不要担心时光飞逝 I Dread the End of the Year

佚名/Anonymous

“I dread to come to the end of the year,”said a friend to me recently,“it makes me realize I am growing old.”

A great psychologist said that most men are“old fogies at twenty-five”.

He was right. Most men at twenty-five are satisfied with their jobs. They have accumulated the little stock of prejudices that they call their“principles”and closed their minds to all new ideas；they have ceased to grow.

The minute a man ceases to grow, no matter what his years, that minute he begins to be old.

On the other hand, the really great man never grows old.

Goethe passed out at eighty-three, and finished his“Faust”only a few years earlier. Gladstone took up a new language when he was seventy.

Laplace, the astronomer, was still at work when death catch up with him at seventy-eight. He died crying,“What we know is nothing. what we do not know is immense.”

And there you have the real answer to the question,“When is a man old?”

Laplace at seventy-eight died young. He was still unsatisfied, still sure that he had a lot to learn.

“我很担心，一年又将逝去了，”最近，一个朋友这样对我说，“这让我觉得自己又老了一岁。”

曾有一位著名的心理学家说过，很多人“在25岁时就已衰老”。

他说对了，很多人在25岁时就对自己的工作感到满足。他们积累了一些成见，并把它们当成自己的所谓“原则”；他们思想守旧，拒绝新的观点；他们已经停止了成长。

当一个人停止成长的时候——无论他的年龄如何——他就已经开始衰老。

从另一方面来说，真正伟大的人是永不衰老的。

歌德是在83岁逝世的。他在逝世的前几年，完成了巨著《浮士德》。英国政治家格拉德斯通在70岁那年，还在学习一门新语言。

天文学家拉普拉斯一直坚持工作到78岁。死神来临时，在弥留的刹那间，他还喊道：“我们知道的何其少，而不知道的又何其多！”

从上面的几个例子中，你可以得出“人的衰老是在什么时候”的真正答案了。

当拉普拉斯78岁去世时，他仍然是年轻的，因为他仍然没有满足于现状，仍然觉得自己还有许多东西要学。

心灵小语

每一秒中世界上有多少人出生，又有多少人死亡？这一秒，你又是如何度过的？我们是否应该检讨一下自己对待时间的态度？生命无限短，也无限长。

psychologist n.心理学家

例 He fancies himself a bit of a psychologist.

他自以为有一点儿心理学家的天分。

accumulate v.累积；积聚；积攒

例 They set to work accumulating a huge mass of data.

他们开始积累大量的材料。

principle n.原则；原理；主义；信条

例 I take this seriously, it’s a matter of principle.

我对此很认真，这是原则问题。

astronomer n.天文学家

例 He is the best one of those astronomers.

他是最好的天文学家之一。

他们积累了一些成见，并把它们当成自己的所谓“原则”；他们思想守旧，拒绝新的观点；他们已经停止了成长。

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从另一方面来说，真正伟大的人是永不衰老的。

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我们知道的何其少，而不知道的又何其多！

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On the other hand, the really great man never grows old.

on the other hand：另一方面

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……catch up with him at seventy-eight.

catch up with：赶上；追上

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