感恩节特辑 耶鲁校长谈感恩(中英双语)(2)

　　美国桂冠诗人比利·柯林斯(Billy Collins)在写给母亲的一首叫做《系带》(The Lanyard)诗中捕获了这些情感。目前，母亲节仅仅过去一周。因此，这首诗很适合在这里读给你们听。

　　《系带》

　　日前，我缓缓跃起，

　　从房间蓝色的墙壁上，

　　仿佛在水底，由打字机至钢琴，

　　从书架到地板上的信封，

　　当发现自己停留在字典的L部分时，

　　我把视线落在了“系带”上。

　　一个法国小说家啃过的曲奇，

　　不可能忽然送回过去，

　　那时我坐在野营的工作台，

　　靠近深深的阿迪朗达克湖，

　　学习如何编织细长的塑料条，

　　编成一条系带，送给母亲做礼物。

　　我从未见有谁用过系带，

　　或者佩戴，如果可以这样使用，

　　但这并没有阻止我，

　　一股压一股，一遍又一遍地编，

　　直到做成一个四四方方的，

　　红白相间的挂绳，给我的母亲。

　　她给我生命和乳汁，

　　我给她一条系带，

　　难忍的病房，她悉心照料着我，

　　举起汤匙，喂药到我嘴边，

　　冰凉方巾，敷我额头，

　　然后，带我走进轻而薄的光明。

　　教我走路，带我游泳，

　　而我，送她一条系带。

　　她说，这里有数不尽的饭菜，

　　这里有衣服和优质的教育。

　　我回答说，这是送你的系带。

　　在一位参谋的小小帮助下，我完成了它。

　　这里有活着的躯体，有跳动的心，

　　有强壮的双腿，强健的骨骼和坚固的牙齿，

　　还有可以了解世界的清澈双眸，她低语道。

　　我说，这是我在营地做的丝带。

　　此时此刻，我想告诉她，

　　这是一个小小礼物——微不足道。

　　你永远无法报答你的母亲，

　　我悲哀地承认，当她接过我手中双色的系带时，

　　我像个孩子一样肯定无疑，

　　打发无聊而编织的这个无用的东西，

　　却足以使我们扯平。

　　毕业生们，我不是要你们必须感谢母亲。尽管这并不是一个坏主意，但你们至少应该为此花上些许时间。尽管这个周末很喧嚣，还是请大家静下来想想所有帮助你们走到今天的人，那些你们无法报答的人。他们可能是家人、朋友、敬爱的师长，甚至是你们从未谋面的作者。想想他们，借此机会，轻声说句“谢谢”。正如20世记早期耶鲁大学的杰出英语教授威廉·里昂·菲尔普斯曾经写到的：“感恩带来幸福，给予越多，得到的就越多”。

　　On Gratitude: 2014 Baccalaureate Address by President Peter Salovey

　　May 18, 2014

　　In his first Baccalaureate Address, President Peter Salovey urged the graduates to consider the benefits of gratitude. Here is the text of his speech.

　　Colleagues, friends, families, graduating seniors: It is a pleasure to greet you today and offer a few words on this celebratory weekend.

　　Over the years, I have participated in the baccalaureate service in various roles — as a member of the faculty, as a dean, as provost, and now, for the first time, as president. There is a Yale tradition that I have observed that I would like to continue today, during a year in which we have introduced new rituals while also honoring old ones:

　　Might I ask all of the families and friends here today to rise and recognize the outstanding — and graduating — members of the Class of 2014?

　　And now, might I ask the Class of 2014 to consider all those who have supported your arrival at this milestone, and to please rise and recognize them?

　　Thank you! I delight in this custom not merely because it is lovely in its own right, but also because my baccalaureate remarks today focus on gratitude. I talk about gratitude in part because I am so thankful for the dedicated leadership of Yale College that Dean Miller has provided since December 2008, and in part because gratitude turns out to be one of the keys to happiness.

　　For most of my adult life, I have been a student of human emotion. It is the basis for my academic career and one of the passions of my professional life. And although there is a large — and growing — body of scholarly literature on emotion, it might surprise you that the psychological literature on gratitude is rather meager. Laboratory experiments exploring gratitude are few and far between. Field studies of how children learn to say “thank you” are viewed as quaint and old-fashioned.

　　We all know — all of us in our own minds — what it means to be grateful, particularly on a weekend like this one. But until the last decade, gratitude almost never appeared in handbooks and encyclopedias of human emotions compiled by psychologists. And the neglect of serious consideration of gratitude is not limited to psychology: Aristotle, for example, did not include it on his famous list of human virtues.

　　But even if psychology and Aristotle have neglected gratitude, many philosophers — from Cicero to Seneca to Aquinas to Spinoza to Hobbs to Hume and Kant — acknowledge that the ability to express gratitude is not just socially polite but also a core human capacity. These philosophers worry that societies characterized by ungrateful people — by ingrates — might be unjust and unfair, and turn to vengeance and destruction.