《四季随笔》是吉辛的散文代表作。其中对隐士赖克罗夫特醉心于书籍、自然景色与回忆过去生活的描述，其实是吉辛的自述，作者以此来抒发自己的情感，因而本书是一部富有自传色彩的小品文集。

吉辛穷困的一生，对文学名著的爱好与追求，以及对大自然恬静生活的向往，在书中均有充分的反映。本书分为春、夏、秋、冬四个部分，文笔优美，行文流畅，是英国文学中小品文的珍品之一。

以下是由网友分享的《四季随笔》节选 - 冬 16的内容，让我们一起来感受吉辛的四季吧!

I have been dull to-day, haunted by the thought of how much there is that I would fain know, and how little I can hope to learn. The scope of knowledge has become so vast. I put aside nearly all physical investigation; to me it is naught, or only, at moments, a matter of idle curiosity. This would seem to be a considerable clearing of the field; but it leaves what is practically the infinite. To run over a list of only my favourite subjects, those to which, all my life long, I have more or less applied myself, studies which hold in my mind the place of hobbies, is to open vistas of intellectual despair. In an old note-book I jotted down such a list—"things I hope to know, and to know well." I was then four and twenty. Reading it with the eyes of fifty-four, I must needs laugh. There appear such modest items as "The history of the Christian Church up to the Reformation"—"all Greek poetry"—"The field of Mediaeval Romance"—“German literature from Lessing6 to Heine”—"Dante!" Not one of these shall I ever "know, and know well"; not any one of them. Yet here I am buying books which lead me into endless paths of new temptation. What have I to do with Egypt? Yet I have been beguiled by Flinders Petrie7 and by Maspero8. How can I pretend to meddle with the ancient geography of Asia Minor? Yet here have I bought Prof. Ramsay9's astonishing book, and have even read with a sort of troubled enjoyment a good many pages of it; troubled, because I have but to reflect a moment, and I see that all this kind of thing is mere futile effort of the intellect when the time for serious intellectual effort is over.

今天我情绪低落，一直被一个想法所折磨，那就是，我想知道的东西那么多，而有望学到的却那么少。知识的领地已变得如此广阔，我放弃了几乎所有身体力行的探索。对我来说，它无足轻重，有时只是一种无聊的好奇。这样似乎清出了相当大的一块空地，而留下的却几乎是无限。仅来盘点一下我最爱的研究题目——它们是我一生中多多少少曾研究过的，在我的心目中占据着爱好的地位——我便看到了绝望的学海无涯的远景。在一本旧笔记上，我草草记下了一个清单——“我希望了解，并且是非常了解的事物”。当时我二十四岁。用现在五十四岁的眼睛看来，我忍不住要大笑。清单里有一些较小的项目，如“从基督教会到宗教改革的历史”、“所有希腊诗歌”、“中世纪的传奇”、“从莱辛到海涅的德国文学”，“但丁！”。其中没有一个我会“了解，而且非常了解”，没有任何一个。但是我又在买一些书把自己引领到新知诱惑的无尽道路。埃及跟我有什么关系呢？但我却被弗林德斯·皮特里和马伯乐深深吸引住了。我怎能逞强过问古代小亚细亚的地理呢？但是我买了拉姆齐教授让人啧啧惊奇的书，我带着一种不安的享受阅读了其中许多页；不安是因为只要略一思索，我就会明白，在我郑重努力探究学问的时代结束以后，所有这些都不过是智力所做的无用功而已。

It all means, of course, that, owing to defective opportunity, owing, still more perhaps, to lack of method and persistence, a possibility that was in me has been wasted, lost. My life has been merely tentative, a broken series of false starts and hopeless new beginnings. If I allowed myself to indulge that mood, I could revolt against the ordinance which allows me no second chance. O mihi praeteritos referat si Jupiter annos! If I could but start again, with only the experience there gained! I mean, make a new beginning of my intellectual life; nothing else, O heaven! Nothing else. Even amid poverty, I could do so much better; keeping before my eyes some definite, some not unattainable, good; sternly dismissing the impracticable, the wasteful.

当然，它也意味着：因为时机不佳，也许更因为方法和恒心的缺乏，我身上一种可能性被浪费掉了，丢失了。我的生活一直以来都只是尝试性的，一连串失败的开始和无望的新开端。如果放纵自己沉浸在那种情绪中，我会反抗那不给我第二次机会的自然法则。“唉，如果朱庇特能将过去的岁月带回给我！”如果我能够带着从那里获得的经验再次开始！我是说，让我的学术生活有一个崭新的开端；别得什么都不要，噢，上天哪，别得都不要。即使身陷贫穷，我也可以取得大得多的成就；在我面前设立某个确定的、并非遥不可及的目标，坚决摒弃不可行的和浪费时光的事情。

And, in doing so, become perhaps an owl-eyed pedant, to whom would be for ever dead the possibility of such enjoyment as I know in these final years. Who can say? Perhaps the sole condition of my progress to this state of mind and heart which make my happiness was that very stumbling and erring which I so regret.

这样做，我也许会成为一位有猫头鹰般眼睛的书呆子，也就永远不可能得到我在晚年的这些享受。谁能说得准呢？也许正是因为我现在如此懊悔的跌跌撞撞和屡屡犯错，我才能进步并取得今天这样一种愉快的身心状态。