英語(yǔ)經(jīng)典美文誦讀100篇：092.on the instability of human glory
[00:11.92]What then is the work of life? What the business of great men,
[00:16.64]that pass the stage of the world in seeming triumph as these men we call heroes have done?
[00:23.12]Is it to grow great in the mouth of fame and take up so many pages in history?
[00:29.63]Alas! That is no more than making a tale for the reading of posterity till it turns into fable and romance.
[00:38.30]Is it to furnish subjects to the poets, and live in their immortal rhymes as they call them?
[00:44.96]That is, in short, no more than to be hereafter turned into ballad and song and be sung by old women to quiet children,
[00:53.95]or at the corner of the street to gather crowds in aid of the pickpocket and the poor.
[01:00.09]Or is their business rather to add virtue and piety to their glory,
[01:04.81]which alone will pass them into eternity and make them truly immortal?
[01:10.05]What is glory without virture? A great man without religion is no more than a great beast without a soul.
[01:18.33]What is honour without merit?
[01:20.48]And what can be called true merit but that which makes a person be a good man as well as a great man?
