心猿意馬

I have spent many an hour, when I was younger, floating over its surface as the zephyr willed, having paddled my boat to the middle, and lying on my back across the seats, in a summer forenoon, dreaming awake, until I was aroused by the boat touching the sand, and I arose to see what shore my fates had impelled me to; days when idleness was the most attractive and productive industry. Many a forenoon have I stolen away, preferring to spend thus the most valued part of the day; for I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days, and spent them lavishly; nor do I regret that I did not waste more of them in the workshop or the teacher's desk. But since I left those shores the woodchoppers have still further laid them waste, and now for many a year there will be no more rambling through the aisles of the wood, with occasional vistas through which you see the water. My Muse may be excused if she is silent henceforth. How can you expect the birds to sing when their groves are cut down?

唐玄奘在五十六歲時想要歸隱少林寺，於是向高宗進表：

　... 斷伏煩惱，必定、慧相資，如車二輪，闕一不可。至如研味
　經論，慧學也；依林宴坐，定學也。玄奘少來頗得專精教義，唯
　於四禪九定，未暇安心。今願託慮禪門，澄心定水；制情猿之逸
　躁，縶意馬之奔馳。若不歛跡山中，不可成就 ...

可見要想成就定學，外在環境也是必要因素。這也可以說明為何自己總是心猿意馬，不得安住。住心尚不能得，何況解脫？任憑一個人如何有修養及智慧，要在人世凡塵中以佛教的修煉方式求得解脫是不可能的。因為要想成就定學，外在環境也是必要因素；「若不歛跡山中，不可成就 」。

　《法華經》的勸持品中提到修煉聲聞乘的比丘們承認自己沒有能力在我們這個世界中廣說《法華經》，這是因為我們這個世界的人多弊惡、傲慢、功德淺薄，內心多懷瞋怒、污濁、諂媚，而且不誠實。只有具備大忍力的菩薩才能在這裡教化弘通這部經典。

　　
梭羅年輕時經常於夏日上午，乘著他的小舟，划到池心，然後躺在舟上，作著他清醒的夢。就這麼載浮載沉，直到他的舟給徐徐的風帶到了岸上，他才起來看看命運之流將他帶到了那裡。他說，在那些日子裡，閑散、無所事事才是最迷人而具有生機的勞動。因為他有的是明媚的陽光和夏日，所以可以大筆揮霍。他往往偷溜出來，寧願把一天中最寶貴的時間就這麼渡過，而不要用在工作室裡或老師的桌前。嗣因他離開湖邊的日子裡，伐木工人把附近的林地攪的荒蕪一片，原來的林間小道沒了，自然也沒了偶爾透過樹林空隙可以瞧見的池水景緻；梭羅的詩興因之沉默，畢竟你如何忍心責備被砍了樹林的小鳥不再鳴唱！

　

湖水、海水和玻璃的顏色

All our Concord waters have two colors at least; one when viewed at a distance, and another, more proper, close at hand. The first depends more on the light, and follows the sky. In clear weather, in summer, they appear blue at a little distance, especially if agitated, and at a great distance all appear alike. In stormy weather they are sometimes of a dark slate-color. The sea, however, is said to be blue one day and green another without any perceptible change in the atmosphere. I have seen our river, when, the landscape being covered with snow, both water and ice were almost as green as grass. Some consider blue "to be the color of pure water, whether liquid or solid." But, looking directly down into our waters from a boat, they are seen to be of very different colors. Walden is blue at one time and green at another, even from the same point of view. Lying between the earth and the heavens, it partakes of the color of both. Viewed from a hilltop it reflects the color of the sky; but near at hand it is of a yellowish tint next the shore where you can see the sand, then a light green, which gradually deepens to a uniform dark green in the body of the pond. In some lights, viewed even from a hilltop, it is of a vivid green next the shore. Some have referred this to the reflection of the verdure; but it is equally green there against the railroad sandbank, and in the spring, before the leaves are expanded, and it may be simply the result of the prevailing blue mixed with the yellow of the sand. Such is the color of its iris. This is that portion, also, where in the spring, the ice being warmed by the heat of the sun reflected from the bottom, and also transmitted through the earth, melts first and forms a narrow canal about the still frozen middle. Like the rest of our waters, when much agitated, in clear weather, so that the surface of the waves may reflect the sky at the right angle, or because there is more light mixed with it, it appears at a little distance of a darker blue than the sky itself; and at such a time, being on its surface, and looking with divided vision, so as to see the reflection, I have discerned a matchless and indescribable light blue, such as watered or changeable silks and sword blades suggest, more cerulean than the sky itself, alternating with the original dark green on the opposite sides of the waves, which last appeared but muddy in comparison. It is a vitreous greenish blue, as I remember it, like those patches of the winter sky seen through cloud vistas in the west before sundown. Yet a single glass of its water held up to the light is as colorless as an equal quantity of air. It is well known that a large plate of glass will have a green tint, owing, as the makers say, to its "body," but a small piece of the same will be colorless. How large a body of Walden water would be required to reflect a green tint I have never proved. The water of our river is black or a very dark brown to one looking directly down on it, and, like that of most ponds, imparts to the body of one bathing in it a yellowish tinge; but this water is of such crystalline purity that the body of the bather appears of an alabaster whiteness, still more unnatural, which, as the limbs are magnified and distorted withal, produces a monstrous effect, making fit studies for a Michael Angelo.

梭羅在此用了一大段文字描寫華爾騰湖的湖水顏色。他還用玻璃的顏色來作比較。但是我們現在知道這可能是兩回事。應該是無色的厚玻璃之所以會呈現綠色，跟它的材質(原料配方)有關；低鐵玻璃可以作到完全透明。而湖水和海水的顏色之所以會產生不同的變化，主要是因為大海的顏色是由海面反射的光和來自海水內部的回散射光的顏色決定的。湖水亦然。

太陽光線雖然從表面上看是白色的，可實際上它是由紅、橙、黃、綠、青、藍、紫七種可見光組成。這七種光線波長各不相同，而不同深度的海水會吸收不同波長的光，也就是說，海水對不同波長光的吸收和散射是有選擇性的。一般情況下，紅色和黃色等色光的波長比較長，最容易被海水吸收，當他們射入海水後，大部分光會被海水吸收，只有極少部分被水分子及海水中的懸浮顆粒反射和散射。而波長較短的藍光和綠光的穿透能力強，當它們射入海水後，只有少部分被海水吸收，大部分光遇到水分子或其他懸浮顆粒便向四周反射和散射，這樣一來，海水對藍光吸收得少而反射得多，而且越往海水深處越有更多的藍光被折回到水面上來。當這些被反射的藍色光射入到我們眼睛裏時，我們看到的大海便是藍藍的一片。 （問號小博士）

溪頭之旅

There was one older man, an excellent fisher and skilled in all kinds of woodcraft, who was pleased to look upon my house as a building erected for
the convenience of fishermen; and I was equally pleased when he sat in my doorway to arrange his lines.

Once in a while we sat together on the pond, he at one end of the boat, and I at the other; but not many words passed between us, for he had grown deaf
in his later years, but he occasionally hummed a psalm, which harmonized well enough with my philosophy.

Our intercourse was thus altogether one of unbroken harmony, far more pleasing to remember than if it had been carried on by speech. When, as was commonly
the case, I had none to commune with, I used to raise the echoes by striking with a paddle on the side of my boat, filling the surrounding woods with
circling and dilating sound, stirring them up as the keeper of a menagerie his wild beasts, until I elicited a growl from every wooded vale and hillside.

有一善釣魚的老者，精於各種木工，樂於將我的小屋當作釣客休憩之所；而我亦欣然見到他來坐在我門前小逕整理釣線。一日，我與他在池上，各坐在舟的一端；因其年老耳朵漸聾，我們交談不多，然其偶爾哼唱之詩歌，與我的哲學頗相合。我們之間的交流乃成了一段沒有間斷的旋律，較之言語的溝通更值懷念。當我無話可說之時，也嘗用漿擊船舷，鏗鏗鏘鏘，聲振林木，好似馴獸師的鞭子拍在地上，激得每個林壑山坡發出回應之吼。

-- 譯自湖濱散記, 於溪頭大學池旁

此段《湖濱散記》是我有一次去有「台灣的康乃爾」之稱的溪頭時所譯。那時我的朋友帥憲正在康乃爾求學，所以想去體會他在異鄉生活的景況。

這大概是我生平第二次來到這裡。十多年前，當我們都還是理著平頭的高中生時，也曾來到這個地方參加救國團的自強活動。只是我人到了溪頭，卻似從未來過一般。此時方知，『凡走過必留下痕跡』這句話，應該是某個無聊的人憑空想像的蠢話。

第二天上午，洗過澡，練了一套八段錦，到大學池旁的咖啡廳，也許看過書，寫過東西以後，便從銀杏林道出發，往不知名的方向走去。這一天，是絕對自由的。

即使在平常的夜晚，森林裡都比一般人所料想的更黑。人之所以群居，之所以貪財好富，皆是由於恐懼；恐懼黑暗，恐懼孤獨，恐懼貧窮。

風行草偃

I had no lock nor bolt but for the desk which held my papers, not even a nail to put over my latch or windows. I never fastened my door night or day, though I was to be absent several days; not even when the next fall I spent a fortnight in the woods of Maine. And yet my house was more respected than if it had been surrounded by a file of soldiers. The tired rambler could rest and warm himself by my fire, the literary amuse himself with the few books on my table, or the curious, by opening my closet door, see what was left of my dinner, and what prospect I had of a supper. Yet, though many people of every class came this way to the pond, I suffered no serious inconvenience from these sources, and I never missed anything but one small book, a volume of Homer, which perhaps was improperly gilded, and this I trust a soldier of our camp has found by this time. I am convinced, that if all men were to live as simply as I then did, thieving and robbery would be unknown. These take place only in communities where some have got more than is sufficient while others have not enough. The Pope's Homers would soon get properly distributed.

"Nec bella fuerunt,
Faginus astabat dum scyphus ante dapes."
"Nor wars did men molest,
When only beechen bowls were in request."

"You who govern public affairs, what need have you to employ punishments? Love virtue, and the people will be virtuous. The virtues of a superior man are like the wind; the virtues of a common man are like the grass; the grass, when the wind passes over it, bends."


《論語．顏淵》

季康子問政於孔子曰：“如殺無道，以就有道，何如？”孔子對曰：“子為政，焉用殺？子欲善，而民善矣。君子之德風，小人之德草。草上之風，必偃。”

不患寡而患不均是梭羅的思想，他認為如果每個人都生活的像他在樹林時這麼簡樸，根本就不會有偷盜發生；那種事情只會發生在有些人所得超過必需而有些人卻不足的社會。現在大概沒有人會相信這種事情。有些人即使所得已經很足夠了，他還是要偷盜。我在東西德統一之後不久曾到過東德，有機會到一個動物園管理員家中作客。那天，他帶著我和另一位研究鳥類的台灣朋友，跟著他做日常的餵養和管理工作。晚上，他在小小的居室點起暖爐，沒有多餘的傢俱，只是牆壁上排滿著書。三個人吃著很簡單的食物，也許談到孔子的學生顏淵，以前的東德。他大概也不認為共產主義的社會合乎人性，但卻對過去人與人的關係充滿懷念。

如果在上位者都爭著去富豪家的婚宴作客，要人民不跟從也難。你們拿著人民的錢，制定了法律，要求人民不可學你們這樣；但是只要努力打拼，總有一天，總有一天，等賺夠了錢，有了足夠的身份地位，那也能像你們這樣。那些沒有能力，也沒有祖上庇蔭的人，應該安份守己，等你們吃飽喝足了，也許還會剩下一些排翅鮑魚，可以讓他們嚐嚐，作作夢也好。

非暴力反抗 (Civil Disobedience)

One afternoon, near the end of the first summer, when I went to the village to get a shoe from the cobbler's, I was seized and put into jail, because, as I have elsewhere related, I did not pay a tax to, or recognize the authority of, the State which buys and sells men, women, and children, like cattle, at the door of its senate-house. I had gone down to the woods for other purposes. But, wherever a man goes, men will pursue and paw him with their dirty institutions, and, if they can, constrain him to belong to their desperate odd-fellow society. It is true, I might have resisted forcibly with more or less effect, might have run "amok" against society; but I preferred that society should run "amok" against me, it being the desperate party. However, I was released the next day, obtained my mended shoe, and returned to the woods in season to get my dinner of huckleberries on Fair Haven Hill.

第一年的夏天將近尾聲，某天下午，梭羅到鎮上拿之前送去修補的鞋子時，被逮捕入獄，因為沒有繳稅。他認為那種會在國會門口販賣奴隸的政府，沒有資格抽人民的稅。

目前台灣這個政府，似乎沒有在做什麼正面的事；若是有，也是人民自己做，而它剛好樂觀其成的。它沒有在維護國家主權及自由，也沒有幫台商西進大陸。它沒有教育人民，而是台灣人民自己教育自己，以免被它的教育污染。一切完成的事多是台灣人民依據自己性格完成的；要不是政府從中阻撓，台灣人民還能做的更多。所以，這樣一個犯下跟李泰安搞軌案一樣罪行的政府，怎能讓人繳稅繳的心甘情願？

梭羅說，培養對法律的尊敬，正如培養對權利的尊敬一樣，是不當的。法律從不能使人的正直增加絲毫。而由於對法律的尊敬，即使天性善良的人也日日做了非正義的代理人。說到對權利的尊敬，以音樂的智慧財產權為例，智慧財產權的存在實是人類在市場經濟的機制運作下退化的現象。市場經濟假設除非這些智慧財產受到保護，沒有人會有動機去發明新的事物；譬如大成本的電影，或者是需要龐大研發經費的新藥品。所以實際上，這些受保護的人，基本上是為了私利而創作，雖然受法律保護，實在不值得尊重。從經濟方面來說，像音樂這種製作成本很低的智慧財產有沒有必要保護也有爭議性。也就是說，保護唱片業者，是否就保證大眾能夠聽到較好的音樂？恐怕未必。我不知道馬英九先生是否天性善良，但他不但尊敬法律，也尊敬權利。

我們唯一應盡的義務，是在任何時候都不做違背自己良心的事。林義雄先生說的好，他的道德標準一點也不高，他周圍的人都是這樣誠實地在過日子，這樣才是個人，才是個台灣人。

共產黨宣言

Ancient poetry and mythology suggest, at least, that husbandry was once a sacred art; but it is pursued with irreverent haste and heedlessness by us, our object being to have large farms and large crops merely. We have no festival, nor procession, nor ceremony, not excepting our cattle-shows and so-called Thanksgivings, by which the farmer expresses a sense of the sacredness of his calling, or is reminded of its sacred origin. It is the premium and the feast which tempt him. He sacrifices not to Ceres and the Terrestrial Jove, but to the infernal Plutus rather. By avarice and selfishness, and a grovelling habit, from which none of us is free, of regarding the soil as property, or the means of acquiring property chiefly, the landscape is deformed, husbandry is degraded with us, and the farmer leads the meanest of lives. He knows Nature but as a robber. Cato says that the profits of agriculture are particularly pious or just (maximeque pius quæstus), and according to Varro the old Romans "called the same earth Mother and Ceres, and thought that they who cultivated it led a pious and useful life, and that they alone were left of the race of King Saturn."

這段文字讓我想起了馬克斯的<共產黨宣言>。

160多年前，即1848年二月，由馬克思主筆，而與恩格斯共同署名的<共產黨宣言>問世。那時梭羅已經結束他在華爾騰湖旁兩年的實驗，暫住在愛默森的家裡。此時的共產主義已經被歐洲一切勢力公認為一種勢力。

<共產黨宣言>裡說：

凡是資產階級已經取得統治的地方，就把所有封建的、宗法的和純樸的關係統統破壞了；無情的斬斷了那些使人依附於「天然的尊長」的形形色色的封建羈絆，使人和人之間，除了赤裸裸的利害關係，即冷酷無情的「現金交易」之外，再也找不到任何其他的聯繫。也把高尚激昂的宗教虔誠、俠義的血性及平凡人的溫情，一概淹沒在利己主義的冷漠之中。... 總而言之，它用公開的、無恥的、直接的、冷酷的剝削，代替了由宗教幻想和政治幻想掩蔽著的剝削。

資產階級如果不使生產工具經常發生變革，就不能生存下去。... 生產中經常不斷的變革，一切社會關係接連不斷的震盪，恆久的不安定和變動 －－ 這就是資產階級時代不同於過去各個時代的地方。... 一切新產生的關係，也都等不到固定下來就變陳舊了。... 一切神聖的事物都給褻瀆了，於是人們最後也就只好用冷靜的眼光來看待自己的生活處境和自己的相互關係了。


羅馬的農業作家Marcus Porcius Cato(234-149 B.C.)曾說：農業的收益是特別虔敬或正當的；但是，梭羅說，”由於貪婪與自私，我們把土地視作私產，或拿來作為獲取私產的手段，農業因之跟著我們一起降格，而農夫則過著最低下的生活”；由於貪婪與自私，我們把智慧視作私產，或拿來作為獲取私產的手段，智識因之跟著我們一起降格，而讀書人則過著最低下的生活。

共產主義本有著天下為公的理想，所以土地不能私有；然而共產主義終究敵不過人類的貪婪和自私，到最後變成了服務少數統治階級者鞏固權力的工具，另一種更厲害的、由政治幻想掩蔽著的剝削。中國的共產黨員肯定對<共產黨宣言>的內容十分熟稔，但是統治階級及資本主義社會才有的中產階級卻可以為了祖國的榮光（事實上是個人的榮光）自欺欺人，掛羊頭賣狗肉。即使中國真的強了，也不過是全世界最大的詐騙集團罷了。而左派人士最為人詬病的地方亦在於此：一方面不願放棄資本主義世界所提供的舒適生活，另一方面批評資本家的不義及剝削，渾然不知自己是剝削者的幫凶。梭羅說，事實上，人並沒有義務獻身於根除錯誤。但如果他要獻身於其他的追求和沉思，他至少必須先弄清楚，他不是坐在別人的肩膀上追求他們的。我們不再需要由宗教幻想和政治幻想掩蔽著的剝削，但如果你無法過簡單樸素的生活，而又不是資產階級，那就只能成為生產機器的簡單附屬品，和其他的勞動工具競爭，跟著受到市場波動影響，隨時準備放無薪假，自願從自由人降格為資本家奴役的對象。

共產黨的實驗已經證明馬克思理論的失敗，人類只能盡可能的讓人類社會往更開放的路上走。階級之分會永遠存在於人類社會；年輕時的哥兒們在經過一二十年的發展後，在下層工作的人會自然與上流社會遠離。這樣的階級之分無法以鬥爭來打破。市場經濟鼓勵公平競爭也許是階級鬥爭的最終型態。馬克思理論的另一個誤判是人類的健忘。馬克思認為由於工商業太發達，社會所擁有的生產力會大到市場無法消耗。結果是，資產階級一方面不得不消滅大量生產力，另一方面奪取新的市場以及更加徹底的剝削舊的市場。然而，人類的歷史與個人的一生都是片斷而不連續的。這是因為人類的記憶往往是破碎而不完整之故。如果我向世人宣稱，昨日的我已非今日之我，世人多半存疑；但是沒有人會否認十年前的我已經和今日的我大不相同。就我本身而言，十年前的我又有多少意義可言呢？幸好，因為人類的健忘，市場經濟對地球資源的消耗才能稍微緩一緩。企業為了保持競爭力，必須不斷創新。但是太陽底下能有多少新鮮事呢？因為人類的健忘而把舊的事物當成新的，於是多餘的生產力便可以適時被市場消化。共產黨的實驗雖已經證明馬克思理論的失敗，但馬克思主義仍會是個備忘錄，提醒世人市場經濟只是必要之惡，絕對不是真正的解決之道。

播 種

This further experience also I gained: I said to myself, I will not plant beans and corn with so much industry another summer, but such seeds, if the seed is not lost, as sincerity, truth, simplicity, faith, innocence, and the like, and see if they will not grow in this soil, even with less toil and manurance, and sustain me, for surely it has not been exhausted for these crops. Alas! I said this to myself; but now another summer is gone, and another, and another, and I am obliged to say to you, Reader, that the seeds which I planted, if indeed they were the seeds of those virtues, were wormeaten or had lost their vitality, and so did not come up. Commonly men will only be brave as their fathers were brave, or timid. This generation is very sure to plant corn and beans each new year precisely as the Indians did centuries ago and taught the first settlers to do, as if there were a fate in it. I saw an old man the other day, to my astonishment, making the holes with a hoe for the seventieth time at least, and not for himself to lie down in! But why should not the New Englander try new adventures, and not lay so much stress on his grain, his potato and grass crop, and his orchards — raise other crops than these? Why concern ourselves so much about our beans for seed, and not be concerned at all about a new generation of men? We should really be fed and cheered if when we met a man we were sure to see that some of the qualities which I have named, which we all prize more than those other productions, but which are for the most part broadcast and floating in the air, had taken root and grown in him. Here comes such a subtile and ineffable quality, for instance, as truth or justice, though the slightest amount or new variety of it, along the road.Our ambassadors should be instructed to send home such seeds as these, and Congress help to distribute them over all the land. We should never stand upon ceremony with sincerity. We should never cheat and insult and banish one another by our meanness, if there were present the kernel of worth and friendliness. We should not meet thus in haste. Most men I do not meet at all, for they seem not to have time; they are busy about their beans. We would not deal with a man thus plodding ever, leaning on a hoe or a spade as a staff between his work, not as a mushroom, but partially risen out of the earth, something more than erect, like swallows alighted and walking on the ground: —

"And as he spake, his wings would now and then
Spread, as he meant to fly, then close again —"

so that we should suspect that we might be conversing with an angel. Bread may not always nourish us; but it always does us good, it even takes stiffness out of our joints, and makes us supple and buoyant, when we knew not what ailed us, to recognize any generosity in man or Nature, to share any unmixed and heroic joy.

我一直想著，像我這樣的人，若是沒有佔了這麼多的便宜，而是必須像大部份的人一樣工作謀生養家，那我最適合幹什麼？深思熟慮之後，就只剩下去種一些不用去街上叫賣的農作物了；如果作物賣不出去，至少可以養活自己。但是這樣恐怕還養不活我的家人。假設性的問題就不要想了！

《耕者婆羅豆婆遮經》說到一則故事：

佛陀有一次在化緣時遇見耕者婆羅豆婆遮。婆羅豆婆遮對佛陀說：「世尊！我種作人耕種而食，不從人乞。瞿曇！汝今亦可耕種而食。」佛陀回道：「我亦耕種而食。」婆羅豆婆遮說：「自說耕田者，而不見其耕，為我說耕田，令我知耕法。」

佛陀於是說：

信心為種子，智慧為時軛，慚愧心為轅，正念為犁鞭。
保藏身口業，知食處內藏，真諦以除草，樂住為懈息。
精進為馱牛，安隱而速進，直往不轉還，得到無憂處。
如是耕田者，逮得甘露果，如是耕田者，不還受諸有。

婆羅豆婆遮聽了，以大銅缽盛乳粥奉上，說道：「請尊者食用！尊者是耕作者，因為，尊者所種植的是真正的甘露果。」

梭羅第一年種了豆子後，第二年似乎就沒種了。他說他要在那片土地上播下其他的種子：譬如真誠，真理，單純，信念，純潔，以及諸如此類的其他種子。然而在過了幾年之後，他發現他播下的那些種子可能因為被狗啃了，所以連發芽的機會都沒有。

如果人類應該從歷史得到經驗，則我可以跳過種豆子的過程，直接再去播下真誠，真理，單純，信念及純潔這些甘露果的種子，看它們會不會在台灣這塊土地上抽出芽來。只要這些種子能在台灣生根，那我們便永遠不必再去講求虛禮，不必再用卑下來欺騙和污辱對方，像郭台銘和林百里那樣試圖消滅對方。

阿羅漢的神通

As I drew a still fresher soil about the rows with my hoe, I disturbed the ashes of unchronicled nations who in primeval years lived under these heavens, and their small implements of war and hunting were brought to the light of this modern day. They lay mingled with other natural stones, some of which bore the marks of having been burned by Indian fires, and some by the sun, and also bits of pottery and glass brought hither by the recent cultivators of the soil. When my hoe tinkled against the stones, that music echoed to the woods and the sky, and was an accompaniment to my labor which yielded an instant and immeasurable crop. It was no longer beans that I hoed, nor I that hoed beans; and I remembered with as much pity as pride, if I remembered at all, my acquaintances who had gone to the city to attend the oratorios. The nighthawk circled overhead in the sunny afternoons — for I sometimes made a day of it — like a mote in the eye, or in heaven's eye, falling from time to time with a swoop and a sound as if the heavens were rent, torn at last to very rags and tatters, and yet a seamless cope remained; small imps that fill the air and lay their eggs on the ground on bare sand or rocks on the tops of hills, where few have found them; graceful and slender like ripples caught up from the pond, as leaves are raised by the wind to float in the heavens; such kindredship is in nature. The hawk is aerial brother of the wave which he sails over and surveys, those his perfect air-inflated wings answering to the elemental unfledged pinions of the sea. Or sometimes I watched a pair of hen-hawks circling high in the sky, alternately soaring and descending, approaching, and leaving one another, as if they were the embodiment of my own thoughts. Or I was attracted by the passage of wild pigeons from this wood to that, with a slight quivering winnowing sound and carrier haste; or from under a rotten stump my hoe turned up a sluggish portentous and outlandish spotted salamander, a trace of Egypt and the Nile, yet our contemporary. When I paused to lean on my hoe, these sounds and sights I heard and saw anywhere in the row, a part of the inexhaustible entertainment which the country offers.

梭羅說他在華爾騰湖旁的高地種了兩英畝半，每行田畦長15杆，總長加起來是7英哩的豆田。

1杆是16.5英呎，16.5×15=247.5英呎。(每行田畦長度)
1英哩是5,280英呎，5280×7=36,960英呎。(田畦總長度)
36960÷247.5=149.3，所以梭羅大概種了150行田畦的豆田。

一英畝是43,560平方英呎，
2.5英畝則是43560×2.5=108,900平方英呎。(田畦總面積)
108900÷247.5=440英呎(田畦總寛度)，
440÷150=2.9英呎，所以每行田畦有大約3英呎寬。
一英呎約等於30公分。

《法句經》有：

如鴈將群　　避羅高翔　　明人導世　　度脫邪眾

這一偈說的是透過修行，人可以橫越天空、凌水而過，遁入地中等。這些能力是精神的、超越自然的，但絕不是奇蹟。梭羅說他在鋤豆田時看到一對鷂鷹在天空飛翔，一會盤旋而上，一會俯衝而下，互相接近而又遠離，正如他思想的化身。有時，我真的覺得透過梭羅的文字，我腳下的不是磨石子地板，而是踩在華爾騰湖旁，清晨露濕的豆田上。

給家穗

I could not but notice some of the peculiarities of my visitors. Girls and boys and young women generally seemed glad to be in the woods. They looked in the pond and at the flowers, and improved their time. Men of business, even farmers, thought only of solitude and employment, and of the great distance at which I dwelt from something or other; and though they said that they loved a ramble in the woods occasionally, it was obvious that they did not. Restless committed men, whose time was all taken up in getting a living or keeping it; ministers who spoke of God as if they enjoyed a monopoly of the subject, who could not bear all kinds of opinions; doctors, lawyers, uneasy housekeepers who pried into my cupboard and bed when I was out — how came Mrs. — to know that my sheets were not as clean as hers? — young men who had ceased to be young, and had concluded that it was safest to follow the beaten track of the professions — all these generally said that it was not possible to do so much good in my position. Ay! there was the rub. The old and infirm and the timid, of whatever age or sex, thought most of sickness, and sudden accident and death; to them life seemed full of danger — what danger is there if you don't think of any? — and they thought that a prudent man would carefully select the safest position, where Dr. B. might be on hand at a moment's warning. To them the village was literally a com-munity, a league for mutual defence, and you would suppose that they would not go a-huckleberrying without a medicine chest. The amount of it is, if a man is alive, there is always danger that he may die, though the danger must be allowed to be less in proportion as he is dead-and-alive to begin with. A man sits as many risks as he runs.

曾經看過一部日本電影《黃昏清兵衛》，其中有一段對白令我頗為感動：

男主角真田廣之是一個明治維新初年落魄的低階武士，妻子死後獨力撫養
二個幼女及癡呆的老母，需要靠作散工及借貸渡日。一晚聽到大女兒背誦
《論語》，問起學校的事。女兒說現在不論男女都要讀《論語》了。父親
不禁嘆道：多麼懷念兒時讀《論語》的日子！

女兒便問：我學會裁縫後，可以作和服、浴袍，但讀了書有什麼用呢？

父親想了想，說道：這個問題不是很容易回答 －－ 可以這麼說，讀了書
後，可以讓人學會思考，只要能夠思考，不論世道人心如何，你一樣可以
生存下去。

小女孩似懂非懂地答是，繼續背著：
　
　”吾日三省吾身：為人謀而不忠乎？與朋友交而不信乎？傳不習乎？”

這也就是說，只要學會怎樣思考，再大的難關都可以過得去。妳曾經遇過
比現在更困難的日子，可是從未想過尋短見。現在妳覺得累了，而且苦日
子好像沒有盡頭，但事實上並非這樣，自我了斷也解決不了問題。最要緊
的是妳如何看待事情，如何擺脫自我的束縛。