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(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
I am speaking not as a Briton, not as a European, not as a member of a western democracy, but as a human being, a member of the species Man, whose continued existence is in doubt. The world is full of conflicts: Jews and Arabs; Indians and Pakistanis; white men and Negroes in Africa; and, overshadowing all minor1 conflicts, the titanic2 struggle between communism and anticommunism.
Almost everybody who is politically conscious has strong feelings about one or more of these issues; but I want you, if you can, to set aside such feelings for the moment and consider yourself only as a member of a biological species which has had a remarkable3 history and whose disappearance4 none of us can desire. I shall try to say no single word which should appeal to one group rather than to another. All, equally, are in peril5, and, if the peril is understood, there is hope that they may collectively avert6 it. We have to learn to think in a new way. We have to learn to ask ourselves not what steps can be taken to give military victory to whatever group we prefer, for there no longer are such steps. The question we have to ask ourselves is: What steps can be taken to prevent a military contest of which the issue must be disastrous7 to all sides?
The general public, and even many men in positions of authority, have not realized what would be involved in a war with hydrogen bombs. The general public still thinks in terms of the obliteration8 of cities. It is understood that the new bombs are more powerful than the old and that, while one atomic bomb could obliterate9 Hiroshima, one hydrogen bomb could obliterate the largest cities such as London, New York, and Moscow. No doubt in a hydrogen-bomb war great cities would be obliterated10. But this is one of the minor disasters that would have to be faced. If everybody in London, New York, and Moscow were exterminated11, the world might, in the course of a few centuries, recover from the blow. But we now know, especially since the Bikini test, that hydrogen bombs can gradually spread destruction over a much wider area than had been supposed. It is stated on very good authority that a bomb can now be manufactured which will be 25,000 times as powerful as that which destroyed Hiroshima. Such a bomb, if exploded near the ground or under water, sends radioactive particles into the upper air. They sink gradually and reach the surface of the earth in the form of a deadly dust or rain. It was this dust which infected the Japanese fishermen and their catch of fish although they were outside what American experts believed to be the danger zone. No one knows how widely such lethal12 radioactive particles might be diffused13, but the best authorities are unanimous in saying that a war with hydrogen bombs is quite likely to put an end to the human race. It is feared that if many hydrogen bombs are used there will be universal death - sudden only for a fortunate minority, but for the majority a slow torture of disease and disintegration14...
Here, then, is the problem which I present to you, stark15 and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race1 or shall mankind renounce16 war? People will not face this alternative because it is so difficult to abolish war. The abolition17 of war will demand distasteful limitations of national sovereignty. But what perhaps impedes18 understanding of the situation more than anything else is that the term 'mankind' feels vague and abstract. People scarcely realize in imagination that the danger is to themselves and their children and their grandchildren, and not only to a dimly apprehended19 humanity' And so they hope that perhaps war may be allowed to continue provided modern weapons are prohibited. I am afraid this hope is illusory. Whatever agreements not to use hydrogen bombs had been reached in time of peace, they would no longer be considered binding20 in time of war, and both sides would set to work to manufacture hydrogen bombs as soon as war broke out, for if one side manufactured the bombs and the other did not, the side that manufactured them would inevitably21 be victorious22...
As geological time is reckoned, Man has so far existed only for a very short period one million years at the most. What he has achieved, especially during the last 6,000 years, is something utterly23 new in the history of the Cosmos24, so far at least as we are acquainted with it. For countless25 ages the sun rose and set, the moon waxed and waned26, the stars shone in the night, but it was only with the coming of Man that these things were understood. In the great world of astronomy and in the little world of the atom, Man has unveiled secrets which might have been thought undiscoverable. In art and literature and religion, some men have shown a sublimity27 of feeling which makes the species worth preserving. Is all this to end in trivial horror because so few are able to think of Man rather than of this or that group of men? Is our race so destitute28 of wisdom, so incapable29 of impartial30 love, so blind even to the simplest dictates31 of self-preservation, that the last proof of its silly cleverness is to be the extermination32 of all life on our planet? - for it will be not only men who will perish, but also the animals, whom no one can accuse of communism or anticommunism.
I cannot believe that this is to be the end. I would have men forget their quarrels for a moment and reflect that, if they will allow themselves to survive, there is every reason to expect the triumphs of the future to exceed immeasurably the triumphs of the past. There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? I appeal, as a human being to human beings: remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, nothing lies before you but universal death.
点击收听单词发音
1 minor | |
adj.较小(少)的,较次要的;n.辅修学科;vi.辅修 | |
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2 titanic | |
adj.巨人的,庞大的,强大的 | |
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3 remarkable | |
adj.显著的,异常的,非凡的,值得注意的 | |
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4 disappearance | |
n.消失,消散,失踪 | |
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5 peril | |
n.(严重的)危险;危险的事物 | |
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6 avert | |
v.防止,避免;转移(目光、注意力等) | |
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7 disastrous | |
adj.灾难性的,造成灾害的;极坏的,很糟的 | |
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8 obliteration | |
n.涂去,删除;管腔闭合 | |
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9 obliterate | |
v.擦去,涂抹,去掉...痕迹,消失,除去 | |
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10 obliterated | |
v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 );涂去;擦掉;彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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11 exterminated | |
v.消灭,根绝( exterminate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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12 lethal | |
adj.致死的;毁灭性的 | |
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13 diffused | |
散布的,普及的,扩散的 | |
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14 disintegration | |
n.分散,解体 | |
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15 stark | |
adj.荒凉的;严酷的;完全的;adv.完全地 | |
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16 renounce | |
v.放弃;拒绝承认,宣布与…断绝关系 | |
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17 abolition | |
n.废除,取消 | |
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18 impedes | |
阻碍,妨碍,阻止( impede的第三人称单数 ) | |
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19 apprehended | |
逮捕,拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 ); 理解 | |
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20 binding | |
有约束力的,有效的,应遵守的 | |
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21 inevitably | |
adv.不可避免地;必然发生地 | |
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22 victorious | |
adj.胜利的,得胜的 | |
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23 utterly | |
adv.完全地,绝对地 | |
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24 cosmos | |
n.宇宙;秩序,和谐 | |
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25 countless | |
adj.无数的,多得不计其数的 | |
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26 waned | |
v.衰落( wane的过去式和过去分词 );(月)亏;变小;变暗淡 | |
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27 sublimity | |
崇高,庄严,气质高尚 | |
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28 destitute | |
adj.缺乏的;穷困的 | |
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29 incapable | |
adj.无能力的,不能做某事的 | |
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30 impartial | |
adj.(in,to)公正的,无偏见的 | |
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31 dictates | |
n.命令,规定,要求( dictate的名词复数 )v.大声讲或读( dictate的第三人称单数 );口授;支配;摆布 | |
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32 extermination | |
n.消灭,根绝 | |
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