谋杀机器(五)：教育的理想

An Ideal in Education

The words and phrases of a language are always to some extent revelations of the mind of the race that has moulded the language. How often does an Irish vocable light up as with a lantern some immemorial Irish attitude, some whole phase of Irish thought. Thus, the words which the old Irish employed when they spoke of Education show that they had gripped the very heart of that problem. To the old Irish the teacher was ‘aite’, fosterer; the pupil, was ‘dalta’, foster-child; the system was ‘aiteachas’, fosterage; words which we still retain as oide, dalta, oideachas.

民族语言的单词和短语总是在某种程度上表现了使用者的思想。每当爱尔兰语被讲出，声音便像灯笼一样照亮爱尔兰的古老的态度，照亮爱尔兰思考的整个过程。 因此，过去的爱尔兰人在谈到教育时所使用的词语表明他们已经抓住了这个问题的核心。对于过去的爱尔兰人而言，老师是“aite”，寄养者；学生是“dalta”，被寄养的儿童； 该系统是“aiteachas”，寄养；现在，三个词语分别演变为oide、dalta和oideachas。

And is not the precise aim of educatio to ‘foster'. Not to inform, to indoctrinate, to conduct through a course of studies [though these be the dictionary meanings of the word], but, first and last, to ‘foster' the elements of character native to a soul, to help to bring these to their full perfection rather than to implant exotic excellences.

 教育事实上的目的不正是 "培养 "吗？不是告知，不是灌输，不是通过学习课程进行指导(尽管这些都是这个词的字典里的意思)，而是，首先和最后，"培养 "一个灵魂中固有的性格元素，帮助使这些元素达到完全的完美，而不是植入外来的优点。

Fosterage implies a foster-father or foster-mother, a person as its centre and inspiration rather than a code of rules. Modem education systems are elaborate pieces of machinery devised by highly-salaried officials for the purpose of turning out citizens according to certain approved patterns. The modem school is a State- controlled institution designed to produce workers for the State, and is in the same category which a dockyard, or any other State-controlled institution which produces articles necessary to the progress, well-being, and defence of the State. We speak of the ‘efficiency’, the ‘cheapness’ and the ‘up-to-dateness' of an education system just as we speak of the ‘efficiency’, the ‘cheapness’ and the ‘up-to-dateness' of a system of manufacturing coal-gas. We shall soon reach a stage when we speak of the ‘efficiency’, the ‘cheapness’ and the ‘up-to-dateness' of our systems of soul saving. We shall hear it said ‘Salvation is very cheap in England’, or 'The Germans are wonderfully efficient in prayer’, or ‘Gee, it takes a New York parson to hustle ginks into heaven.'

寄养意味着一个养父或养母，一个作为其中心和灵感的人，而不是一个规则的代码。现代教育系统是由高级官员精心设计的机器，目的是按照某些被认可的模式培养公民。现代学校是一个由国家控制的机构，旨在为国家培养工人，与船坞或任何其他由国家控制的机构一样，为国家的进步、福利和国防生产必要的物品。我们谈论一个教育系统的 "效率"、"廉价"和 "最新"，就像我们谈论一个煤气生产系统的 "效率"、"廉价 "和 "最新"。(如此推进，)我们很快就会进入另一个阶段：彼时，我们将会谈论我们的灵魂拯救系统的"效率"、"廉价"和 "最新"。我们将听到有人说："英国的救赎非常便宜"，或者 "德国人的祷告效率非常高"，或者"天啊，只有纽约的牧师才能把愚蠢卑鄙的人送入天堂"。  

Now, education is as much concerned with souls as religion is. Religion is a Way of Life. and education is a preparation of the soul to live its life here and hereafter; to live it nobly and fully. And as we cannot think of religion without a Person as its centre, as we cannot think of a church without its Teacher, so we cannot think of a school without its Master. A school, in fact. according to the conception of our wise ancestors, was less a place than a little group of persons, a teacher and his pupils. Its place might be poor, nay, it might have no local habibtion at all, it may be peripatetic: where the master went his disciples followed. One may think of Our Lord and his Friends as a sort of school: was He not the Master, and were not they His disciples? That gracious conception was not only the conception of the old Gael, pagan and Christian, but the conception of Europe all through the Middle Ages. Philosophy was not crammed out of text-books, but was learned at the knee of some great philosopher: art was learned in the studio of some master-artist, a craft in the workshop of some master-craftsman. Always it was the personality of the master that made the school, never the State that built it of bricks and mortar, drew up a code of rules to govern it, and sent hirelings into it to carry out its decrees.

如今，教育与宗教一样与灵魂有关。宗教是一种生活方式而教育是为灵魂的今后高尚、充实的生活所做的准备。正如我们认为宗教不能没有一个人作为中心，正如我们认为教堂不能没有布道者，我们也认为学校不能没有教师。、根据我们明智的祖先的概念，学校与其说是一个地方，不如说是一小群人——一个老师和他的学生。它的地方可能很破旧，甚至可能根本没有固定的场所，而是流动的：老师去哪里，学生就跟到哪里。人们可以认为我们的主和他的追随者是一种学校：他不是老师，而他们不是他的门徒吗？这种亲切的概念不仅是旧盖尔人——包括异教徒和基督徒——的概念，而且是整个中世纪欧洲的概念。哲学不是从教科书中挤出来的，而是在一些伟大的哲学家膝下学到的：艺术是在一些艺术大师的工作室里学到的，是在一些工匠大师的车间里学到的。支撑起学校的始终是老师的个性，而不是使用砖头和砂浆建造，制定规则以管理，并派人进驻以执行法令的国家。

I do not know how far it is possible to revive the old ideal of fosterer and foster-child. I know it were very desirable. One sees too clearly that the modern system, under which the teacher tends more and more to become a mere civil servant, is making for the degadation of education. and will end in irreligion and anarchy. The modern child is coming to regard his teacher as an official paid by the State to render him certain services; services which it is in interest to avail of. since by doing so he will increase his earning capacity later on; but services the rendering and acceptance of which no more imply a sacred relationship than do the tendering and acceptance of the services of a dentist or a chiropodist. There is thus coming about a complete reversal of the relative positions of master and disciple, a tendency which is increased by every statute that is placed in the statute book, by every rule that is added to the education code of modern countries.

 我不知道可以在多大程度上恢复寄养的古老理想。我知道这过于理想。人们已经清楚地看到，在现代制度下，教师越来越倾向于成为一个单纯的公务员——这使之堕落，最终失去信仰与中心。现代儿童开始把他的老师看作是由政府提供的服务；利用这些服务是有利可图的，因为如此可以增加他以后的收入能力；但提供和接受这些服务并不意味着一种神圣的关系，就像提供和接受牙医或按摩师的服务一样。因此，教师与学生的相对地位即将完全颠倒过来，这种趋势因现代国家的每一条法规、每一条加入教育法典的规则而加剧。

Against this trend I would oppose the ideal of those who shaped the Gaelic polity nearly two thousand years ago. It is not merely that the old Irish had a good education system; they had the best and noblest that has ever been known among men. There has never been any human institution more adequate to its purpose than that which, in pagan times, produced Cuchulainn and the Boy-Corps of Eamhain Macha and, in Christian times, produced Enda and the companions at his solitude in Aran. The old Irish systems pagan and Christian, possessed in premiment degree the thing most needful in education: an adequate inspiration. Colmcille suggested what that inspiration was when he said, ‘If I should die it shall be from the excess of love thal I bear the Gae.' A love and a service so excessive as to annihilate all thought of self, a recognition that one must give all, must be willing always to make the ultimate sacrifice. This is the inspiration alike of the story of Cuchulainn and of the story of Colmcille. The inspiration that made one a hero and the other a saint.

与趋势相反，我反对近两千年前塑造盖尔政体的那些人的理想。这不仅仅是因为旧爱尔兰人拥有良好的教育体系：他们有人类有史以来最好和最崇高的教育体系。从来没有任何一种人类制度比这种制度更适合其目的，异教时代，它培养了Cuchulainn和Eamhain Macha的少年团；在基督教时代，它培养了Enda和他在Aran的孤独中的同伴们。古老的爱尔兰异教和基督教系统拥有教育中的关键：充分的灵感。Colmcille将这种灵感表述为："如果我死了，那将是由于我对盖尔文化的过度热爱。”过度的爱和奉献，以至于消灭了所有对自我的思考，认识到一个人必须付出所有，必须愿意永远做出最终的牺牲。这就是Cuchulainn和Colmcille的故事的灵感所在。这种灵感使一个人成为英雄，另一个人成为圣人。