晨讀英語美文：人在旅途
We Are on a Journey人在旅途
By Henry Van Dyke
Wherever you are, and whoever you maybe, there is one thing in which you and I are just alike at this moment, and in all the moments of our existence. We are not at rest; we are on a journey, our life is a movement, a tendency, a steady, ceaseless progress towards an unseen goal. We are gaining something, or losing something, everyday. Even when our position and our character seem to remain precisely the same, they are changing. For the mere advance of time is a change. It is not the same thing to have a bare field in January and in July, the season makes the difference. The limitations that are childlike in the child are childish in the man.
Everything that we do is a step in one direction or another, even the failure to do something is in itself a deed. It sets us forward or backward. The action of the negative pole of a magnetic needle is just as real as the action of the positive pole. To decline is to accept – the other alternative.
Are you nearer to your port today than you were yesterday? Yes, -- you must be a little nearer to some port or other; for since your ship was first lunched upon the sea of life, you have never been still for a single moment; the sea is too deep, you could not find an anchorage if you would. There can be no pause until you come into port.
無論你在何處，無論你是何人，此刻，而且在我們生命的每時每刻，你與我有一點是類似的。我們不是在休息，我們在旅途中。生命是一種運動，一種趨勢，一個穩步、持續的通往一個未知目標的過程。每天，我們都在獲得，或失去。儘管我們的地位和性格看起來好像一點都沒變，但是它們在變化。因爲時光的流逝本身是一種變化。在一月和七月擁有一片貧瘠的土地是不同的，是季節本身帶來了變化。孩童時可愛的缺點到了成人時便成了幼稚。
我們做的每件事都是邁向一個或另外一個方向，甚至“什麼都沒做”本身也是一種行爲，它讓我們前進或倒退。一棵磁針的陰極的作用與陽極是一樣的。拒絕即接受??接受反面。
你今天比昨天更加接近你的目標了嗎?是的，你肯定是離一個或另一個碼頭或更近一些了。因爲自從你的小船從生命的海洋上啓航時，你沒有哪一刻是停止的。大海是這樣深，你想拋錨時找不到地方。在你駛入碼頭之前，你不可能停留。
