The Deadliest of the Sins 翻译.doc

The deadliest of the sins 七罪惰为首 What shall we talk about, you and I, who are getting our first degrees from Queens University today? The problem is a little easier than is usually the case, because we are both going into new jobs. I have been an author for many years, and I intend to go on being one. But being an author isnt a job -it is a state of mind; also, it is not a gainful occupation except in a rather restricted sense. I have been earning my living as journalist for twenty years, and now I am giving up that sort of work to take a different sort of job in a university. I shall be very green at it, and I expect I shall do a lot of things the wrong way. Perhaps I shall be a failure, but I have failed at several things already, and somehow I have lived through it. Failure at a specific task is always disagreeable and sometimes it is humiliating. But there is only one kind of failure that really breaks the spirit, and that is failure in the art of life itself. That is the failure that one does well to fear. 今天是你我从女王大学获得人生中第一个学位的日子，我们该谈些什么呢？既然我们都将开始新的工作，那么问题就简单多了。我成为一个作家已经有些年头了，我也想接着干下去。但是成为一名作家，可以说并不是一件工作，而更像是一种心态。当然，除了少部分人，当作家也不能挣很多钱。二十年来，我作为一名记者谋生，现在我辞职不干了，并在大学里找到了一份与以往不同的新工作。我全无经验，也料到难免会错误百出，也许我会失败。当然之前在一些事情上我也失败过，但谢天谢地我都挺过来了。工作上的失败固然总是让人不快和蒙羞，但是令人心灰意冷的失败却只有一种，那就是生活态度上的“失败”。它才是我们真正应该畏惧的失败。 What is it like, this failure in the art of life? It is the failure which manifests itself in a loss of interest in really important things. It does not come suddenly, there is nothing dramatic about it, and thus it works with a dreadful advantage; it creeps upon us, and once it has us in its grip, it is hard for us to recognize what ails us . 这种所谓的生活态度上的“失败”是什么呢？当一个人对自己生命中真正重要的那些事物丧失兴趣时，我们就能在这个人的身上看到那种“失败”。它一点也不引人注目，从不突然而至，这也成了它发生作用的有利条件。它如一道阴影笼罩在人们的身后，渐渐遮住人们生命中的光亮，而那些被它完全俘获的人们自己却很难发现是什么东西在折磨着他们。 It is not for nothing that this failure was reckoned by medieval theologians as one of the Seven Deadly Sins. I suppose you know what they were. Wrath, Gluttony, Envy, Avarice, and