LESSON 23

THE MEMORY OF OUR FATHERS

怀念先辈

Lyman Beecher, 1775-1863, a famous congregational minister of New England, was born in New Haven, graduated from Yale College in 1797, and studied theology with Dr. Timothy Dwight. His first settlement was at East Hampton, L. I., at a salary of three hundred dollars per year. He was pastor of the church in Litchfield, Ct., from 1810 till 1826, when he removed to Boston, and took charge of the Hanover Street Church. In the religious controversies of the time, Dr. Beecher was one of the most prominent characters. From 1832 to 1842, he was President of Lane Theological Seminary, in the suburbs of Cincinnati. He then returned to Boston, where he spent most of the closing years of his long and active life. His death occurred in Brooklyn, N. Y. As a theologian, preacher, and advocate of education, temperance, and missions, Dr. Beecher occupied a very prominent place for nearly half a century. He left a large family of sons and two daughters, who are well known as among the most eminent preachers and authors in America.

We are called upon to cherish with high veneration and grateful recollections, the memory of our fathers. Both the ties of nature and the dictates of policy demand this. And surely no nation had ever less occasion to be ashamed of its ancestry, or more occasion for gratulation in that respect; for while most nations trace their origin to barbarians, the foundations of our nation were laid by civilized men, by Christians. Many of them were men of distinguished families, of powerful talents, of great learning and of preeminent wisdom, of decision of character, and of most inflexible integrity. And yet not unfrequently they have been treated as if they had no virtues; while their sins and follies have been sedulously immortalized in satirical anecdote.

The influence of such treatment of our fathers is too manifest. It creates and lets loose upon their institutions, the vandal spirit of innovation and overthrow; for after the memory of our father shall have been rendered contemptible, who will appreciate and sustain their institutions? “The memory of our fathers” should be the watchword of liberty throughout the land; for, imperfect as they were, the world before had not seen their like, nor will it soon, we fear, behold their like again. Such models of moral excellence, such apostles of civil and religious liberty, such shades of the illustrious dead looking down upon their descendants with approbation or reproof, according as they follow or depart from the good way, constitute a censorship inferior only to the eye of God; and to ridicule them is national suicide.

The doctrines of our fathers have been represented as gloomy, superstitious, severe, irrational, and of a licentious tendency. But when other systems shall have produced a piety as devoted, a morality as pure, a patriotism as disinterested, and a state of society as happy, as have prevailed where their doctrines have been most prevalent, it may be in season to seek an answer to this objection.

The persecutions instituted by our fathers have been the occasion of ceaseless obloquy upon their fair fame. And truly, it was a fault of no ordinary magnitude, that sometimes they did persecute. But let him whose ancestors were not ten times more guilty, cast the first stone, and the ashes of our fathers will no more be disturbed. Theirs was the fault of the age, and it will be easy to show that no class of men had, at that time, approximated so nearly to just apprehensions of religious liberty; and that it is to them that the world is now indebted for the more just and definite views which now prevail.

The superstition and bigotry of our fathers are themes on which some of their descendants, themselves far enough from superstition, if not from bigotry, have delighted to dwell. But when we look abroad, and behold the condition of the world, compared with the condition of New England, we may justly exclaim, “Would to God that the ancestors of all the nations had been not only almost, but altogether such bigots as our fathers were.”

【中文阅读】

我们响应上帝的召唤，向我们的先辈致以崇高的敬意和深切的缅怀。不论是亲情的纽带还是上天的神旨，都要求我们这样做。可以确信的是，没有哪个国家曾经为它的祖先感到羞耻，更多的是表示敬意中获得满足。由于绝大多数国家的历史都可以追溯到野蛮人，我们国家是由文明人，是由基督徒建立起来的。其中许多人都出身于受人尊敬的家庭，都是有影响力的天才人士，都是伟大的学者，拥有卓越的智慧和决断力，而且拥有不可动摇的正直品质。不同寻常的是，人们认为他们拥有完美无缺的美德；与此同时，在颇具讽刺意味的趣闻轶事里，他们的过错和愚蠢行为被刻意看做是不朽的。

这样对待我们的先辈所产生的影响显而易见。创建制度然后放任其发展，创新和推翻都带有野蛮人的印记，在对先辈的怀念已经证明是可鄙的之后，谁还会珍视和维护他们的制度呢？“对我们先辈的怀念”应该是整个这块土地上打出的自由的口号，尽管他们并不完美，而之前的世界并没有见到与他们相类的人，我们担心今后也不会见到这样的人。道德上这样完美的模范，这样孜孜追求国家和宗教自由的传道先驱，那些以赞许和鄙夷的神情看待他们先辈的杰出人士的内心留下这样的阴影，不论他们遵守还是抛弃美德，建立属下审查制度只是为了做给上帝看。嘲笑先辈就意味着这个国家在自杀。

我们先辈的信条以蒙昧、迷信、纯朴和非理性为特征，具有一种淫乱倾向。但是，当其他制度导致能够为之献身的虔敬，纯粹的道德伦理，公正的爱国主义，快乐的社会形态时——这是他们的制度所能取得的最普遍的结果，也许就反对的理由寻求答案就有其合理性了。

从我们先辈开始的迫害使他们的名誉蒙受无休止的诽谤。真实的情形是，这是一个重大错误，他们有时确实在迫害。但是，让那个祖先的罪恶并不比他多十倍的人向他的祖先投掷第一块石头，我们先辈的灵魂就不再感到不安了。他们的过错是所处的时代造成的，很容易举出实例说明当时没有这类人，只是近乎对宗教自由的担心；对他们而言，这个世界现在享受先辈的恩惠越多，这种普遍的观点就越确定。

我们先辈的迷信和偏执是他们某些后辈讨论的主题，这些后辈本身就足够迷信，如果不是偏执的话，他们对此心安理得。但是，当我们把眼界放宽，审视当时世界的情形，并与新英格兰的处境进行比较，我们也许会公平地高声喊出，“既然上帝保佑所有民族的祖先，那么对我们的先辈抱如此偏见的人也会得到原谅的。”