3小节

 I cannot guess how Sanderson, had he lived, would have resolved this conflict between his House of Vision and his Great Chapel¹, just as I can hazard no opinion of the ultimate form his interpretation² of Christianity would have taken. But the recognition of these conflicts is fundamental to my conception of the man and his significance.

 

He stands for a great multitude reluctant to abandon many of the familiar phrases of the Christian³ use and eager to read new and deeper meanings into them. But he never took 'holy orders'; he knew the days of the priest, except for evil, were past, and it is only by its being born again as a House of Vision that he could [Pg 144]anticipate his chapel with contentment. The time has come for mankind to choose plainly between the priest and the teacher.

 

Some six months after Sanderson's death I went to Oundle and visited the Yarrow Memorial, that abortive⁴ first House of Vision. Except for a bronze statue of a boy by Lady Scott that Sanderson had liked and bought, it was as I had seen it with Sanderson a year before. It was still, deserted⁵, and I suppose I must count it dead. The time-charts had not been carried on. The collection of inventions, the display of humanity's growth, were still represented by empty cases. The statue was intended for the school chapel, but meanwhile it had been dumped in the House of Vision as a convenient vacant place for such dumping. The bronze boy is in an eager pose; there is duty to be done and danger to be faced and a great creative effort to be made. 'Send me!' he said, in that empty, neglected House of Vision. But the hand that would have put that dart⁶ to the bowstring and aimed it at work and service was there no more.

 

Building operations upon the chapel were proceeding⁷ slowly. The rising walls were very like[Pg 145] the rising walls of the sort of church for respectable people that gets built in Surbiton or Beckenham. I gather that in all probability it will even carry the debt customary in such cases. The new headmaster was, I found, a thoroughly⁸ pleasant man who came not from an elementary school but from Eton, and had never met Sanderson in his life and knew nothing of his work. He seemed disposed to regard Sanderson as a bit of a crank and to be intelligently puzzled by his originalities. I felt assured that when at last that old corrugated-iron building is abandoned for the new chapel there would be pews in the new nave⁹ in spite of Sanderson, and services of an altogether normal type and no nonsense of walking about and thinking or anything of that sort.

 

But though I have seen the House of Vision at Oundle dead and vacant as a museum skull¹⁰, yet I know surely that neither Sanderson nor his House of Vision are in any real sense dead at all. A day will certainly come when his name will be honoured above all other contemporary schoolmasters as the precursor¹¹ of a new age in education and human affairs. In that age of realisation every village will be dominated by its school,[Pg 146] with its library and theatre, its laboratories and gymnasium, every town will converge¹² upon its cluster of schools and colleges, its research buildings and the like, and it will have its Great Chapel, its House of Vision as its crown and symbol even as the cathedral was the crown and symbol of the being and devotion of the medieval city. And therein Sanderson's stout¹³ hopefulness and pioneer thrustings will be kept in remembrance by generations that have come up to the pitch of understanding him.

1 chapel   

n.小教堂，殡仪馆

参考例句：

• The nimble hero,skipped into a chapel that stood near.敏捷的英雄跳进近旁的一座小教堂里。
• She was on the peak that Sunday afternoon when she played in chapel.那个星期天的下午，她在小教堂的演出，可以说是登峰造极。

2 interpretation   

n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理

参考例句：

• His statement admits of one interpretation only.他的话只有一种解释。
• Analysis and interpretation is a very personal thing.分析与说明是个很主观的事情。

3 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。

4 abortive   

adj.不成功的，发育不全的

参考例句：

• We had to abandon our abortive attempts.我们的尝试没有成功，不得不放弃。
• Somehow the whole abortive affair got into the FBI files.这件早已夭折的案子不知怎么就进了联邦调查局的档案。

5 deserted   

adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的

参考例句：

• The deserted village was filled with a deathly silence.这个荒废的村庄死一般的寂静。
• The enemy chieftain was opposed and deserted by his followers.敌人头目众叛亲离。

6 dart   

v.猛冲，投掷；n.飞镖，猛冲

参考例句：

• The child made a sudden dart across the road.那小孩突然冲过马路。
• Markov died after being struck by a poison dart.马尔科夫身中毒镖而亡。

7 proceeding   

n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报

参考例句：

• This train is now proceeding from Paris to London.这次列车从巴黎开往伦敦。
• The work is proceeding briskly.工作很有生气地进展着。

8 thoroughly   

adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地

参考例句：

• The soil must be thoroughly turned over before planting.一定要先把土地深翻一遍再下种。
• The soldiers have been thoroughly instructed in the care of their weapons.士兵们都系统地接受过保护武器的训练。

9 nave   

n.教堂的中部；本堂

参考例句：

• People gathered in the nave of the house.人们聚拢在房子的中间。
• The family on the other side of the nave had a certain look about them,too.在中殿另一边的那一家人，也有着自己特有的相貌。

10 skull   

n.头骨；颅骨

参考例句：

• The skull bones fuse between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five.头骨在15至25岁之间长合。
• He fell out of the window and cracked his skull.他从窗子摔了出去，跌裂了颅骨。

11 precursor   

n.先驱者；前辈；前任；预兆；先兆

参考例句：

• Error is often the precursor of what is correct.错误常常是正确的先导。
• He said that the deal should not be seen as a precursor to a merger.他说该笔交易不应该被看作是合并的前兆。

12 converge   

vi.会合；聚集，集中；(思想、观点等)趋近

参考例句：

• The results converge towards this truth.其结果趋近于这个真理。
• Parallel lines converge at infinity.平行线永不相交。

13   

参考例句：