激情晨读英语美文 第三章 美是大地的微笑:论美

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Chapter Three 
Beauty Is the Smile on the Earth’s Face
A ship in sail,
an opening flower,
a town at night,
the song of the blackbird,
a lovely poem,
leaf shadows,
a child’s grace,
the starry skies,
apple trees in spring,
sheep-bells on a hill,
a rippling stream,
a butterfly,
the crescent moon,
the thousand sights or sounds or words
that evoke in us the thought of beauty —
these are the drops of rain
that keep the human spirit from death by drought.
They are a stealing and silent refreshment
that we perhaps do not think about,
but which goes on all the time.
Beauty is the smile on the earth’s face,
open to all, and needs but the eyes to see,
the mood to understand.
——John Galsworthy
On Beauty
By Gibran Khalil Gibran
Where shall you seek beauty,
and how shall you find her
unless she herself be your way and your guide?
And how shall you speak of her
except she be the weaver of your speech?
The aggrieved and the injured say,
“Beauty is kind and gentle.
Like a young mother half-shy of her own glory
she walks among us.”
And the passionate say,
“Nay, beauty is a thing of might and dread.
Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us
and sky above us.”
The tired and the weary say,
“Beauty is of soft whisperings.
She speaks in our spirit.
Her voice yields to our silences like a faint light
that quivers in fear of the shadow.”
But the restless say,
“We have heard her shouting among the mountains,
and with her cries came the sound of hoofs,
and the beating of wings and the roaring of lions.”
At night the watchmen of the city say,
“Beauty shall rise with the dawn from the east.”
And at noon-time the toilers say,
“We have seen her leaning over the earth
from the windows of the sunset.”
In winter say the snowbound,
“She shall come with the spring leaping upon the hills.”
And in the summer heat the reapers say,
“We have seen her dancing with the autumn leaves,
and we saw a drift of snow in her hair.”
All these things have you said of beauty,
yet in truth you spoke not of her
but of needs unsatisfied,
and beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting
nor an empty hand stretched forth,
but rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted.
It is not the image you would see
nor the song you would hear,
but rather an image you see though you close your eyes
and a song you hear though you shut your ears.
It is not sap within the furrowed bark,
nor a wing attached to a claw,
but rather a garden for ever in bloom
and a flock of angels for ever in flight.
Beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.