One John Rawn is to be the hero of this pleasing tale; no ordinary hero, as you might learn did you make inquiry1 of himself. His history must be set down in full, from beginning to culmination2, from delicate flowering to opulent fruitage, from early obscurity to later fame. Such would be his wish; and the wishes of John Rawn long have been commands.
For the most part the early history of any hero is of small consequence. We are chiefly concerned that he shall be tall and shapely, mighty3 in war and love, and continuously engaged therein from the first moment of his entrance on our scene. Granted these essentials, we customarily pass carelessly over any hero's youth, even as lightly, perchance, over his ancestry5. Not so in the case of John Rawn. He himself would say, if asked, that no hero of so exceptional a merit as his own could be thus lightly produced; that indeed not even the three generations accorded to the making of a gentleman could be called sufficient for the evolution of a personage of mold such as his. Let us yield to a will so imperious, a wish so germane6 to our own amiable7 intent. Mr. Rawn shall have all the generations that he likes.
II
John Rawn might, in the caretaking plans of the immortal8 gods, have been born at any time in the world's history, at any place upon the world's surface. He himself, had he been consulted, might have suggested Rome, Greece, or medi?val England, as offering better field for one of his kidney. He might have indicated certain resemblances between himself and persons who, through virtue9 given of the immortal gods, have attained10 the purple, who have held permanent and admitted ascendancy11 over their fellow-men. As a matter of fact, however, John Rawn was born in Texas—and of Texas at the very spot where, had it been left to his own candid12 opinion, no John Rawn, no especial hero, ought ever to have been born. The village he honored by his birth—one of seven which now contend over that claim to fame—was the very home of democratic equality; and how could the home of democratic equality be called typical environment for the production of a man believing in the divine right of a very few?
Neither, had John Rawn been consulted in the matter, would he have indorsed the plans of fate in respect to his ancestry any more than he did the workings of the misguided stars in regard to his environment. By right he should have been the offspring of parents for long generations accustomed to rule, to command, to sway the destinies of others. Yet far from this was the truth in our hero's case.
Which of us can tell what is in an infant's mind? At what day or hour of a child's life does the consciousness of human values in affairs first impinge upon the embryonic13 mentality14? At what date, first feeling itself human and not plant, not oyster15 nor amoeba, can it logically begin that reproach of its own parentage which to so many of us is held as a personal right, convenient and pleasant because it explains away so many things by way of human failures? At what time, at what moment of John Rawn's life did he, lying in his cradle, and looking up for the first conscious time into the faces solicitously16 bending above him, realize that after all, in spite of all the plans of the watchful17 fates, here were no king and queen, no emperor and empress assigned to him as parents, but only an humble18 Methodist preacher and his still more humble wife?
Truly here was hard handicap even at the start, that of both birth and environment, as he himself would have been first to admit. Not that it could daunt19 him, not that it could cause a soul like his to feel the pangs20 of despair. No; it meant only that much further to travel, that much higher to climb. This American republic was expressly framed for such as Mr. Rawn. The issue never was to be called in doubt. From that first hour of consciousness of his ego21 which marks the real birth of a human soul, John Rawn must have said to himself that success was meant for him; that not all the hostile array of circumstances, birth, heredity and environment, could do more than temporarily balk22 his aim. From the cradle, indeed for generations uncounted—as many as he likes—before the cradle, John Rawn believed in himself. How can we fail to join him in that belief?
III
It was rarely that ever a smile enlivened the somewhat heavy features of young John Rawn, even in the earliest stages of his babyhood. Rarely did the mirth of any situation bring up in his face an answering dawn of appreciation23. He was a serious child, as all admitted even from the first. He grew to be a grave boy, a solemn youth. He made no jests, nor smiled at those of others. There was a corrugation between his brows before he was twenty years of age. In his declamations at the exercises of the village school, his hand went instinctively24 into a bosom25 not yet ten years of age; his forelock fell across his brow before he was twelve; already his gestures were large and wide, his voice prematurely26 deep before he had reached fourteen. He was of that temperament27 which, in accordance with the term, takes itself seriously. It is astonishing what virtue lies in that habit. The world, sometimes for many years, indeed sometimes permanently28, accepts seriously those who seriously accept themselves. Many of the most colossal29 asses30 ever born have not "Ass4" written on their tombstones, where righteously it so very frequently belongs in the history of the great.
IV
Curious persons might have found certain explanations for these traits in the calling, the temper and training of the father of John Rawn. In that time and place, a minister of the gospel was a man of whom all stood in awe31. He was not much gainsaid32, not much withstood, not much disapproved33. His conclusions were announced for acceptance, not for argument. At best he was only to be avoided, if one dreaded34 the look of the clerical eye, the denunciation of the clerical tongue. Other men might be met, might be antagonized, might be overcome by fist or thumb or firearms, per example; not so the parson of the village church.
It is an excellent profession; that of minister of the gospel. The ranks of none offer better men than the best types of that profession, large men, strong men, just men, not doing preaching for a business, but really wishing to counsel and aid frail35 humanity as it marches among the perpetual pitfalls36, the perpetual hardships of human life. It is an exceedingly good religion of itself, that merely of helping37 your fellow-man, of saying something to soften38 and better him, of giving to him something of hope and courage when he is in need of them. Let us not argue whether or not a divine spirit can become mortal, whether or not Christ was divine. We know by virtue of abundant human testimony39 that He was a great and kindly40 Man, a great and adorable Human Being, the greatest of whom we know in all our human history. And that man who makes the creed41 of the greatest of us all his own, who lives kindly and helpfully and modestly, with no blare of trumpet43, doing simply and silently that which his human hands find to do; that man nearest to the greatest Man of whom we know, the one who went closest to making human life endurable, who took humanity farthest away from the cruel creed of the jungle—that minister of the gospel, let us say then, who lives as is possible for one of his calling to live, and attains44 in that calling what may be attained, may be, and not infrequently is, a splendid human being.
But he is worth our admiration45 when he is worth it; not necessarily otherwise. A minister of the gospel may not always be the central figure of that religious fervor46 which has come sporadically47 and spasmodically to men under many creeds48, since man began to think aloud, to doubt and despair in public, and to pray in company. Besides, there are ministers and ministers. Some are men naturally large and are so accepted. Others, alas49! bulk larger than really they are, by virtue of the fact that always they apparently50 have prevailed; whereas, in truth, they only have met small opposition51.
'Tis a sweet fashion of life which allows us always to have our own way! Nor is it to be denied that when the preacher stands before the flock, his disordered hair falling above his brow, his eyes flashing, his breath sobbing52 in his emotion; when he hurls53 out questions to which he knows there will be no answer; when he makes one assertion after another to which he knows there is to be no contradiction; when he rules, sways, expounds54, glorifies55, waxing greater in stature56 out of the very situation in which he stands—let us not deny that he is then in the way—the simple and forgivably human way—of coming more and more into the belief that he himself is as great as the doctrines57 which he expounds. There are martyrs58 in history because of human convictions which led them to contradict the church. There are other and far more numerous martyrs, made such because they dared not contradict it.
Given, then, a man of rawboned frame, of virile59 physical health, and of pronouncedly good opinion of himself, this is perhaps the very profession of all others which would be most apt to build up that man in his own eyes into a personage of considerable stature. Such a man might easily regard himself as set apart from his fellow human beings—a feeling which Christ Himself never had, nor any great man in or out of history before Him or after Him. It is understandable that such a man, of such a profession, might be the very one to find his philosophy feeding upon itself; with the net result of an inordinate60, ingrown egotism. And this ingrown egotism in himself might, in the case of his son, become an egotism congenital. There are ministers of the gospel, and other ministers of the gospel. John Rawn, Senior, was of this particular and less desirable sort. We mention him, having promised our hero all the analysis and all the generations he may desire; and being, moreover, commendably61 anxious fully42 to account for him and his many noteworthy peculiarities62.
V
Had John Rawn, our hero, been able in his childhood to figure out that, after all, God and the undying stars had no special grudge63 against him in assigning his birth to a humble inland village; had he been able to picture to himself his real value as a human unit; had he been able to understand his own explanation,—that is to say this explanation of him which we so patiently have given—had he been able to qualify his own mind as that of a congenital egotist, and hence to see himself naturally come by certain phases of his character—he might have smiled and have been different. He might one day have extended his hand to his fellow-man understandingly, might have gone through life much as other men indeed, dying simply and without much outcry about it, as most of us do, and living with small disturbance64 of the world's equilibrium65, as most of us also do. But in that deplorable case there would have been no John Rawn as we know him, and no story about him worth the telling. Let us, therefore, beg to disagree even with him, and not hold it as entire misfortune that he was born in an unstoried spot, and of parents one of whom, by reason of his natural character and of his calling, was wont66 to consider himself the partner, and not necessarily the junior partner, of a Divine Providence67.
点击收听单词发音
1 inquiry | |
n.打听,询问,调查,查问 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
2 culmination | |
n.顶点;最高潮 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
3 mighty | |
adj.强有力的;巨大的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
4 ass | |
n.驴;傻瓜,蠢笨的人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
5 ancestry | |
n.祖先,家世 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
6 germane | |
adj.关系密切的,恰当的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
7 amiable | |
adj.和蔼可亲的,友善的,亲切的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
8 immortal | |
adj.不朽的;永生的,不死的;神的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
9 virtue | |
n.德行,美德;贞操;优点;功效,效力 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
10 attained | |
(通常经过努力)实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 ); 达到; 获得; 达到(某年龄、水平、状况) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
11 ascendancy | |
n.统治权,支配力量 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
12 candid | |
adj.公正的,正直的;坦率的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
13 embryonic | |
adj.胚胎的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
14 mentality | |
n.心理,思想,脑力 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
15 oyster | |
n.牡蛎;沉默寡言的人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
16 solicitously | |
adv.热心地,热切地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
17 watchful | |
adj.注意的,警惕的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
18 humble | |
adj.谦卑的,恭顺的;地位低下的;v.降低,贬低 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
19 daunt | |
vt.使胆怯,使气馁 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
20 pangs | |
突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 ); 悲痛 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
21 ego | |
n.自我,自己,自尊 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
22 balk | |
n.大方木料;v.妨碍;不愿前进或从事某事 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
23 appreciation | |
n.评价;欣赏;感谢;领会,理解;价格上涨 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
24 instinctively | |
adv.本能地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
25 bosom | |
n.胸,胸部;胸怀;内心;adj.亲密的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
26 prematurely | |
adv.过早地,贸然地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
27 temperament | |
n.气质,性格,性情 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
28 permanently | |
adv.永恒地,永久地,固定不变地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
29 colossal | |
adj.异常的,庞大的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
30 asses | |
n. 驴,愚蠢的人,臀部 adv. (常用作后置)用于贬损或骂人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
31 awe | |
n.敬畏,惊惧;vt.使敬畏,使惊惧 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
32 gainsaid | |
v.否认,反驳( gainsay的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
33 disapproved | |
v.不赞成( disapprove的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
34 dreaded | |
adj.令人畏惧的;害怕的v.害怕,恐惧,担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
35 frail | |
adj.身体虚弱的;易损坏的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
36 pitfalls | |
(捕猎野兽用的)陷阱( pitfall的名词复数 ); 意想不到的困难,易犯的错误 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
37 helping | |
n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的,辅助的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
38 soften | |
v.(使)变柔软;(使)变柔和 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
39 testimony | |
n.证词;见证,证明 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
40 kindly | |
adj.和蔼的,温和的,爽快的;adv.温和地,亲切地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
41 creed | |
n.信条;信念,纲领 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
42 fully | |
adv.完全地,全部地,彻底地;充分地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
43 trumpet | |
n.喇叭,喇叭声;v.吹喇叭,吹嘘 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
44 attains | |
(通常经过努力)实现( attain的第三人称单数 ); 达到; 获得; 达到(某年龄、水平、状况) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
45 admiration | |
n.钦佩,赞美,羡慕 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
46 fervor | |
n.热诚;热心;炽热 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
47 sporadically | |
adv.偶发地,零星地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
48 creeds | |
(尤指宗教)信条,教条( creed的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
49 alas | |
int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
50 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
51 opposition | |
n.反对,敌对 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
52 sobbing | |
<主方>Ⅰ adj.湿透的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
53 hurls | |
v.猛投,用力掷( hurl的第三人称单数 );大声叫骂 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
54 expounds | |
论述,详细讲解( expound的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
55 glorifies | |
赞美( glorify的第三人称单数 ); 颂扬; 美化; 使光荣 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
56 stature | |
n.(高度)水平,(高度)境界,身高,身材 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
57 doctrines | |
n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 );教义;学说;(政府政策的)正式声明 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
58 martyrs | |
n.martyr的复数形式;烈士( martyr的名词复数 );殉道者;殉教者;乞怜者(向人诉苦以博取同情) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
59 virile | |
adj.男性的;有男性生殖力的;有男子气概的;强有力的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
60 inordinate | |
adj.无节制的;过度的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
61 commendably | |
很好地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
62 peculiarities | |
n. 特质, 特性, 怪癖, 古怪 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
63 grudge | |
n.不满,怨恨,妒嫉;vt.勉强给,不情愿做 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
64 disturbance | |
n.动乱,骚动;打扰,干扰;(身心)失调 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
65 equilibrium | |
n.平衡,均衡,相称,均势,平静 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
66 wont | |
adj.习惯于;v.习惯;n.习惯 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
67 providence | |
n.深谋远虑,天道,天意;远见;节约;上帝 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
欢迎访问英文小说网 |