英语美文：Dear Sir or Madam

 What's in a word? Quite a lot, I suspect.

Travellers to Francophone and Hispanophone countries will have noticed a superiority of everyday social interactions to those observable in our own country. They retain a slightly formulaic ceremoniousness that is now entirely¹ lacking from our own culture, and that comes (at least to me) as a great relief. If there's one thing that ought to be avoided in casual, everyday encounters, it's saying the first thing that comes into your head.

I attribute the superiority in part to their continued use of the terms Monsieur and Madame and Se?or and Se?ora. It is not affectation, but a deeply ingrained habit. You don't go into a shop in France without saying "Bonjour, monsieur" or "Bonjour, madame".

The other day, I was crossing the street in Paris reading a book, as is my slightly hazardous² wont³, when a man on a bicycle nearly ran me down. "Attention, monsieur! Attention, monsieur!" he cried, not forgetting his manners even in his irritation⁴. I shouted an appropriate apology after him, rather gratified and reassured⁵ by the whole episode.

Goodness knows what an English cyclist would have shouted in the circumstance: almost certainly something unprintable in a respectable journal.

For some reason we in England can no longer use Sir and Madam in an unstilted way. The last time I called an adult Sir was in addressing a coroner while explaining how a patient came to hang himself. As for Madam, I used it only when angry, for example after a woman launched into me with reflections upon my character when I had inadvertently and unknowingly stood in her way for a few moments. "You have a tongue in your head, Madam, have you not, and could have asked me to move?" In my mouth, then, Madam is a term of abuse.

Why can we not use Sir and Madam? It obviously has something to do with our ideological⁶ revulsion against any taint⁷ of hierarchy⁸. So in large parts of the country, I am most commonly addressed by spotty young men as "mate". This aggressively levelling and proletarianising mode of address has spread very rapidly. The trouble is that objecting to it (which I have on occasion done) sounds pompous⁹ and priggish, in the same way that objecting to obscenity always appears prudish¹⁰ and narrow-minded. There seems to be a Gresham's Law of etiquette¹¹: the coarse drives out the refined. The Bolsheviks knew this very well, and welcomed it.

I should like to start a society for the restoration of Sir and Madam in everyday speech. Unfortunately, all the causes I espouse¹² are lost.

1 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

2 hazardous   

adj.(有)危险的，冒险的；碰运气的

参考例句：

• These conditions are very hazardous for shipping.这些情况对航海非常不利。
• Everybody said that it was a hazardous investment.大家都说那是一次危险的投资。

3 wont   

adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯

参考例句：

• He was wont to say that children are lazy.他常常说小孩子们懒惰。
• It is his wont to get up early.早起是他的习惯。

4 irritation   

n.激怒，恼怒，生气

参考例句：

• He could not hide his irritation that he had not been invited.他无法掩饰因未被邀请而生的气恼。
• Barbicane said nothing,but his silence covered serious irritation.巴比康什么也不说，但是他的沉默里潜伏着阴郁的怒火。

5 reassured   

adj.使消除疑虑的；使放心的v.再保证，恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词)

参考例句：

• The captain's confidence during the storm reassured the passengers. 在风暴中船长的信念使旅客们恢复了信心。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The doctor reassured the old lady. 医生叫那位老妇人放心。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 ideological   

a.意识形态的

参考例句：

• He always tries to link his study with his ideological problems. 他总是把学习和自己的思想问题联系起来。
• He helped me enormously with advice on how to do ideological work. 他告诉我怎样做思想工作，对我有很大帮助。

7 taint   

n.污点；感染；腐坏；v.使感染；污染

参考例句：

• Everything possible should be done to free them from the economic taint.应尽可能把他们从经济的腐蚀中解脱出来。
• Moral taint has spread among young people.道德的败坏在年轻人之间蔓延。

8 hierarchy   

n.等级制度；统治集团，领导层

参考例句：

• There is a rigid hierarchy of power in that country.那个国家有一套严密的权力等级制度。
• She's high up in the management hierarchy.她在管理阶层中地位很高。

9 pompous   

adj.傲慢的，自大的；夸大的；豪华的

参考例句：

• He was somewhat pompous and had a high opinion of his own capabilities.他有点自大，自视甚高。
• He is a good man underneath his pompous appearance. 他的外表虽傲慢，其实是个好人。

10 prudish   

adj.装淑女样子的，装规矩的，过分规矩的；adv.过分拘谨地

参考例句：

• I'm not prudish but I think these photographs are obscene.我并不是假正经的人，但我觉得这些照片非常淫秽。
• She was sexually not so much chaste as prudish.她对男女关系与其说是注重贞节，毋宁说是持身谨慎。

11 etiquette   

n.礼仪，礼节；规矩

参考例句：

• The rules of etiquette are not so strict nowadays.如今的礼仪规则已不那么严格了。
• According to etiquette,you should stand up to meet a guest.按照礼节你应该站起来接待客人。

12 espouse   

v.支持，赞成，嫁娶

参考例句：

• Today,astronomers espouse the theory that comets spawn the swarms.如今，天文学家们支持彗星产生了流星团的说法。
• Some teachers enthusiastically espouse the benefits to be gained from educational software.有些教师热烈赞同可以从教学软件中得到好处的观点。