'瓦爾登湖翻譯（四）'

I would fain say something, not so much concerning the Chinese and Sandwich Islanders as you who read these pages, who are said to live in New England; something about your condition, especially your outward condition or circumstances in this world, in this town, what it is, whether it is necessary that it be as bad as it is, whether it cannot be improved as well as not.I have travelled a good deal in Concord; and everywhere, in shops, and offices, and fields, the inhabitants have appeared to me to be doing penance in a thousand remarkable ways.What I have heard of Brahmins sitting exposed to four fires and looking in the face of the sun; or hanging suspended, with their heads downward, over flames; or looking at the heavens over their shoulders“until it becomes impossible for them to resume their natural position, while from the twist of the neck nothing but liquids can pass into the stomach”；or dwelling, chained for life, at the foot of a tree; or measuring with their bodies, like caterpillars, the breadth of vast empires; or standing on one leg on the tops of pillars—even these forms of conscious penance are hardly more incredible and astonishing than the scenes which I daily witness.The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor.They have no friend Iolaus to burn with a hot iron the root of the hydra's head, but as soon as one head is crushed, two spring up.

我非常高興，讀這些文字的人，不管是中國人還是麻薩諸塞州桑威奇島上的人，或者是住在新英格蘭的人，也無論你貧富，無論你身份如何，背景怎樣，無論你在這個小鎮上，還是在小鎮之外，無論這個世界是什麼樣，不管它這幅糟糕的樣子是否為其必然，也不管是否它能得以改善。我的日子大部分時間過得極為和諧，在任何地方，商店，工作室，田間。我發現這裡的居民以各種不同的方式過著苦哈哈的日子，像是贖罪一樣。聽說，婆羅門教的教徒周身圍火朝著太陽仰面而坐，或頭朝下，腳朝上，倒掛在火上烘烤，或者扭動脖子凝視天堂，直到他們的身體無法恢復原狀，只能吃流質食物為止；或者用鎖鏈把腳銬在一棵樹上終其一生；或者像毛毛蟲一樣用身體丈量大帝國的廣度；或是單腳站在柱子頂端——而我日常所見景象與這些刻意而為之的苦事相比，有過之而無不及。赫拉克勒斯的12件難差都不足以與我的鄰居們所做的事情相比較；因為那只是12件，是有盼頭的；但是我從沒看到這些男人獵殺或捕獲過任何怪物，或是完成過一件苦差事。他們沒有伊奧勞斯這樣的朋友用燙熨斗去燒九頭蛇怪海德拉長頭的根部，以防打坎掉一個頭，又會冒出兩個來。