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 | 林肯总统感恩节文告（1863年） |
| | 一年一度的感恩节又到了。"基甸聊天" (http://ocimx.com/jdlt）约我说点什么。我想到了1863年林肯总统的感恩节文告。1999年感恩节时我把该文告翻译成中文如下（当时在网上没有找到中文译本），今天又补译漏掉的末尾两句，送给各位朋友。如果您想听听我如何用略带湘音的乡音录制的声情并茂的朗诵，请点击上述基甸聊天链接（今天稍后会发表）。祝您感恩节阖家快乐！
林肯总统感恩节文告（1863年）
即将过去的一年充满了天祥地灵的福气。
我们时时享用这些福气，却常常忘了饮水思源。然而有一些不同凡响的福上之福，不可能不穿透并软化那对全能上帝的惠赐已麻木不仁的心灵。
在这场规模空前甚至引发异邦对我们虎视眈眈的惨烈内战当中，我们保持了与世界各民族的和平，保障了社会秩序，保护了法律的尊严，保守了战地外的和睦。战场正随著我们联邦海陆军的节节胜利而大大缩小。
犁头、梭子或船只并没有因为和平工业的财力往国防的必要转移而停滞。开荒斧头拓宽了我们居住的地界，铁矿、煤矿和贵金属矿连年增产。
尽管军营、围城及战场造成废墟浩劫，我们的人口持续增长。国力增强令人欣喜，人民定将继续享有更大自由。这些伟大的事情，不是出于人心的设计，也不是人的手能成全，乃是来源于至高上帝的恩赐。
他诚然因我们的罪孽而发怒，但仍然乐意赐下慈爱怜悯。我深深觉得，全体美国人民应当万众一心，向至高上帝致以庄严而虔诚的谢忱。
因此，我谨邀请全美各地的同胞以及海外侨胞，把十一月的最后一个礼拜四分别出来，向住在天上的慈爱父神献上感恩与赞美。当我们这样敬拜这位拯救与赐福我们的上帝的同时，我建议每人本着为民族的邪恶与叛逆而谦卑痛悔的心，把所有因为这场无法避免的内战而成为孤儿、寡妇、哀哭与受害者的同胞，交托在上帝恩惠的手中，恳求全能者伸手医治我们民族的伤痕，并按照他的美意，尽快恢复那完全的和平、和谐、安宁与联邦。
谨此为证，亲手加盖，合众国印。
林肯总统写于华盛顿市，主后一千八百六十三年十月三日，合众国独立第八十八年
(张儒民译于1999年感恩节，2013年感恩节补译末尾两句，并稍微修改)
原文：
By the President of the United States of America.
A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies.
To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God.
In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.
Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore.
Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things.
They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People.
I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.
And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln |
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