古大叔小木屋（93）瓦尔登湖第六章 访客（9）腾讯会议版

2021年9月17日 星期五 古大叔小木屋（93）直播实况录制 时间：晚8:30——9:50 文本 Walden [ˈwɔldən] (Issue 93) 6. Visitors(9) [15] Many a traveller came out of his way to see me and the inside of my house, and, as an excuse for calling, asked for a glass of water. I told them that I drank at the pond, and pointed thither[ˈðɪðə], offering to lend them a dipper. Far off as I lived, I was not exempted[ɪɡˈzemptid] from the annual visitation which occurs, methinks, about the first of April, when everybody is on the move; and I had my share of good luck, though there were some curious specimens[ˈspesɪmɪns] among my visitors. Half-witted men from the almshouse[ˈɑːmzˌhaʊs] and elsewhere came to see me; but I endeavored to make them exercise all the wit they had, and make their confessions to me; in such cases making wit the theme of our conversation; and so was compensated['kɒmpenseɪtid]. Indeed, I found some of them to be wiser than the so-called overseers of the poor and selectmen of the town, and thought it was time that the tables were turned. With respect to wit, I learned that there was not much difference between the half and the whole. One day, in particular, an inoffensive[ˌɪnəˈfensɪv], simple-minded pauper[ˈpɔːpə], whom with others I had often seen used as fencing stuff, standing or sitting on a bushel in the fields to keep cattle and himself from straying, visited me, and expressed a wish to live as I did. He told me, with the utmost simplicity and truth, quite superior, or rather inferior, to anything that is called humility, that he was "deficient in intellect." These were his words. The Lord had made him so, yet he supposed the Lord cared as much for him as for another. "I have always been so," said he, "from my childhood; I never had much mind; I was not like other children; I am weak in the head. It was the Lord's will, I suppose." And there he was to prove the truth of his words. He was a metaphysical puzzle to me. I have rarely met a fellowman on such promising ground - it was so simple and sincere and so true all that he said. And, true enough, in proportion as he appeared to humble himself was he exalted[ɪɡˈzɔːltɪd]. I did not know at first but it was the result of a wise policy. It seemed that from such a basis of truth and frankness as the poor weak-headed pauper had laid, our intercourse might go forward to something better than the intercourse of sages[seɪdʒs].