Youth青春

Youth is not a time of life;

it is a state of mind;

it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees;

it is a matter of the will,

a quality of the imagination,

a vigor of the emotions;

it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.

青春不是生命裡的一段時光年華，

而是心境；

青春所指的不是桃面、丹唇、柔膝，

而是一種意志的呈現：

高超的想像力，

和充沛的熱情；

它是生命泉源湧現的清新。

Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity of the appetite,

for adventure over the love of ease.

This often exists in a man of sixty more than a boy of twenty.

Nobody grows old merely by a number of years.

We grow old by deserting our ideals.

青春是一股蓋過怯弱慾望的超然勇氣，

冒險上進，不圖苟安。

這種氣質可見於二十青年，更常見於六十男人。

年歲有加，並非垂老，

理想丟棄，方墮暮年。

Years may wrinkle the skin,

but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul.

Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart

and turns the spirit back to dust.

歲月悠悠，衰微只及肌膚；

熱忱拋卻，頹廢必致靈魂。

憂煩，惶恐，喪失自信，

且使心靈墜於塵土。

Whether sixty or sixteen,

there is in every human being's heart the lure of wonder,

the unfailing child-like appetite of what's next,

and the joy of the game of living.

無論年屆花甲，擬或二八芳齡，

心中皆有好奇誘惑和生命歡樂，

一如孩童，久盛不衰。

In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station;

so long as it receives messages

of beauty, hope, cheer, courage

and power from men and from the infinite,

so long are you young.

人人心中皆有一座無線電台；

只要持續從天上人間接受美好、希望、歡樂、勇氣和力量的訊息，

你就青春永駐，風華常存。

When the aerials are down,

and your spirit is covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism,

then you are grown old, even at twenty,

but as long as your aerials are up,

to catch the waves of optimism,

there is hope you may die young at eighty.

一旦天線倒塌，

心靈被墮落卑觀的冰雪風暴覆蓋，

即使年方二十，實已垂垂老矣；

然則只要天線仍然豎立，

捉注樂觀的信號，

有望在八十離世時仍覺年輕。

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