📝 您未登录，登录后完成练习可保存成绩、查看最佳记录。
总字符
0
正确字符
0
错误字符
0
错误率
0.00%
耗时(秒)
0
速度 WPM
0
0 / 75
1I am wont to think that men are not so much the keepers of herds as herds are the keepers of men, the former are so much
2the freer. Men and oxen exchange work; but if we consider necessary work only, the oxen will be seen to have greatly the
3advantage, their farm is so much the larger. Man does some of his part of the exchange work in his six weeks of haying,
4and it is no boy's play. Certainly no nation that lived simply in all respects, that is, no nation of philosophers,
5would commit so great a blunder as to use the labor of animals. True, there never was and is not likely soon to be a
6nation of philosophers, nor am I certain it is desirable that there should be. However, I should never have broken a
7horse or bull and taken him to board for any work he might do for me, for fear I should become a horse-man or a
8herds-man merely; and if society seems to be the gainer by so doing, are we certain that what is one man's gain is not
9another's loss, and that the stable-boy has equal cause with his master to be satisfied? Granted that some public works
10would not have been constructed without this aid, and let man share the glory of such with the ox and horse; does it
11follow that he could not have accomplished works yet more worthy of himself in that case? When men begin to do, not
12merely unnecessary or artistic, but luxurious and idle work, with their assistance, it is inevitable that a few do all
13the exchange work with the oxen, or, in other words, become the slaves of the strongest. Man thus not only works for the
14animal within him, but, for a symbol of this, he works for the animal without him. Though we have many substantial
15houses of brick or stone, the prosperity of the farmer is still measured by the degree to which the barn overshadows the
16house. This town is said to have the largest houses for oxen, cows, and horses hereabouts, and it is not behindhand in
17its public buildings; but there are very few halls for free worship or free speech in this county. It should not be by
18their architecture, but why not even by their power of abstract thought, that nations should seek to commemorate
19themselves? How much more admirable the Bhagvat-Geeta than all the ruins of the East! Towers and temples are the luxury
20of princes. A simple and independent mind does not toil at the bidding of any prince. Genius is not a retainer to any
21emperor, nor is its material silver, or gold, or marble, except to a trifling extent. To what end, pray, is so much
22stone hammered? In Arcadia, when I was there, I did not see any hammering stone. Nations are possessed with an insane
23ambition to perpetuate the memory of themselves by the amount of hammered stone they leave. What if equal pains were
24taken to smooth and polish their manners? One piece of good sense would be more memorable than a monument as high as the
25moon. I love better to see stones in place. The grandeur of Thebes was a vulgar grandeur. More sensible is a rod of
26stone wall that bounds an honest man's field than a hundred-gated Thebes that has wandered farther from the true end of
27life. The religion and civilization which are barbaric and heathenish build splendid temples; but what you might call
28Christianity does not. Most of the stone a nation hammers goes toward its tomb only. It buries itself alive. As for the
29Pyramids, there is nothing to wonder at in them so much as the fact that so many men could be found degraded enough to
30spend their lives constructing a tomb for some ambitious booby, whom it would have been wiser and manlier to have
31drowned in the Nile, and then given his body to the dogs. I might possibly invent some excuse for them and him, but I
32have no time for it. As for the religion and love of art of the builders, it is much the same all the world over,
33whether the building be an Egyptian temple or the United States Bank. It costs more than it comes to. The mainspring is
34vanity, assisted by the love of garlic and bread and butter. Mr. Balcom, a promising young architect, designs it on the
35back of his Vitruvius, with hard pencil and ruler, and the job is let out to Dobson & Sons, stonecutters. When the
36thirty centuries begin to look down on it, mankind begin to look up at it. As for your high towers and monuments, there
37was a crazy fellow once in this town who undertook to dig through to China, and he got so far that, as he said, he heard
38the Chinese pots and kettles rattle; but I think that I shall not go out of my way to admire the hole which he made.
39Many are concerned about the monuments of the West and the East,--to know who built them. For my part, I should like to
40know who in those days did not build them,--who were above such trifling. But to proceed with my statistics. By
41surveying, carpentry, and day-labor of various other kinds in the village in the mean while, for I have as many trades
42as fingers, I had earned $13.34. The expense of food for eight months, namely, from July 4th to March 1st, the time when
43these estimates were made, though I lived there more than two years,--not counting potatoes, a little green corn, and
44some peas, which I had raised, nor considering the value of what was on hand at the last date, was
45Rice,................... $ 1.73½ Molasses,................ 1.73 Cheapest form of the saccharine. Rye
46meal,................ 1.04¾ Indian meal,............. 0.99¾ Cheaper than rye. Pork,.................... 0.22 All
47experiments which failed: Flour,................... 0.88 Costs more than Indian meal, both money and trouble.
48Sugar,................... 0.80 Lard,.................... 0.65 Apples,.................. 0.25 Dried apple,.............
490.22 Sweet potatoes,.......... 0.10 One pumpkin,............. 0.06 One watermelon,.......... 0.02
50Salt,.................... 0.03 Yes, I did eat $8.74, all told; but I should not thus unblushingly publish my guilt, if I
51did not know that most of my readers were equally guilty with myself, and that their deeds would look no better in
52print. The next year I sometimes caught a mess of fish for my dinner, and once I went so far as to slaughter a woodchuck
53which ravaged my bean-field,--effect his transmigration, as a Tartar would say,--and devour him, partly for experiment's
54sake; but though it afforded me a momentary enjoyment, notwithstanding a musky flavor, I saw that the longest use would
55not make that a good practice, however it might seem to have your woodchucks ready dressed by the village butcher.
56Clothing and some incidental expenses within the same dates, though little can be inferred from this item, amounted to
57$8.40¾ Oil and some household utensils,....... 2.00 So that all the pecuniary outgoes, excepting for washing and
58mending, which for the most part were done out of the house, and their bills have not yet been received,--and these are
59all and more than all the ways by which money necessarily goes out in this part of the world,--were
60House,................................ $ 28.12½ Farm one year,.......................... 14.72½ Food eight
61months,...................... 8.74 Clothing, etc., eight months,........... 8.40¾ Oil, &c., eight
62months,................. 2.00 ------------ In all,........................... $ 61.99¾ I address myself now to those of
63my readers who have a living to get. And to meet this I have for farm produce sold $23.44 Earned by
64day-labor,................... 13.34 ------------ In all,............................ $36.78, which subtracted from the
65sum of the outgoes leaves a balance of $25.21¾ on the one side,--this being very nearly the means with which I started,
66and the measure of expenses to be incurred,--and on the other, beside the leisure and independence and health thus
67secured, a comfortable house for me as long as I choose to occupy it. These statistics, however accidental and therefore
68uninstructive they may appear, as they have a certain completeness, have a certain value also. Nothing was given me of
69which I have not rendered some account. It appears from the above estimate, that my food alone cost me in money about
70twenty-seven cents a week. It was, for nearly two years after this, rye and Indian meal without yeast, potatoes, rice, a
71very little salt pork, molasses, and salt, and my drink water. It was fit that I should live on rice, mainly, who loved
72so well the philosophy of India. To meet the objections of some inveterate cavillers, I may as well state, that if I
73dined out occasionally, as I always had done, and I trust shall have opportunities to do again, it was frequently to the
74detriment of my domestic arrangements. But the dining out, being, as I have stated, a constant element, does not in the
75least affect a comparative statement like this.
🎉 全部完成！共 75 行