短文翻译练习

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On the Feeling of Immortality in Youth
William Hazlitt
Life is a pure flame, and we live by and invisible sun within us.

         Sir Thomas Browne



No young man believes he shall ever die. It was a saying of my brother's, and a fine one. There is a feeling of Eternity in youth, which makes us amend for everything. To be young is to be as one of the Immortal Gods. One half of time indeed is flown——the other half remains in store for us with all its countless treasures; for there is no line drawn, and we see no limit to our hopes and wishes. We make the coming age our own. ——

The vast, the unbounded prospect lies before us.

Death, old age, are words without a meaning, that pass by us like the idle air which we regard not. Others may have undergone, or may still be liable to them—— we “bear a charmed life,” which laughs to scorn all such sickly fancies. As in setting out on a delightful journey, we strain our eager gaze forward——

Bidding the lovely scenes at distance hail,

——and see no end to the landscape, new objects presenting themselves as we advance; so, in the commencement of life, we set no bounds to our inclinations, nor to the unrestricted opportunities of gratifying them. We have as yet found no obstacle, no disposition to flag; and it seems that we can go on so forever. We look round in a new world, full of life, and motion, and ceaseless progress; and feel in ourselves all the vigour and spirit to keep pace with it, and do not foresee from any present symptoms how we shall be left behind in the natural course of things, decline into old age, and drop into the grave. It is the simplicity, and as it were abstractedness of our feelings in youth, that (so to speak) identifies us with nature, and (our experience being slight and our passions strong) deludes us into a belief of being immortal like it. Our short-lived connexion with existence we fondly flatter ourselves, is and indissoluble and lasting union——a honeymoon that knows neither coldness, jar, nor separation. As infants smile and sleep, we are rocked in the cradle of our wayward fancies, and lulled into security by the roar of the universe around us——we quaff the cup of life with eager haste without draining it, instead of which it only overflows the more——objects press around us, filling the mind with their magnitude and with the throng of desires that wait upon them, so that we have no room for the thoughts of death……



媪劝餐已，婢来敛具。媪曰：“唤宁姑来。”婢应去，闻户外隐有笑声。媪又唤曰：“婴宁，汝姨兄在此。”户外嗤嗤笑不已。婢推之以入，犹掩其口，笑不可遏。媪嗔目曰：“有客在，咤咤叱叱，是何景象？”女忍笑而言，生揖之。媪曰：“此王郎，汝姨子。一家尚不相识，可笑人也？”生问：“妹今年几何矣？”媪未能解。生又言之。女复笑不可仰视。媪谓生曰：“小于甥一岁。”曰：“阿甥已十七矣，得非庚午属马者耶？”生首应之。又问：“甥妇阿谁？”答云：“无之。”曰：“如甥才貌，何十七犹款聘？婴宁变无姑家，极相匹故，惜有内亲之嫌。”生无语，目注婴宁，不遑他瞬。婢向女小语云：“目灼灼，贼腔未改！”女又大笑，顾婢曰：“视碧桃开未？”遽起，以袖掩口，细碎连步而出。至门外，笑声始纵。