【华慧考博】2020年考博英语翻译每日一练(10月16日)
【翻译-段落翻译练习】在竞争的法则下,上万人的雇主不得不实行一些最严厉的节约措施,其中节约给工人报酬的那部分占很大一部分。社会为这个法则付出的代价如同为低廉的舒适条件和奢侈品付出的代价一样是巨大的。但带来的好处超过了代价,因为正是这个法则,我们才有了了不起的物质进步,其结果是生活水平的提高。但是,不管这个法则是好是坏,我们无法回避,对任何建议替代它的新东西,其作用我们是不敢肯定的,虽然这个法则有时对个人来说可能很残酷,但对人类来说是好的,因为它确保每个领域里适者生存。我们接受并欢迎环境上的不平等,接受并欢迎让工商业经营集中在少数人的手里,接受和欢迎他们之间存在竞争的法则,我们把所有这一切看成是我们必须适应的条件,看成对人类未来的进步不仅有益,而且是很有必要的。
【翻译参考译文】
(1) Under the law of competition the employer of thousands is forced into the strictest economies among which the rates paid to labor figure prominently. (2) The price which society pays for the law like the price it pays for cheap comforts and luxuries is great but the advantages of this law are also greater than its cost—for it is to this law that we owe our wonderful material development which brings improved conditions in living standards. (3) But whether the law is benign or not, we cannot evade it; of the effect of any new substitutes for it proposed we cannot be sure; and while the law may be sometimes hard for the individual, it is best for our human being because it ensures the survival of the fittest in every field. (4) We accept and welcome therefore as conditions to which we must accommodate ourselves great inequality of environment; the concentration of industrial or commercial operation in the hands of a few; and the law of competition between them, as being not only beneficial but essential to the future progress of humankind.