2小节

 Now that was the key in which Sanderson dealt with his boys and in which he gave his message to the world. And that is also the key in which they dealt with him. I want to clear out of the reader's mind any idea that this great teacher of men was a solemn and superior person, clear, exact, and exalted¹, and that his boys had any vague sentimental² worship for him. They laughed at him, loved him, understood him, assimilated his ideas, and worked with him. He was much more like a sweating, panting, burly leader pushing a way for himself and others through a thorny³ thicket⁴. And when I sat in his study and read over the notes of his sermons and scripture⁵ lessons I got the same impression of a sturdy fighter thrusting through a tangle⁶.

 

[Pg 83]

 

Altogether there were several hundred of these sermon-memoranda. He would take a quire of manuscript paper and write down his notes, not headings merely but sentences, writing very fast, missing out halves of words, leaving phrases incomplete. The result would be a little book with perhaps a title and a date scribbled⁷ on the back page. The dozen specimen⁸ sermons in the official Life were mostly taken from these rough drafts. There was also a quantity of printed sermons dating from his earliest days at Oundle. So that it was possible to trace his development from the days when every heretical utterance⁹ was jealously noted¹⁰, to the days of complete freedom of thought and expression.

 

He came into the interlaced briars and brakes of modern religious thought, a trained theological student, but already a very broad one, far from the trite¹¹ materialistic¹² superstitions¹³ of the narrowly orthodox. 'Of what is termed "definite religious teaching" his boys received little,' says one of his clerical assistants. 'The Head fought shy of anything which he felt might cramp¹⁴ a boy's tendency to think for himself and develop his own views.'

 

[Pg 84]

 

This is far from the old days of salvation¹⁵ by belief.

 

He took Christ as the central figure in his teaching. In his early days he had prepared a parallel arrangement of the gospels, and this developed into his Synopsis¹⁶ of the Life of Christ. He seems to have clung stoutly¹⁷ to the authenticity¹⁸ of the recorded sayings of Christ, but he held himself free to doubt whether we have as yet 'got to the bottom of many sayings of the Master.' And, says the same witness, at once rather vaguely¹⁹ and rather illuminatingly²⁰: 'He brushed aside impatiently doubts as to the feasibility of this miracle or that. To any who seemed to be worrying about the actual turning of water into wine at Cana he would urge that they were missing the whole point; cold, lifeless water was turned into warm, life-giving wine—and this was the work of the Master and His new teaching. Could they doubt that? He seemed to feel acutely that the passing of the centuries is liable to bring a distortion as well as an enrichment of the Christian²¹ revelation, and for that reason he was always trying to meditate²² himself, and to get others to meditate, on the true characteristics of the Master in the earliest[Pg 85] portraits of Him handed down to us in the Gospels.'

 

 

 

Like all religious teachers he emphasised some aspects of the general doctrine²³ in preference to others, but his accent was never on the sacramental or ceremonial side. The root ideas of orthodox Christianity, the ideas of sin and an atonement, never very prominent in his teaching, faded more and more from his discourses²⁴ as the years went on. He never seems to have had much sense of sin, and he laid an increasing stress on action, on courage and experiment. One saying he repeated endlessly, 'Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, shall men give into your bosom²⁵.' Still more frequently he quoted, 'I came that ye might have life, and that ye might have it more abundantly.' In his later days that had become a new motto for Oundle School; it ousted²⁶ 'God grant Grace' from the boys' thoughts in much the same way that Faraday for all spiritual purposes ousted St. Anthony as the patron saint of the school. And in the later sermons one would find side by side with Gospel sayings, exhortations²⁷ from quite another quarter. The boys were[Pg 86] told to 'live dangerously.' The Christ of later Oundle became indeed a very Nietzschean Christ.

1 exalted   

adj.(地位等)高的，崇高的；尊贵的，高尚的

参考例句：

• Their loveliness and holiness in accordance with their exalted station.他们的美丽和圣洁也与他们的崇高地位相称。
• He received respect because he was a person of exalted rank.他因为是个地位崇高的人而受到尊敬。

2 sentimental   

adj.多愁善感的，感伤的

参考例句：

• She's a sentimental woman who believes marriage comes by destiny.她是多愁善感的人，她相信姻缘命中注定。
• We were deeply touched by the sentimental movie.我们深深被那感伤的电影所感动。

3 thorny   

adj.多刺的，棘手的

参考例句：

• The young captain is pondering over a thorny problem.年轻的上尉正在思考一个棘手的问题。
• The boys argued over the thorny points in the lesson.孩子们辩论功课中的难点。

4 thicket   

n.灌木丛，树林

参考例句：

• A thicket makes good cover for animals to hide in.丛林是动物的良好隐蔽处。
• We were now at the margin of the thicket.我们现在已经来到了丛林的边缘。

5 scripture   

n.经文，圣书，手稿；Scripture:(常用复数)《圣经》，《圣经》中的一段

参考例句：

• The scripture states that God did not want us to be alone.圣经指出上帝并不是想让我们独身一人生活。
• They invoked Hindu scripture to justify their position.他们援引印度教的经文为他们的立场辩护。

6 tangle   

n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱

参考例句：

• I shouldn't tangle with Peter.He is bigger than me.我不应该与彼特吵架。他的块头比我大。
• If I were you, I wouldn't tangle with them.我要是你，我就不跟他们争吵。

7 scribbled   

v.潦草的书写( scribble的过去式和过去分词 )；乱画；草草地写；匆匆记下

参考例句：

• She scribbled his phone number on a scrap of paper. 她把他的电话号码匆匆写在一张小纸片上。
• He scribbled a note to his sister before leaving. 临行前，他给妹妹草草写了一封短信。

8 specimen   

n.样本，标本

参考例句：

• You'll need tweezers to hold up the specimen.你要用镊子来夹这标本。
• This specimen is richly variegated in colour.这件标本上有很多颜色。

9 utterance   

n.用言语表达，话语，言语

参考例句：

• This utterance of his was greeted with bursts of uproarious laughter.他的讲话引起阵阵哄然大笑。
• My voice cleaves to my throat,and sob chokes my utterance.我的噪子哽咽，泣不成声。

10 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。

11 trite   

adj.陈腐的

参考例句：

• The movie is teeming with obvious and trite ideas.这部电影充斥着平铺直叙的陈腐观点。
• Yesterday,in the restaurant,Lorraine had seemed trite,blurred,worn away.昨天在饭店里，洛兰显得庸俗、堕落、衰老了。

12 materialistic   

a.唯物主义的，物质享乐主义的

参考例句：

• She made him both soft and materialistic. 她把他变成女性化而又实际化。
• Materialistic dialectics is an important part of constituting Marxism. 唯物辩证法是马克思主义的重要组成部分。

13 superstitions   

迷信，迷信行为( superstition的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Old superstitions seem incredible to educated people. 旧的迷信对于受过教育的人来说是不可思议的。
• Do away with all fetishes and superstitions. 破除一切盲目崇拜和迷信。

14 cramp   

n.痉挛；[pl.](腹)绞痛；vt.限制，束缚

参考例句：

• Winston stopped writing,partly because he was suffering from cramp.温斯顿驻了笔，手指也写麻了。
• The swimmer was seized with a cramp and had to be helped out of the water.那个在游泳的人突然抽起筋来，让别人帮着上了岸。

15 salvation   

n.（尤指基督）救世，超度，拯救，解困

参考例句：

• Salvation lay in political reform.解救办法在于政治改革。
• Christians hope and pray for salvation.基督教徒希望并祈祷灵魂得救。

16 synopsis   

n.提要，梗概

参考例句：

• The synopsis of the book is very good.这本书的梗概非常好。
• I heard there wasn't a script.They only had a synopsis.我听说是没有剧本的。他们只有一个大纲。

17 stoutly   

adv.牢固地，粗壮的

参考例句：

• He stoutly denied his guilt.他断然否认自己有罪。
• Burgess was taxed with this and stoutly denied it.伯杰斯为此受到了责难，但是他自己坚决否认有这回事。

18 authenticity   

n.真实性

参考例句：

• There has been some debate over the authenticity of his will. 对于他的遗嘱的真实性一直有争论。
• The museum is seeking an expert opinion on the authenticity of the painting. 博物馆在请专家鉴定那幅画的真伪。

19 vaguely   

adv.含糊地，暖昧地

参考例句：

• He had talked vaguely of going to work abroad.他含糊其词地说了到国外工作的事。
• He looked vaguely before him with unseeing eyes.他迷迷糊糊的望着前面，对一切都视而不见。

20 illuminatingly   

adv.照亮地，启蒙地

参考例句：

21 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

22 meditate   

v.想，考虑，（尤指宗教上的）沉思，冥想

参考例句：

• It is important to meditate on the meaning of life.思考人生的意义很重要。
• I was meditating,and reached a higher state of consciousness.我在冥想，并进入了一个更高的意识境界。

23 doctrine   

n.教义；主义；学说

参考例句：

• He was impelled to proclaim his doctrine.他不得不宣扬他的教义。
• The council met to consider changes to doctrine.宗教议会开会考虑更改教义。

24 discourses   

论文( discourse的名词复数 )； 演说； 讲道； 话语

参考例句：

• It is said that his discourses were very soul-moving. 据说他的讲道词是很能动人心灵的。
• I am not able to repeat the excellent discourses of this extraordinary man. 这位异人的高超言论我是无法重述的。

25 bosom   

n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的

参考例句：

• She drew a little book from her bosom.她从怀里取出一本小册子。
• A dark jealousy stirred in his bosom.他内心生出一阵恶毒的嫉妒。

26 ousted   

驱逐( oust的过去式和过去分词 )； 革职； 罢黜； 剥夺

参考例句：

• He was ousted as chairman. 他的主席职务被革除了。
• He may be ousted by a military takeover. 他可能在一场军事接管中被赶下台。

27 exhortations   

n.敦促( exhortation的名词复数 )；极力推荐；（正式的）演讲；（宗教仪式中的）劝诫

参考例句：

• The monuments of men's ancestors were the most impressive exhortations. 先辈们的丰碑最能奋勉人心的。 来自辞典例句
• Men has free choice. Otherwise counsels, exhortations, commands, prohibitions, rewards and punishments would be in vain. 人具有自由意志。否则，劝告、赞扬、命令、禁规、奖赏和惩罚都将是徒劳的。 来自辞典例句