緣，心中的信仰纔是核心所在。我真實地發現，自己擁有一個靈魂。
Just sitting in the sun one day, I realized the shattering meaning of St. Augustine’s statement that, “The sun and the moon, all the wonders of nature, are not God’s first works but second to spiritual works.”I had, up till then, perceived spiritual beauty only through the outward. It had come into me. Now I am groping towards an inner, spiritual consciousness that will be able to go out from me. I am lost in the middle ground. I’m learning.
一天，當我坐在陽光下時，我猛然明白了聖尼古斯丁的話的涵義：太陽與月亮，所有自然界的奇蹟，皆非上帝的“初作”，而是精神上的二次創造。直到那一刻，通過外部的事物，我才認識到精神上的美，那種美已經走進我的心中。如今，我正在通往內在精神意識的道路上摸索前行，希望有一天能夠將它們從我的內心喚醒。我迷失在探索之中，我在學習。
勵志英文美文賞析I Live Four Lives at a Time我的四種生活
by Alice Thompson
艾麗斯·湯普森
I live a life of four dimensions—a wife, a mother, a worker, an individual in society. Diversified roles, yes; but they are well knit by two major forces: an attempt to discover, understand, and accept other human beings; and a belief in my responsibility toward others. The first began in my childhood when my father and I acted out Shakespeare.
我在生活中有着四重身份——既爲人妻，又爲人母;既有自己的事業，又是社會的一分子。是的，角色不同，但配合得很好，因爲它們都受兩種主要力量的支配：一是努力觀察、理解和接受他人，二是對他人盡職盡責。第一種努力早在孩童時代我和父親一起“出演”莎劇時就開始了。
He refused to let me merely parrot Hamlet’s brooding soliloquy, Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking scene, or Cardinal Woolsey’s self-analysis. He made a fascinating game of helping me understand the motivations behind the poetic words.
無論是哈姆雷特深沉的獨白、麥克白夫人的夢囈，還是伍思裏主教的自我剖析，父親都不讓我機械地背誦，而是通過有趣的遊戲幫我揣摩詩句中隱含的角色內心活動。
In college, a professor further sparked this passionate curiosity about the essence of others and, by his example, transmuted it into a deep concern, a sense of responsibility that sprang not from stern Calvinistic principles, but from an awareness of all I received—and must repay with gladness.
在大學時代，一位教授的言傳身教進一步引發了我理解他人本質的熱忱與好奇，從他身上，我學到了如何將這種熱忱與好奇轉化爲對他人深切的關愛、對他人應負的責任。這種責任心絕非源自卡爾文教派嚴格的教義，而是源自對我所獲得一切的欣然回報。
I believe this acceptance, this tenderness one has for others, is impossible without an acceptance of self. Just when or where I learned that the full quota of human weakness and strength was the common property of each of us, I don’t know. But somewhere in my late twenties, I grew able to admit my own drives—and, rid of the anguished necessity of re-costuming them, I was free to face them, and recognize that they were neither unique nor uncontrollable.
我相信人若不能接受自己，便不可能接受和善待他人。不知從何時何地開始，我意識到每個人都有優點和缺點。在我快滿三十歲的時候，我學會了承認內心的衝動，而非痛苦地將其掩飾，我泰然自若地應付它們，因爲它們乃人之共性，只需善於駕馭。
The rich and happy life I lead every day brings new witness to the validity of my own philosophy, for me. Certainly it works in marriage. Any real marriage is a constant understanding and acceptance, coupled with mutual responsibility for one another’s happiness. Each day I go out strengthened by the knowledge that I am loved and love.
我想我的人生哲學是正確的——我度過的充實而快樂的每一天便是明證。我的人生哲學也適用於婚姻生活，因爲真正幸福的婚姻都建立在夫妻之間彼此不斷理解和相互接受的基礎之上，雙方應盡職盡責，讓對方幸福。每天我外出工作，知道我的愛得到了回報，便渾身有了力量。
In the mother-child relationship, those same two forces apply. Words are useless to describe my efforts to know my own children. But my great debt to them for their understanding of me is one I have often failed to repay. How can I overvalue a youngster with the thoughtfulness, the imagination to always phone when a late arrival might cause worry? To always know how to reassure. How can I repay the one who dashed into adulthood far too young but has carried all of its burden with a firm, joyous spirit?
這兩種力量在母子關係之間也發揮了效用。我爲了解孩子們所做出的努力遠非文字所能形容，而孩子們對我的理解更讓我無以爲報。是怎樣的想象力、心靈相通和體貼，讓一個孩子在母親遲遲未歸時總是打電話確認她的行蹤與安危?他用稚嫩的雙肩快樂而堅定地擔起成人的責任，我要怎樣做才能報答這位早熟懂事的孩子?!
My job itself is a reaffirmation of that by which I live. Very early in my working life, I was a small cog in a big firm. Emerging from a tiny job, I found a strange frightening world. Superficially, everyone was friendly. But beneath the surface were raging suspicion, distrust; the hand ever ready to ward off—or deliver—the knife in the back. For years I thought I was in a world of monstrous people. Then I began to know the company’s president.
我的人生信條在工作中也得到了印證。從業之初，我只是一家大公司的無名小卒。我從低微的職位慢慢晉升，發現公司是個十分古怪而可怕的世界。每個人表面上和和氣氣，暗中卻相互猜忌，人人自危，既怕自己背後射來暗箭，又想伺機捅人一刀。幾年下來，我覺得公司裏每個人都是魔鬼，後來才發現這一切都是總裁一手造成的。
What he had been I have no way of knowing. But at seventy, he was suspicious, distrusting, sure that no one was telling him the truth. He had developed a technique of pitting all of us against each other. Able to see the distortion he caused, I youthfully declared that if I every ran a business, it would be on the reverse principle.
他從前爲人如何我無從得知，但年已七旬的他滿腹狐疑，不相信任何人，覺得所有人都在欺騙他，便運用手段挑起員工之間的爭鬥。明白了他何以能使人心扭曲，年輕的我暗下決心，他年我若自行創業，一定運用完全相反的原則。
For the last two years, I have had that opportunity, and had the joy of watching people—widely different people, too—learn to understand each other, accept each other, feel mutually responsible.
兩年前我終於有機會自立門戶，有了觀察人的工作。我看到各種不同的人如何學會相互理解和接受，對彼此盡責。
My trials and errors have really synthesized into one great belief, which is that I am not alone in my desire to reach my fellow man. I believe the human race is inherently cooperative and concerned about its brother.
我的嘗試和成敗得失熔鑄成一個堅定的信念——絕非僅我一人試圖理解與尊重他人。我相信合作與相互關愛正是人類的本性。
