中小学英语诵读名篇18 The Essays of Montaigne 蒙田随笔（节选）

I have a special vocabulary of my own; I “pass away time,”when it is ill and uneasy, but when ‘tis good I do not pass it away: “I taste it over again and adhere to it”; one must run over the ill and settle upon the good. This ordinary phrase of pastime, and passing away the time, represents the usage of those wise sort of people who think they cannot do better with their lives than to let them run out and slide away, pass them over, and baulk them, and, as much as they can, ignore them and shun them as a thing of troublesome and contemptible quality: but I know it to be another kind of thing, and find it both valuable and commodious, even in its latest decay, wherein I now enjoy it; and nature has delivered it into our hands in such and so favourable circumstances that we have only ourselves to blame if it be troublesome to us, or escapes us unprofitably:

“Stulti vita ingrata est, trepida est, tota in futurum fertur.” [1]

Nevertheless I compose myself to lose mine without regret; but withal as a thing that is perishable by its condition, not that it molests or annoys me. Nor does it properly well become any not to be displeased when they die, excepting such as are pleased to live. There is good husbandry in enjoying it: I enjoy it double to what others do; for the measure of its fruition depends upon our more or less application to it. Chiefly that I perceive mine to be so short in time, I desire to extend it in weight; I will stop the promptitude of its flight by the promptitude of my grasp; and by the vigour of using it compensate the speed of its running away. In proportion as the possession of life is more short , I must make it so much deeper and fuller.

﹝法﹞米歇尔·蒙田（Michel de Montaigne）

[1] “The life of a fool is thankless, timorous, and wholly bent upon the future.” —Seneca, Ep:, 15.