• How is it that the learned are more commonly confounded when they come among the rich and ignorant, than the rich and ignorant lose confidence in the society of thelearned? ——Rev. J. R. Pretyman, Stray Thoughts and Short Essays (1872), p. 89. [A contrast clumsily expressed. Omit “lose confidence"; or, better, read, "than the rich and ignorant when they come among the learned"; or after "confounded,”"in the society of the rich and ignorant, than the rich and ignorant in that of the learned."]
• Some of the leading errors of Protestant churches have been attempted to be noticed, and it has also been attempted to notice their continual hostility to new intellectual influences as regards the general progress of humanity. --Westminster Review, January, 1873, p. 138.
[Read,“We have attempted to notice some of the leading errors,”&c.]
• He who needs any other lesson on this suhject than the whole course of ancient history affords, Let him read Cicero de officiis. —-J. S. Mill, Three Essays on Religion (1874), p. 107,"Utility of Religion.”[We must say either“He who... ought to read,”& c.; or “Let him who.…. read,"]
究其实质，语言的变化反映人这个使用语言的主体在渐渐地变化。但长期以来，在翻译理论研究者心目中，翻译主体似乎是不变的，翻译标准似乎也是不变的。事实上，科技在发展，社会在进步。现实世界变化了，价值观变化了，主体变化了。翻译标准不可能历数百年、数十年而“顽固不化”。问题是因袭之见的“在场”拼命拉住因袭的标准“在场”，企望借传统定势使传统的翻译标准也永远“在场”下去。从消极方面来看，这也是为什么“信、达、雅”风靡中国译坛近百年的个中原委。
其实，多种新思潮的出现导致社会价值观的转变，早已推动翻译者在翻译实践中自觉或不自觉地恪守…种比较符合时代发展的要求(包括语言社会交际的要求、审美和文风时尚的要求、现代语用规范的要求)，特别是语义的“信、达”问题，涉及语言的意义增生、富集(enrichment）、演变以及意义转换对策性原
则，这一切都要求有意义理论的“支持”（backup)，根本不是传统的“要诀式原则”（如中国的“信、达、雅”、“悟、人、化”以及西方的所谓“三S原则”：Sense,Spirit,Style等等）所能解决的。传统的翻译标准在当时有限规模、有限题材、有限功能、有限读者的条件下，可能足以解决问题，而且确实作出过功不可没的贡献。但本世纪六、七上年代以来科技理论系统化，社会生活科技化，人类思维和言语交际形式复杂化，对翻译的要求无论在质素、数量和速度上都今非昔比。
从哲学现象学上分析，翻译标准只从主体一方提出要求而不顾客体本身的、内在的、原质的特征、结构、功能、性质，特别是其本身的质素，就难免陷人对客体的“认识论超越”（episte-mological transcendence)。胡塞尔对此有一段论述：
All the basic errors of the theory of knowledge go hand in hand with thc above mentioned transcendence, on the one -hand the basic error of psychologism, on the other that of anthropologism and biologism. The transcendence is so exceedingly dangerous, partly because the proper sense of the problem is never made clear and remains totally lost in it, and partly because even those who have become clear about it find it hard to remain clear and slip easily, as their thinking proceeds, back into the temptations of the natural modes of thought and judgment as well as into the false and seductive conceptions of the problerns which grow on their basis.
胡塞尔的意思是“超越”可能掩盖住人观察现象的重要途径，使“问题的实质所在”(the proper sense of the prohlem)永远弄不明白，而且会在超越中消逝；更有甚者，那些弄明白的人也会被人之常情和人之常理所造成的错误认识，弄得迷迷糊糊而人云亦云。胡氏的这一现象学分析，也许有助于解释中国和西方为什么对翻译标准（诸如“信、达、雅”、“等值”、“等效”）长期存有“春花秋月何时了”式的争论。事情确实是这样：如果客体（文本、作者、读者）本身的“值”或“效”、“思维”或“表达式”本来就有问题，又怎么给“有问题的客体”定一个“没问题的标准”呢？
因此，关键在于：主体如何认识自己的可变性，以及如何用自己的可变性以最大的限度来适应客体的可变性和可容性。此之谓主体的主导性权限，也就是他的权力界限。
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