It is time that we gave a second thought to Puritanism. In the heyday of release from forms which had lost their meaning, it was natural to look back on that period of our history with eyes that saw in it nothing but fanatical excess; we approved the picturesque phrase which showed the English mind going into prison and having the key turned upon it. Now, when the peril of emancipation becomes as manifest as was the hardship of restraint, we shall do well to remember all the good that lay in that stern Puritan discipline, how it renewed the spiritual vitality of our race, and made for the civic freedom which is our highest national privilege. An age of intellectual glory is wont to be paid for in the general decline of that which follows. Imagine England under Stuart rule, with no faith but the Protestantism of the Tudor. Imagine (not to think of worse) English literature represented by Cowley, and the name of Milton unknown. The Puritan came as the physician; he brought his tonic at the moment when lassitude and supineness would naturally have followed upon a supreme display of racial vitality.
我们现在应该再次对清教徒主义进行反思了。我们已经从失去意义的形式束缚中解脱出来,正处于一个全盛时期,此时对其进行回顾,自然只能看到狂热的冲动;这个生动的词语值得我们赞赏，它表明英国人的思想进了监牢，而钥匙就挂在牢门上。现在,当释放的危险与约束的困难同样显而易见时,我们应当清晰地记起在严苛的清教徒修行中所能获得的所有益处——它如何重振我们的民族精神,如何使公民自由成为了我们最值得称道的国家公民权利。一个在知识上取得荣耀的时代,常常是以后来的时代的普遍衰落为代价的。想一想,在斯图亚特王朝统治下的英国,除了都铎王朝的新教教义之外，再没有别的信仰;再想一想(不要往更糟糕的方面想),当时的英国文学以考利为代表,而弥尔顿的名字则无人知晓。当一个种族的生命力展示了其最高境界之后,倦怠和懒散便随之而来;在这样的时候，清教徒以医生的身份来到这里,带来了滋补的药品。
Regret, if you will, that England turned for her religion to the books of Israel; this suddenly revealed sympathy of our race with a fierce Oriental theocracy is perhaps not difficult to explain, but one cannot help wishing that its piety had taken another form; later, there had to come the "exodus from Houndsditch," with how much conflict and misery!Such, however, was the price of soul's health; we must accept the fact and be content to see its better meaning. Health, of course, in speaking of mankind, is always a relative term. From the point of view of a conceivable civilization, Puritan England was lamentably ailing; but we must always ask not how much better off a people might be, but how much worse. Of all theological systems, the most convincing is Manichism, which, of course under another name, was held by the Puritans themselves. What we call Restoration morality -- the morality, that is to say, of a king and court -- might well have become that of the nation at large under a Stuart dynasty safe from religious revolution.
英国居然从以色列的书籍中寻求宗教,如果你要为此感到惋惜,那就惋惜吧。我们的民族所突然表现出来的这种对野蛮的东方神权政治的同情,或许不难解释，但我们不得不希望它能够用另外一种形式来表达自己的虔敬。后来发生的“豪恩德斯狄奇大出走”是不可避免的,又有多少斗争与苦难随之而来啊!然而,为了灵魂的健康必须付出这样的代价;我们必须接受这一事实，并在其更积极的意义中获得满足。当然，就人类而言,健康始终是一个相对而言的词。从一种能够想象得到的文明的观点来看,清教徒的英国罹患疾病、情状可悲;然而,我们始终应该提出疑问的,并非一个民族能够处于如何优越的境遇,而是一个民族所能陷入的最悲惨的境地是怎样的。摩尼教是所有神学体系中最令人信服的教派,当然，在另一个名目下,它也就是清教徒们自己主张的信仰。在不会受到宗教革命威胁的斯图亚特王朝的统治下,我们所说的复辟时期的道德,即国王与朝臣的道德,很可能会被整个国家所采纳。
The political services of Puritanism were inestimable; they will be more feelingly remembered when England has once more to face the danger of political tyranny. I am thinking now of its effects upon social life. To it we owe the characteristic which, in other some countries, is expressed by the term English prudery, the accusation implied being part of the general charge of hypocrisy. It is said by observers among ourselves that the prudish habit of mind is dying out, and this is looked upon as a satisfactory thing, as a sign of healthy emancipation. If by prude be meant a secretly vicious person who affects an excessive decorum, by all means let the prude disappear, even at the cost of some shamelessness. If, on the other hand, a prude is one who, living a decent life, cultivates, either by bent or principle, a somewhat extreme delicacy of thought and speech with regard to elementary facts of human nature, then I say that this is most emphatically a fault in the right direction, and I have no desire to see its prevalence diminish. On the whole, it is the later meaning which certain foreigners have in mind when they speak of English prudery -- at all events, as exhibited by women; it being, not so much an imputation on chastity, as a charge of conceited foolishness. An English woman who typifies the b gueule may be spotless as snow; but she is presumed to have snow's other quality, and at the same time to be a thoroughly absurd and intolerable creature. Well, here is the point of difference. Fastidiousness of speech is not a direct outcome of Puritanism, as our literature sufficiently proves; it is a refinement of civilization following upon absorption into the national life of all the best things which Puritanism had to teach. We who know English women by the experience of a lifetime are well aware that their careful choice of language betokens, far more often than not, a cогresponding delicacy of mind. Landor saw it as a ridiculous trait that English people were so mealy-mouthed in speaking of their bodies; De Quincey, taking him to task for this remark, declared it a proof of blunted sensibility due to long residence in Italy; and, whether the particular explanation held good or not, as regards the question at issue De Quincey was perfectly right. It is very good to be mealy-mouthed with respect to everything that reminds us of the animal in man. Verbal delicacy in itself will not prove an advanced civilization, but civilization, as it advances, assuredly tends that way.
清教徒主义的政治贡献无法衡量。当英国再一次面临政治专制危机时，人们就会更加充满感情地记起他们。我现在正在思考的是它对社会生活的影响。我们将自己的一个性格特征归因于它——在其他国家,人们将其称为“英国式的故作正经”;这一称呼中隐含着谴责之意,它是虚伪之罪整体中的一部分。我们之中的观察家表示，矫揉造作的思想习惯正在逐渐消失——这被看做是一件令人满意的事情,预示着一种有益于健康的解放。如果故作正经之人指的是内心恶毒、表面上却表现得正派又得体的人,那么,就要想尽一切办法,哪怕使用一些卑鄙的手段,也要让这种假正经消失。另一方面,如果故作正经之人指的是这样的人:他过着体面而正派的生活,在与人性的基本事实有关的方面,根据自己的倾向和原则,从思想上和语言上培养一种有些极端的高雅。那么,我要说的是,这是在正确的方向上所犯的一个极大的错误,但我却不希望看到这样的人大批地消失。从整体上看,某些外国人在提及英国人的故作正经时一一至少就女人的表现而言一一浮现在他们的脑海之中的是后一种意思;这与其说是对她们的贞洁的诽谤，不如说是对她们的自负和愚蠢的一种指责。一个故作正经的英国女人的典型代表,也许就像雪一样纯洁,但她也可能会具有雪的其他特征,同时,她非常可笑而且令人忍无可忍。是的,这就是不同之处。我们的文学充分证明,言辞上的过分讲究并非清教徒主义的直接结果，而是在国家生活吸收了清教徒主义所提供的优秀成分之后,产生的一种文明精髓。我们用一生的时间努力去了解英国的女人,因此清楚地知道她们在言辞上的精心选择,往往表明她们的心灵也同样高雅、细腻。兰多认为,英国人在谈及身体时使用委婉措辞是一种十分荒唐的特点;德・昆西对他的这种说法进行了指责,并指出这恰恰证明由于他久居意大利,感性都已经变得迟钝了。无论这个独特的解释正确与否,针对他们所争论的这个问题而言,德・昆西是完全正确的。当谈及那些能让我们想起人类的兽性的事情时,言辞委婉一些还是非常有必要的。言辞优雅本身并不是文明进步的证明,但在文明进程中,它却的确代表着前进的方向。
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