寬容

內(nèi)容概要

《寬容》（Tolerance）是一部描寫人類思想發(fā)展史、暢銷近百年的通俗歷史讀本，是關(guān)于寬容和自由思想的人文主義經(jīng)典之作，由荷蘭裔美國著名歷史學家、作家房龍著作而成。他從人文主義的立場出發(fā)，探尋兩千年來人類精神上“不寬容”的原因。由于信仰、道德、風俗等的不同，人類形成了不同的利益群體，每個群體總是居住在壁壘森嚴的城堡里，用偏見和固執(zhí)這個堅固的屏障抵御外界和外來的影響。偏執(zhí)和固執(zhí)己見給人類帶來了悲劇，致使眾多杰出人物為了“寬容”的事業(yè)前仆后繼。他以深厚的人文關(guān)懷及倡導(dǎo)思想自由的精神解析了人類為尋求思想的權(quán)利昕走過的艱辛歷程，勾勒了一幅波瀾壯闊的人類思想解放史，讓我們重新發(fā)現(xiàn)和更深入地認識兩千年來政冶、宗教、文化、社會的曲折發(fā)展歷史和人類尋求自身解放的漫長歷程。    這本英漢雙語板的經(jīng)典之作，無論作為通俗的思想史讀本，還是作為語言學習的課外讀物，對當代中國的讀者都將產(chǎn)生積極的影響。為了使讀者能夠了解每段故事慨況，提高閱讀速度和閱讀水平，在每篇英文故事的前面增加了中文導(dǎo)讀。

作者簡介

作者：（美國）房龍亨德里克·威廉·房龍（Hendrik Willem Van Loon 1882——1944），美國作家，1882年出生在荷蘭，他是出色的通俗作家，在歷史、文化、文明、科學等方面都有著作，而且讀者眾多，他是偉大的文化普及者，大師級的人物。[編輯本段]亨德里克·威廉·房龍的生平　　房龍青年時期先后在美國康奈爾大學和德國慕尼黑大學學習，獲得博士學位，房龍在上大學前后，屢經(jīng)漂泊，當過教師，編輯，記者和播音員工作，在各種崗位上歷練人生，刻苦學習寫作，有一度還曾經(jīng)專門從通俗劇場中學習說話技巧。1913年起他開始寫書，直到1921年寫出《人類的故事》，一舉成名，從此飲譽世界，直至1946年去世。房龍多才多藝，能說和寫十種文字，拉得一手小提琴，還能畫畫，他的著作的插圖便全部出自自己手筆。　　年輕時的房龍，因經(jīng)濟拮據(jù)，像一頭大象一樣魯莽地闖入了出版界。他指望出本書掙錢維持生活，并以此成為到大學謀個教職的資本。但他選擇的是寫歷史作品，當時沒有人相信干這個能掙錢。由博士論文改寫的《荷蘭共和國的衰亡》，因其新穎的風格頗受書評界的好評，但卻只售出了不到700本，于是引來了出版商滿懷憐憫的話語：“我想連在街上開公交車的也比寫歷史的掙得多。”但有一位芝加哥的書評家卻預(yù)言，要是歷史都這么寫的話，不久歷史書將名列暢銷書榜。 　　當一位出版商有了同樣的先見之明，房龍一生的轉(zhuǎn)折點便到來了。這位出版商名叫霍雷斯·利弗奈特，房龍先后和他簽約寫了《文明的開端》、《人類的故事》、《圣經(jīng)的故事》、《寬容》等等。他們的合作歷時10個年頭?！段拿鞯拈_端》的意外熱銷已經(jīng)表明霍雷斯·利弗奈特獨具慧眼，而《人類的故事》不僅引來書評界的一片歡呼并獲得最佳少兒讀物獎，該書共印了32版，房龍本人的收益也不少于50萬美元。就連給這本書挑錯兒的歷史教授也不禁發(fā)出感嘆：在房龍的筆下，歷史上死氣沉沉的人物都成了活生生的人。 　　也許是熟悉歷史的緣故，房龍還是較早視希特勒上臺為嚴重威脅的少數(shù)美國人之一。1938年，他出版《我們的奮斗———對希特勒所著（我的奮斗）的回答》，擺出了與德國納粹勢不兩立的架勢。在德國入侵他的故國荷蘭、野蠻轟炸了他的出生地鹿特丹之后，房龍自稱“漢克大叔”，在美國通過短波廣播對被占領(lǐng)的荷蘭進行宣傳，以他特有的機智向受難的同胞傳遞了許多信息。[編輯本段]亨德里克·威廉·房龍的主要著述及部分簡介　　房龍的主要著述有：　　《荷蘭共和國的衰亡》（1913）　　《發(fā)現(xiàn)簡史》（1917）　　《古人類》（1920）　　《人類的故事》（1921）　　《圣經(jīng)的故事》（1923）　　《寬容》（1925）　　《美洲的故事》（1927）　　《制造奇跡的人》（1928）　　《倫勃朗的生平與時代》（1930）　　《房龍地理》（1932）　　《藝術(shù)》（1937）　　《太平洋的故事》（1940）　　《約翰·塞巴斯蒂安·巴赫的生平與時代》（1940）　　《托馬斯·杰弗遜》（1943）　　《西蒙·玻利瓦爾的生平與時代》（1943）　　《房龍地理》：　　《房龍地理》（即《人類的家園》），此書是美國的房龍于一九三二年所著，是一本不可多得的好書。它的宗旨是“把所有的高山、城市、大海統(tǒng)統(tǒng)放進地圖里，只告訴我們生活在那里的居民的情況，告訴我們他們?yōu)槭裁磿幼≡谀抢?，他們來自哪里，他們在干什么——把人類關(guān)心的故事寫進地理學”。換句話說，此書注重的是人文地理，他所講的只是“告訴我們生活在那里的居民情況，告訴我們他們?yōu)槭裁磿幼≡谀抢?，他們來自哪里，他們在干什么——把人類關(guān)心的故事寫進地理學?！币唤?jīng)他的渲染，平常我們看來很枯燥的地理知識，里面的山山水水，草草木木就顯得栩栩如生?！　v史發(fā)展到現(xiàn)在，已經(jīng)注明人類居住的這個地球是太小了?！碍h(huán)境保護”是現(xiàn)代工業(yè)發(fā)展到一定程度才提出的，房龍在書中多次指出，地理環(huán)境會影響人類的生存，反過來人類生活又會影響地球的環(huán)境，并用歷史事實反復(fù)提醒人類應(yīng)如何與地球友好相處，否則就會受到自然界的懲罰，他的這些觀點都有相當?shù)某耙庾R?！　》魁堃云鋸V博的知識、獨特的視角和嫻熟的表達為我們樹立了一個地理知識的范本。地理知識是公眾所共同擁有的，為什么能冠上房龍的名字？房龍地理自有其不同于別人之處。房龍也是分國家來講述地理，但他并不像雜貨鋪的老板那樣，滿足于陳列一個個國家的人口、面積等，他有意識地將人在地理中的活動貫穿在知識的介紹中。這個國家的氣候、地勢如何，人們是怎樣來適應(yīng)自然、利用自然繼而改造自然的；特定的環(huán)境中，人們選擇了怎樣特定的生活方式，繼而是如何影響當?shù)氐娘L俗、歷史的，最后形成這個獨一無二的國家和民族的。如果說以前的地理教科書是幻燈片的話，那么《房龍地理》就是一部活動的電影，里面的一切都栩栩如生，可觸可感，呼之欲出?！　　短窖蟮墓适隆罚骸　　短窖蟮墓适隆?，喜歡探險的人可以讀到15至18世紀歐洲人“地理大發(fā)現(xiàn)”中的所有重要的探險活動。從1519年至1522年麥哲倫首次環(huán)海航行，到1642年至1643年艾貝爾·塔斯曼航行至澳大利亞、新西蘭，從1728年白令穿越白令海峽，到1768年至1779年詹姆斯·庫克先后三次環(huán)海航行。喜歡地理的人，也可詳盡地了解太平洋的經(jīng)緯?！　　度祟惖墓适隆罚骸　≡谶x讀房龍的著作時，雖然《發(fā)明的故事》的科學內(nèi)涵，相比之下會更多一些，但其作品在世界上影響最大的還是他的成名之作《人類的故事》。房龍的成名之作《人類的故事》，是寫西方文明發(fā)展史，主要對象是少年。這本書在1921年11月推出，立即成為暢銷書。房龍因此書曾獲得美國圖書館協(xié)會和美國兒童讀物協(xié)會頒發(fā)的兩枚獎?wù)?，以表彰他在美國兒童讀物領(lǐng)域“所作的杰出貢獻”。這本書的主要讀者定位為少年兒童，實際上遠遠超過未成年少年兒童的閱讀水平?！　》魁垖憽度祟惖墓适隆窌r愛因斯坦的相對論還沒有深入人心（盡管愛因斯坦早在1905年就提出相對論，但即使他在1921年獲得了諾貝爾物理獎，人們還是沒有真正認識到相對論的價值），許多人都認為經(jīng)典物理已經(jīng)達到科學的頂峰，人類社會也已經(jīng)發(fā)展到了某種極限，而房龍卻這樣預(yù)言未來：“到了公元10000年……他們（指我們的后代）會把拿破侖……和成吉思汗或馬其頓的亞歷山大混為一談。剛剛結(jié)束的世界大戰(zhàn)會被他們當作羅馬和迦太基之間的長期商業(yè)沖突……甚至值得我們驕傲的醫(yī)院、實驗室和手術(shù)室看上去也不過是稍加改進的煉金術(shù)和中世紀醫(yī)生的工作間?！币虼爽F(xiàn)代人并不值得驕傲自大。房龍揭示了歐洲爆發(fā)的第一次世界大戰(zhàn)的根源。他提出，我們時代的發(fā)展特點是物質(zhì)文明遠遠走在精神文明前面，“科學家們開始制造鋼鐵、化學、電的新世界，卻忘了人類思維比那個諺語中的烏龜要遲緩”。于是“這個笨拙的中世紀機構(gòu)突然應(yīng)時代要求去處理機械、工業(yè)世界的高度現(xiàn)代化問題，它就被迫根據(jù)數(shù)世紀之前定下的游戲規(guī)則盡其所能地去做了?！薄　　妒ソ?jīng)的故事》、《人類的故事》、《寬容》并列為房龍的三大名著，自出版以來，一直飽受贊譽，傳讀不衰?！　　睹绹墓适隆罚骸　》魁堅凇睹绹墓适隆分校云錅Y博的學識，簡潔、流暢的筆觸敘述了從哥倫布發(fā)現(xiàn)新大陸至20世紀30年代在北美大陸上的風云變幻。對美利堅合眾國的形成、誕生和發(fā)展敘述頗詳。對歷史事件，西方文明、科技發(fā)明對人類生活的影響、美國的政治生活都有祥盡的闡述，內(nèi)容豐富、資料翔實、涉及范圍廣泛、知識量大，非一般美國歷史書籍所能及。本書文筆生動、活潑，寫人述事，栩栩如生，不乏奇文妙語，讀來饒有趣味。　　《與偉人談心》：　　　　《與偉人談心》一書內(nèi)容涉及文學、歷史、哲學、宗教、政治、音樂、地理等知識領(lǐng)域，同時，時間跨度也是相當大的。在《與偉人談心》一書中，作者憑借自己豐富的想象力，不拘時空限制，采用古今對話的形式，介紹了幾十位在人類歷史上頗具影響的人物。這本書通過對邀請歷史人物出席晚宴的情景描寫，生動地烘托出了這些人物的生平事跡、思想觀念、生活習慣和性格特征。房龍的《與偉人談心》寫作風格很獨特。在歷史事件和歷史人物的鋪述基礎(chǔ)上不露聲色地表達出自己的人生觀和針對現(xiàn)實社會問題的思考，可謂《與偉人談心》的最大特色。從文學的角度看該書確有一定的研究與欣賞價值。并且，讀一讀這本書，既可以大致了解一批著名歷史人物的情況，了解一些他們生存年代的社會背景，又可以補充人類文化學方面的知識。[編輯本段]對亨德里克·威廉·房龍影響與評價　　褒揚　　許多青少年就是在房龍著作的陪伴下成長起來的。房龍著作文筆優(yōu)美，知識廣博，其中不乏真知灼見。干燥無味的科學常識，經(jīng)他的手筆，無論大人小孩，讀他的書的人，都覺得娓娓忘倦了，在茶余飯后，得到一點科學常識。他為世人留下了30多部作品，而且每部書都由他自己畫了插圖，這些房龍風格的插圖也是寶貴的遺產(chǎn)，并影響著后來的科學作家。例如著名的科學家和科普作家、美國的蓋莫夫，也是學著房龍的樣子，為自己的作品畫插圖。　　他的著作包括《寬容》、《人類的故事》、《文明的開端》、《奇跡與人》、《圣經(jīng)的故事》、《發(fā)明的故事》、《人類的家園》、《倫勃朗的人生苦旅》等，貫穿其中的是理性、寬容和進步。他的目標是向人類的無知和偏執(zhí)挑戰(zhàn)。他采取的方式是普及知識與真理，使它們成為人所盡知的常識?！　∽x房龍的書，對他親手繪制的插圖斷不可視而不見。相反，它們是房龍作品的一個組成部分，是文字難以替代的內(nèi)容。房龍的作品不僅是用青少年都能看懂的語言講述了成年人也同樣感興趣的內(nèi)容，更重要的是他把人類文明的進步與科學技術(shù)的發(fā)展相結(jié)合來講述。他實際上是大文化思想普及的先驅(qū)者。他也是用文藝手法宣傳科學的大師。正如郁達夫先生所："房龍的筆，有這樣一種魔力，但這也不是他的特創(chuàng)，這不過是將文學家的手法，拿來講述科學而已"。應(yīng)該指出，房龍對科普宣傳和創(chuàng)作有著深刻的影響。 　　房龍為寫作歷史耗費了畢生的精力與健康，用他平易近人、生動流暢的文筆把高深、晦澀的歷史知識和理解、寬容和進步的思想普及到廣大普通讀者中，向無知與偏執(zhí)不懈地挑戰(zhàn)，其精神與功績都值得后世的贊揚。　　關(guān)于房龍敘述歷史的立足點，房龍始終站在全人類的高度在寫作。雖然作為一個過了20歲才移居美國的荷蘭人，他不可避免地更多寫到他熟悉的西方，也更鐘情于他的故國，但他絕不是西方中心論者。他一直在努力從人類的眼光來觀察和敘述．超越地區(qū)的、宗教的、黨派的和種族的偏見。他反對任何形式的狹隘，包括那種為了給本民族增光而歪曲事實的超愛國主義　　批評　　有讀者批評，房龍在1932年出版的《房龍地理》中，把中日兩國比作一條船上的兩位乘客，中國年邁體虛，卻緊抱著一大包食物；日本血氣方剛身強體壯卻饑腸轆轆（見《房龍地理》第三十章《日本》）。這句話顯示了房龍認為日本對中國的侵略不可避免，且存在合理性。與房龍對于幾乎同一時期德國在歐洲的擴張和侵略所持的鮮明的批判態(tài)度（見房龍為駁斥希特勒的《我的奮斗》而寫作的《我們的戰(zhàn)斗》（1938））相比，從這一反差中可以看出房龍所宣揚的人文主義似乎本身就常伴隨著歐洲中心主義，并具有虛偽和兩面性?！　⊥瑯邮窃凇斗魁埖乩怼分校蚱鋵⑽鞑嘏c中國分作獨立的兩章撰寫，使得中國大陸的版本都以注釋聲明立場。

書籍目錄

1. 無知的暴政 / The Tyranny of Ignorance	12. 希臘人 / The Greeks	113. 禁錮的開始 / The Beginning of Restraint	464. 眾神的黃昏 / The Twilight of the Gods	585. 禁錮 / Imprisonment	816. 純潔的生活 / The Pure of Life	917. 宗教裁判所 / The Inquisition	1018. 好奇的人 / The Curious ones	1209. 對書籍開戰(zhàn) / The War upon the Printed Word	13310. 關(guān)于寫歷史書的普通問題，以及寫這本書的特殊問題 / Concerning the Writing of History in General and This Book in Particular	14111. 文藝復(fù)興 / Renaissance	14512. 宗教改革 / The Reformation	15413. 伊拉斯謨 / Erasmus	16714. 拉伯雷 / Rabelais	18215. 新招牌換掉舊招牌 / New Signboards for Old	19216. 再洗禮派教徒 / The Anabaptists	21217. 索齊尼叔侄 / The Sozzini Family	22218. 蒙田 / Montaigne	23319. 阿米尼烏斯 / Arminius	24020. 布魯諾 / Bruno	25121. 斯賓諾莎 / Spinoza	25722. 新天堂 / The New Zion	27123. 太陽王 / The Sun King	28424. 腓特烈大帝 / Frederick the Great	28925. 伏爾泰 / Voltaire	29326. 百科全書/ The Encyclopedia	31227. 革命的不寬容 / The Intolerance of Revolution	32028. 萊辛 / Lessing	33029. 托馬斯暸碩? Tom Paine	34330. 最后一百年 / The Last Hundred Years	349

章節(jié)摘錄

　　無知的暴政　　埃及僅存的神廟，坐落在菲萊小島上。從人類有歷史記載以來，這座神廟就是祭拜伊西斯的，它的存在使這個小島成為唯一能夠理解古老而神圣的象形文字的場所，為數(shù)不多的僧侶們還在繼續(xù)從事那些在埃及其他地方早已被忘卻的活動?！　」?27年，一個塞爾維亞農(nóng)民成為東羅馬帝國的統(tǒng)治者，他宣布神廟及附近的學園國有，僧侶和書寫大師被投進了監(jiān)獄，他們因饑餓、無人照料而死去，象形文字繪寫手藝成了一門失傳的藝術(shù)?！　∵@種現(xiàn)象在古代社會的其他民族中也同樣出現(xiàn)過?！　」虐捅葌惾艘环矫鏄O為寬容，鼓勵僧侶們?nèi)パ芯刻煊?、探索陸地和海洋，同時僅因為自己的鄰居違反那些在今天看來微不足道的宗教禮節(jié)，就對其大加懲罰。　　我們的祖先為了方便的劫掠，派出了探險隊，開始跟他們稱之為“野蠻人”的人們打交道?？蓱z的未開化的人們，誤解了白人的企圖，投出長矛和弓箭來歡迎他們，白人則用短槍報復(fù)?！　拇耍届o、無偏見的思想交流幾無可能?！　?8世紀，讓曆趴藭盧梭掀起了一次討論，在討論中野蠻人成了環(huán)境的不幸犧牲品，是人類種種美德的真正代表——這些美德已經(jīng)被三千年墮落的文明制度剝奪殆盡。這些認識一方面使我們得以一窺許多奇怪的被掩藏的人類天性，另一方面對人類所取得的豐功偉績的贊賞，給我們以新的勇氣面對未來，使我們能給自己落伍的遠方表親以更多的寬容?！　捜荩涸试S別人有判斷和行動的自由，耐心，不帶任何偏見地容忍那些有別于自己或被普遍接受的觀點、行為的人?！　∽罱迨陙?，置身于中非、極地、波利尼西亞土著居民中間的探險家、傳教士和醫(yī)生的研究，改變了我們往往認為的原始社會非常簡單的觀點。　　原始人在焦慮中生活，在恐懼中死去。為了成功，他不得不將自己的個性隱埋于部落的復(fù)合特性之中。其他考慮都得服從于一個最高律　　令——生存。由于原始人不理解因果法則，在他生活的世界中，過去、現(xiàn)在和將來混亂地交織在一起。死去的人成了精靈，跟隨著每一個人?！　n the year 527 Flavius Anicius Justinianus became ruler of the eastern half of the Roman Empire.　　This Serbian peasant (he came from Uskub, the much disputed railroad junction of the late war) had no use for “booklearning.” It was by his orders that the ancient Athenian school of philosophy was finally suppressed. And it was he who closed the doors of the only Egyptian temple that had continued to do business centuries after the valley of the Nile had been invaded by the monks of the new Christian faith.　　This temple stood on a little island called Philae, not far from the first great waterfall of the Nile. Ever since men could remember, the spot had been dedicated to the worship of Isis and for some curious reason, the Goddess had survived where all her African and Greek and Roman rivals had miserably perished. Until finally, in the sixth century, the island was the only spot where the old and most holy art of picture writing was still understood and where a small number of priests continued to practice a trade which had been forgotten in every other part of the land of Cheops.　　And now, by order of an illiterate farmhand, known as His Imperial Majesty, the temple and the adjoining school were declared state property, the statues and images were sent to the museum of Constantinople and the priests and the writing-masters were thrown into jail. And when the last of them had died from hunger and neglect, the age-old trade of making hieroglyphics had become a lost art.　　All this was a great pity.　　If Justinian (a plague upon his head!) had been a little less thorough and had saved just a few of those old picture experts in a sort of literary Noah抯 Ark, he would have made the task of the historian a great deal easier. For while (owing to the genius of Champollion) we can once more spell out the strange Egyptian words, it remains exceedingly difficult for us to understand the inner meaning of their message to posterity.　　And the same holds true for all other nations of the ancient world.　　What did those strangely bearded Babylonians, who left us whole brickyards full of religious tracts, have in mind when they exclaimed piously, “Who shall ever be able to understand the counsel of the Gods in Heaven?” How did they feel towards those divine spirits which they invoked so continually, whose laws they endeavored to interpret, whose commands they engraved upon the granite shafts of their most holy city? Why were they at once the most tolerant of men, encouraging their priests to study the high heavens, and to explore the land and the sea, and at the same time the most cruel of executioners, inflicting hideous punishments upon those of their neighbors who had committed some breach of divine etiquette which today would pass unnoticed?　　Until recently we did not know.　　We sent expeditions to Nineveh, we dug holes in the sand of Sinai and deciphered miles of cuneiform tablets. And everywhere in Mesopotamia and Egypt we did our best to find the key that should unlock the front door of this mysterious store-house of wisdom.　　And then, suddenly and almost by accident, we discovered that the back door had been wide open all the time and that we could enter the premises at will.　　But that convenient little gate was not situated in the neighborhood of Akkad or Memphis.　　It stood in the very heart of the jungle.　　And it was almost hidden by the wooden pillars of a pagan temple.　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　Our ancestors, in search of easy plunder, had come in contact with what they were pleased to call “wild men” or “savages.”　　The meeting had not been a pleasant one.　　The poor heathen, misunderstanding the intentions of the white men, had welcomed them with a salvo of spears and arrows.　　The visitors had retaliated with their blunderbusses.　　After that there had been little chance for a quiet and unprejudiced exchange of ideas.　　The savage was invariably depicted as a dirty, lazy, good-for-nothing loafer who worshiped crocodiles and dead trees and deserved all that was coming to him.　　Then came the reaction of the eighteenth century. Jean Jacques Rousseau began to contemplate the world through a haze of sentimental tears. His contemporaries, much impressed by his ideas, pulled out their handkerchiefs and joined in the weeping.　　The benighted heathen was one of their most favorite subjects. In their hands (although they had never seen one) he became the unfortunate victim of circumstances and the true representative of all those manifold virtues of which the human race had been deprived by three thousand years of a corrupt system of civilization.　　Today, at least in this particular field of investigation, we know better.　　We study primitive man as we study the higher domesticated animals, from which as a rule he is not so very far removed.　　In most instances we are fully repaid for our trouble. The savage, but for the grace of God, is our own self under much less favorable conditions. By examining him carefully we begin to understand the early society of the valley of the Nile and of the peninsula of Mesopotamia and by knowing him thoroughly we get a glimpse of many of those strange hidden instincts which lie buried deep down beneath the thin crust of manners and customs which our own species of mammal has acquired during the last five thousand years.　　This encounter is not always flattering to our pride. On the other hand a realization of the conditions from which we have escaped, together with an appreciation of the many things that have actually been accomplished, can only tend to give us new courage for the work in hand and if anything it will make us a little more tolerant towards those among our distant cousins who have failed to keep up the pace.　　This is not a handbook of anthropology.　　It is a volume dedicated to the subject of tolerance.　　But tolerance is a very broad theme.　　The temptation to wander will be great. And once we leave the beaten track,Heaven alone knows where we will land.　　I therefore suggest that I be given half a page to state exactly and specifically what I mean by tolerance.　　Language is one of the most deceptive inventions of the human race and all definitions are bound to be arbitrary. It therefore behooves an humble student to go to that authority which is accepted as final by the largest number of those who speak the language in which this book is written.　　I refer to the Encyclopedia Britannica.　　There on page 1052 of volume XXVI stands written: “Tolerance (from Latin tolerare—to endure):—The allowance of freedom of action or judgment to other people, the patient and unprejudiced endurance of dissent from one抯 own or the generally received course or view.”　　There may be other definitions but for the purpose of this book I shall let myself be guided by the words of the Britannica.　　And having committed myself (for better or worse) to a definite policy, I shall return to my savages and tell you what I have been able to discover about tolerance in the earliest forms of society of which we have any record.　　It is still generally believed that primitive society was very simple, that primitive language consisted of a few simple grunts and that primitive man possessed a degree of liberty which was lost only when the world became“complex.”　　The investigations of the last fifty years made by explorers and missionaries and doctors among the aborigines of central Africa and the Polar regions and Polynesia show the exact opposite. Primitive society was exceedingly complicated, primitive language had more forms and tenses and declensions than Russian or Arabic, and primitive man was a slave not only to the present, but also to the past and to the future; in short, an abject and miserable creature who lived in fear and died in terror.　　This may seem far removed from the popular picture of brave redskins merrily roaming the prairies in search of buffaloes and scalps, but it is a little nearer to the truth.　　And how could it have been otherwise?　　I have read the stories of many miracles.　　But one of them was lacking; the miracle of the survival of man.　　How and in what manner and why the most defenseless of all mammals should have been able to maintain himself against microbes and mastodons and ice and heat and eventually become master of all creation, is something I shall not try to solve in the present chapter.　　One thing, however, is certain. He never could have accomplished all this alone.　　In order to succeed he was obliged to sink his individuality in the composite character of the tribe.　　Primitive society therefore was dominated by a single idea, an alloverpowering desire to survive.　　This was very difficult.　　And as a result all other considerations were sacrificed to the one supreme demand—to live.　　The individual counted for nothing, the community at large counted for everything, and the tribe became a roaming fortress which lived by itself and for itself and of itself and found safety only in exclusiveness.　　But the problem was even more complicated than at first appears. What I have just said held good only for the visible world, and the visible world in those early times was a negligible quantity compared to the realm of the invisible.　　In order to understand this fully we must remember that primitive people are different from ourselves. They are not familiar with the law of cause and effect.　　If I sit me down among the poison ivy, I curse my negligence, send for the doctor and tell my young son to get rid of the stuff as soon as he can. My ability to recognize cause and effect tells me that the poison ivy has caused the rash, that the doctor will be able to give me something that will make the itch stop and that the removal of the vine will prevent a repetition of this painful experience.　　The true savage would act quite differently. He would not connect the rash with the poison ivy at all. He lives in a world in which past, present and future are inextricably interwoven. All his dead leaders survive as Gods and his dead neighbors survive as spirits and they all continue to be invisible members of the clan and they accompany each individual member wherever he goes. They eat with him and sleep with him and they stand watch over his door. It is his business to keep them at arm抯 length or gain their friendship. If ever he fail to do this he will be immediately punished and as he cannot possibly know how to please all those spirits all the time, he is in constant fear of that misfortune which comes as the revenge of the Gods.　　He therefore reduces every event that is at all out of the ordinary not to a primary cause but to interference on the part of an invisible spirit and when he notices a rash on his arms he does not say, “Damn that poison ivy!” but he mumbles, “I have offended a God. The God has punished me,” and he runs to the medicine-man, not however to get a lotion to counteract the poison of the ivy but to get a “charm” that shall prove stronger than the charm which the irate God (and not the ivy) has thrown upon him.　　As for the ivy, the primary cause of all his suffering ,he lets it grow right there where it has always grown. And if perchance the white man comes with a can of kerosene and burns the shrub down, he will curse him for his trouble.　　It follows that a society in which everything happens as the result of the direct personal interference on the part of an invisible being must depend for its continued existence upon a strict obedience of　such laws as seem to appease the wrath of the Gods.　　Such a law, according to the opinion of a savage, existed. His ancestors had devised it and had bestowed it upon him and it was his most sacred duty to keep that law intact and hand it over in its present and perfect form to his own children.　　This, of course, seems absurd to us. We firmly believe in progress, in growth, in constant and uninterrupted improvement.　　But “progress” is an expression that was coined only year before last, and it is typical of all low forms of society that the people see no possible reason why they should improve what (to them) is the best of all possible worlds because they never knew any other.　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　Granted that all this be true, then how does one prevent a change in the laws and in the established forms of society?　　The answer is simple.　　By the immediate punishment of those who refuse to regard common police regulations as an expression of the divine will, or in plain language, by a rigid system of intolerance.　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　If I hereby state that the savage was the most intolerant of human beings, I do not mean to insult him, for I hasten to add that given the circumstances under which he lived, it was his duty to be intolerant. Had he allowed any one to interfere with the thousand and one rules upon which his tribe depended for its continued safety and peace of mind, the life of the tribe would have been put in jeopardy and that would have been the greatest of all possible crimes.　　But (and the question is worth asking) how could a group of people, relatively limited in number, protect a most complex system of verbal regulations when we in our own day with millions of soldiers and thousands of policemen find it difficult to enforce a few plain laws?　　Again the answer is simple.　　The savage was a great deal cleverer than we are. He accomplished by shrewd calculation what he could not do by force.　　He invented the idea of “taboo.”　　Perhaps the word “invented” is not the right expression. Such things are rarely the product of a sudden inspiration. They are the result of long years of growth and experiment. Let that be as it may, the wild men of Africa and Polynesia devised the taboo, and thereby saved themselves a great deal of trouble.　　The word taboo is of Australian origin. We all know more or less what it means. Our own world is full of taboos, things we simply must not do or say, like mentioning our latest operation at the dinner table, or leaving our spoon in our cup of coffee. But our taboos are never of a very serious nature. They are part of the handbook of etiquette and rarely interfere with our own personal happiness.　　To primitive man, on the other hand, the taboo was of the utmost importance.　　It meant that certain persons or inanimate objects had been“set apart”from the rest of the world, that they (to use the Hebrew equivalent) were“holy”and must not be discussed or touched on pain of instant death and everlasting torture. A fairly large order but woe unto him or her who dared to disobey the will of the spirit-ancestors.　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　*　　Whether the taboo was an invention of the priests or the priesthood was created to maintain the taboo is a problem which had not yet been solved. As tradition is much older than religion, it seems more than likely that taboos existed long before the world had heard of sorcerers and witchdoctors. But as soon as the latter had made their appearance, they became the staunch supporters of the idea of taboo and used it with such great virtuosity that the taboo became the“verboten”sign of prehistoric ages.　　When first we hear the names of Babylon and Egypt, those countries were still in a state of development in which the taboo counted for a great deal. Not a taboo in the crude and primitive form as it was afterwards found in New Zealand, but solemnly transformed into negative rules of conduct, the sort of “thou-shalt-not” decrees with which we are all familiar through six of our Ten Commandments.　　Needless to add that the idea of tolerance was entirely unknown in those lands at that early age.　　What we sometimes mistake for tolerance was merely indifference caused by ignorance.　　But we can find no trace of any willingness (however vague) on the part of either kings or priests to allow others to exercise that “freedom of action or judgment” or of that“patient and unprejudiced endurance of dissent from the generally received cause or view” which has become the ideal of our modern age.　　Therefore, except in a very negative way, this book is not interested in prehistoric history or what is commonly called “ancient history.”　　The struggle for tolerance did not begin until after the discovery of the individual.　　And the credit for this, the greatest of all modern revelations, belongs to the Greeks.

編輯推薦

《寬容》(中文導(dǎo)讀英文版)無論作為通俗的思想史讀本，還是作為語言學習的課外讀物，對當代中國的讀者都將產(chǎn)生積極的影響。為了使讀者能夠了解每段故事慨況，提高閱讀速度和閱讀水平，在每篇英文故事的前面增加了中文導(dǎo)讀。

圖書封面

圖書標簽Tags

無

評論、評分、閱讀與下載

---

    寬容 PDF格式下載

---