章节正文
barkeeper till he can't rest, it makes a charming lark for the
young folks, it don't do anybody any harm, it don't cost a rap, and
it keeps up the place's reputation for making all comers happy and
content."
"Very good. I'll be on hand and see them land the barkeeper."
"It is manners to go in full dress. You want to wear your wings,
you know, and your other things."
"Which ones?"
"Halo, and harp, and palm branch, and all that."
"Well," says I, "I reckon I ought to be ashamed of myself, but the
fact is I left them laying around that day I resigned from the
choir. I haven't got a rag to wear but this robe and the wings."
"That's all right. You'll find they've been raked up and saved for
you. Send for them."
"I'll do it, Sandy. But what was it you was saying about
unsacrilegious things, which people expect to get, and will be
disappointed about?"
"Oh, there are a lot of such things that people expect and don't
get. For instance, there's a Brooklyn preacher by the name of
Talmage, who is laying up a considerabledisappointment for
himself. He says, every now and then in his sermons, that the
first thing he does when he gets to heaven, will be to fling his
arms around Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and kiss them and weep on
them. There's millions of people down there on earth that are
promising themselves the same thing. As many as sixty thousand
people arrive here every single day, that want to run straight to
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and hug them and weep on them. Now mind
you, sixty thousand a day is a pretty heavy contract for those old
people. If they were a mind to allow it, they wouldn't ever have
anything to do, year in and year out, but stand up and be hugged
and wept on thirty-two hours in the twenty-four. They would be
tired out and as wet as muskrats all the time. What would heaven
be, to THEM? It would be a mighty good place to get out of - you
know that, yourself. Those are kind and gentle old Jews, but they
ain't any fonder of kissing the emotional highlights of Brooklyn
than you be. You mark my words, Mr. T.'s endearments are going to
be declined, with thanks. There are limits to the privileges of
the elect, even in heaven. Why, if Adam was to show himself to
every new comer that wants to call and gaze at him and strike him
for his autograph, he would never have time to do anything else but
just that. Talmage has said he is going to give Adam some of his
attentions, as well as A., I. and J. But he will have to change
his mind about that."
"Do you think Talmage will really come here?"
"Why, certainly, he will; but don't you be alarmed; he will run
with his own kind, and there's plenty of them. That is the main
charm of heaven - there's all kinds here - which wouldn't be the
case if you let the preachers tell it. Anybody can find the sort
he prefers, here, and he just lets the others alone, and they let
him alone. When the Deity builds a heaven, it is built right, and
on a liberal plan."
Sandy sent home for his things, and I sent for mine, and about nine
in the evening we begun to dress. Sandy says, -
"This is going to be a grand time for you, Stormy. Like as not
some of the patriarchs will turn out."
"No, but will they?"
"Like as not. Of course they are pretty exclusive. They hardly
ever show themselves to the common public. I believe they never
turn out except for an eleventh-hour convert. They wouldn't do it
then, only earthlytradition makes a grand show pretty necessary on
that kind of an occasion."
"Do they an turn out, Sandy?"
"Who? - all the patriarchs? Oh, no - hardly ever more than a
couple. You will be here fifty thousand years - maybe more -
before you get a glimpse of all the patriarchs and prophets. Since
I have been here, Job has been to the front once, and once Ham and
Jeremiah both at the same time. But the finest thing that has
happened in my day was a year or so ago; that was Charles Peace's
reception - him they called 'the Bannercross Murderer' - an
Englishman. There were four patriarchs and two prophets on the
Grand Stand that time - there hasn't been anything like it since
Captain Kidd came; Abel was there - the first time in twelve
hundred years. A report got around that Adam was coming; well, of
course, Abel was enough to bring a crowd, all by himself, but there
is nobody that can draw like Adam. It was a false report, but it
got around, anyway, as I say, and it will be a long day before I
see the like of it again. The reception was in the English
department, of course, which is eight hundred and eleven million
miles from the New Jersey line. I went, along with a good many of
my neighbors, and it was a sight to see, I can tell you. Flocks
came from all the departments. I saw Esquimaux there, and Tartars,
Negroes, Chinamen - people from everywhere. You see a mixture like
that in the Grand Choir, the first day you land here, but you
hardly ever see it again. There were billions of people; when they
were singing or hosannahing, the noise was wonderful; and even when
their tongues were still the drumming of the wings was nearly
enough to burst your head, for all the sky was as thick as if it
was snowing angels. Although Adam was not there, it was a great
time anyway, because we had three archangels on the Grand Stand -
it is a seldom thing that even one comes out."
"What did they look like, Sandy?"
"Well, they had shining faces, and shining robes, and wonderful
rainbow wings, and they stood eighteen feet high, and wore swords,
and held their heads up in a noble way, and looked like soldiers."
"Did they have halos?"
"No - anyway, not the hoop kind. The archangels and the upper-
class patriarchs wear a finer thing than that. It is a round,
solid, splendid glory of gold, that is blinding to look at. You
have often seen a patriarch in a picture, on earth, with that thing
on - you remember it? - he looks as if he had his head in a brass
platter. That don't give you the right idea of it at all - it is
much more shining and beautiful."
"Did you talk with those archangels and patriarchs, Sandy?"
"Who - I? Why, what can you be thinking about, Stormy? I ain't
worthy to speak to such as they."
"Is Talmage?"
"Of course not. You have got the same mixed-up idea about these
things that everybody has down there. I had it once, but I got
over it. Down there they talk of the heavenly King - and that is
right - but then they go right on speaking as if this was a
republic and everybody was on a dead level with everybody else, and
privileged to fling his arms around anybody he comes across, and be
hail-fellow-well-met with all the elect, from the highest down.
How tangled up and absurd that is! How are you going to have a
republic under a king? How are you going to have a republic at
all, where the head of the government is absolute, holds his place
forever, and has no parliament, no council to meddle or make in his
affairs, nobody voted for, nobody elected, nobody in the whole
universe with a voice in the government, nobody asked to take a
hand in its matters, and nobody ALLOWED to do it? Fine republic,
ain't it?"
"Well, yes - it IS a little different from the idea I had - but I
thought I might go around and get acquainted with the grandees,
anyway - not exactly splice the main-brace with them, you know, but
shake hands and pass the time of day."
"Could Tom, Dick and Harry call on the Cabinet of Russia and do
that? - on Prince Gortschakoff, for instance?"
"I reckon not, Sandy."
"Well, this is Russia - only more so. There's not the shadow of a
republic about it anywhere. There are ranks, here. There are
viceroys, princes, governors, sub-governors, sub-sub-governors, and
a hundred orders of nobility, grading along down from grand-ducal
archangels, stage by stage, till the general level is struck, where
there ain't any titles. Do you know what a prince of the blood is,
on earth?"
"No."
"Well, a prince of the blood don't belong to the royal family
exactly, and he don't belong to the mere nobility of the kingdom;
he is lower than the one, and higher than t'other. That's about
the position of the patriarchs and prophets here. There's some
mighty high nobility here - people that you and I ain't worthy to
polish sandals for - and THEY ain't worthy to polish sandals for
the patriarchs and prophets. That gives you a kind of an idea of
their rank, don't it? You begin to see how high up they are, don't
you? just to get a two-minute glimpse of one of them is a thing for
a body to remember and tell about for a thousand years. Why,
Captain, just think of this: if Abraham was to set his foot down
here by this door, there would be a railing set up around that
foot-track right away, and a shelter put over it, and people would
flock here from all over heaven, for hundreds and hundreds of
years, to look at it. Abraham is one of the parties that Mr.
Talmage, of Brooklyn, is going to embrace, and kiss, and weep on,
when he comes. He wants to lay in a good stock of tears, you know,
or five to one he will go dry before he gets a chance to do it."
"Sandy," says I, "I had an idea that I was going to be equals with
everybody here, too, but I will let that drop. It don't matter,
and I am plenty happy enough anyway."
"Captain, you are happier than you would be, the other way. These
old patriarchs and prophets have got ages the start of you; they
know more in two minutes than you know in a year. Did you ever try
to have a sociable improving-time discussing winds, and currents
and variations of compass with an undertaker?"
"I get your idea, Sandy. He couldn't interest me. He would be an
ignoramus in such things - he would bore me, and I would bore him."
"You have got it. You would bore the patriarchs when you talked,
and when they talked they would shoot over your head. By and by
you would say, 'Good morning, your Eminence, I will call again' -
but you wouldn't. Did you ever ask the slush-boy to come up in the
cabin and take dinner with you?"
"I get your drift again, Sandy. I wouldn't be used to such grand
people as the patriarchs and prophets, and I would be sheepish and
tongue-tied in their company, and mighty glad to get out of it.
Sandy, which is the highest rank, patriarch or prophet?"
"Oh, the prophets hold over the patriarchs. The newest prophet,
even, is of a sight more consequence than the oldest patriarch.
Yes, sir, Adam himself has to walk behind Shakespeare."
"Was Shakespeare a prophet?"
"Of course he was; and so was Homer, and heaps more. But
Shakespeare and the rest have to walk behind a common tailor from
Tennessee, by the name of Billings; and behind a horse-doctor named
Sakka, from Afghanistan. Jeremiah, and Billings and Buddha walk
together, side by side, right behind a crowd from planets not in
our astronomy; next come a dozen or two from Jupiter and other
worlds; next come Daniel, and Sakka and Confucius; next a lot from
systems outside of ours; next come Ezekiel, and Mahomet, Zoroaster,
and a knife-grinder from ancient Egypt; then there is a long
string, and after them, away down toward the bottom, come
Shakespeare and Homer, and a shoemaker named Marais, from the back
settlements of France."
"Have they really rung in Mahomet and all those other heathens?"
"Yes - they all had their message, and they all get their reward.
The man who don't get his reward on earth, needn't bother - he will
get it here, sure."
"But why did they throw off on Shakespeare, that way, and put him
away down there below those shoe-makers and horse-doctors and
knife-grinders - a lot of people nobody ever heard of?"
"That is the heavenly justice of it - they warn't rewarded
according to their deserts, on earth, but here they get their
rightful rank. That tailor Billings, from Tennessee, wrote poetry
that Homer and Shakespeare couldn't begin to come up to; but nobody
would print it, nobody read it but his neighbors, an ignorant lot,
young folks, it don't do anybody any harm, it don't cost a rap, and
it keeps up the place's reputation for making all comers happy and
content."
"Very good. I'll be on hand and see them land the barkeeper."
"It is manners to go in full dress. You want to wear your wings,
you know, and your other things."
"Which ones?"
"Halo, and harp, and palm branch, and all that."
"Well," says I, "I reckon I ought to be ashamed of myself, but the
fact is I left them laying around that day I resigned from the
choir. I haven't got a rag to wear but this robe and the wings."
"That's all right. You'll find they've been raked up and saved for
you. Send for them."
"I'll do it, Sandy. But what was it you was saying about
unsacrilegious things, which people expect to get, and will be
disappointed about?"
"Oh, there are a lot of such things that people expect and don't
get. For instance, there's a Brooklyn preacher by the name of
Talmage, who is laying up a considerabledisappointment for
himself. He says, every now and then in his sermons, that the
first thing he does when he gets to heaven, will be to fling his
arms around Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and kiss them and weep on
them. There's millions of people down there on earth that are
promising themselves the same thing. As many as sixty thousand
people arrive here every single day, that want to run straight to
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and hug them and weep on them. Now mind
you, sixty thousand a day is a pretty heavy contract for those old
people. If they were a mind to allow it, they wouldn't ever have
anything to do, year in and year out, but stand up and be hugged
and wept on thirty-two hours in the twenty-four. They would be
tired out and as wet as muskrats all the time. What would heaven
be, to THEM? It would be a mighty good place to get out of - you
know that, yourself. Those are kind and gentle old Jews, but they
ain't any fonder of kissing the emotional highlights of Brooklyn
than you be. You mark my words, Mr. T.'s endearments are going to
be declined, with thanks. There are limits to the privileges of
the elect, even in heaven. Why, if Adam was to show himself to
every new comer that wants to call and gaze at him and strike him
for his autograph, he would never have time to do anything else but
just that. Talmage has said he is going to give Adam some of his
attentions, as well as A., I. and J. But he will have to change
his mind about that."
"Do you think Talmage will really come here?"
"Why, certainly, he will; but don't you be alarmed; he will run
with his own kind, and there's plenty of them. That is the main
charm of heaven - there's all kinds here - which wouldn't be the
case if you let the preachers tell it. Anybody can find the sort
he prefers, here, and he just lets the others alone, and they let
him alone. When the Deity builds a heaven, it is built right, and
on a liberal plan."
Sandy sent home for his things, and I sent for mine, and about nine
in the evening we begun to dress. Sandy says, -
"This is going to be a grand time for you, Stormy. Like as not
some of the patriarchs will turn out."
"No, but will they?"
"Like as not. Of course they are pretty exclusive. They hardly
ever show themselves to the common public. I believe they never
turn out except for an eleventh-hour convert. They wouldn't do it
then, only earthlytradition makes a grand show pretty necessary on
that kind of an occasion."
"Do they an turn out, Sandy?"
"Who? - all the patriarchs? Oh, no - hardly ever more than a
couple. You will be here fifty thousand years - maybe more -
before you get a glimpse of all the patriarchs and prophets. Since
I have been here, Job has been to the front once, and once Ham and
Jeremiah both at the same time. But the finest thing that has
happened in my day was a year or so ago; that was Charles Peace's
reception - him they called 'the Bannercross Murderer' - an
Englishman. There were four patriarchs and two prophets on the
Grand Stand that time - there hasn't been anything like it since
Captain Kidd came; Abel was there - the first time in twelve
hundred years. A report got around that Adam was coming; well, of
course, Abel was enough to bring a crowd, all by himself, but there
is nobody that can draw like Adam. It was a false report, but it
got around, anyway, as I say, and it will be a long day before I
see the like of it again. The reception was in the English
department, of course, which is eight hundred and eleven million
miles from the New Jersey line. I went, along with a good many of
my neighbors, and it was a sight to see, I can tell you. Flocks
came from all the departments. I saw Esquimaux there, and Tartars,
Negroes, Chinamen - people from everywhere. You see a mixture like
that in the Grand Choir, the first day you land here, but you
hardly ever see it again. There were billions of people; when they
were singing or hosannahing, the noise was wonderful; and even when
their tongues were still the drumming of the wings was nearly
enough to burst your head, for all the sky was as thick as if it
was snowing angels. Although Adam was not there, it was a great
time anyway, because we had three archangels on the Grand Stand -
it is a seldom thing that even one comes out."
"What did they look like, Sandy?"
"Well, they had shining faces, and shining robes, and wonderful
rainbow wings, and they stood eighteen feet high, and wore swords,
and held their heads up in a noble way, and looked like soldiers."
"Did they have halos?"
"No - anyway, not the hoop kind. The archangels and the upper-
class patriarchs wear a finer thing than that. It is a round,
solid, splendid glory of gold, that is blinding to look at. You
have often seen a patriarch in a picture, on earth, with that thing
on - you remember it? - he looks as if he had his head in a brass
platter. That don't give you the right idea of it at all - it is
much more shining and beautiful."
"Did you talk with those archangels and patriarchs, Sandy?"
"Who - I? Why, what can you be thinking about, Stormy? I ain't
worthy to speak to such as they."
"Is Talmage?"
"Of course not. You have got the same mixed-up idea about these
things that everybody has down there. I had it once, but I got
over it. Down there they talk of the heavenly King - and that is
right - but then they go right on speaking as if this was a
republic and everybody was on a dead level with everybody else, and
privileged to fling his arms around anybody he comes across, and be
hail-fellow-well-met with all the elect, from the highest down.
How tangled up and absurd that is! How are you going to have a
republic under a king? How are you going to have a republic at
all, where the head of the government is absolute, holds his place
forever, and has no parliament, no council to meddle or make in his
affairs, nobody voted for, nobody elected, nobody in the whole
universe with a voice in the government, nobody asked to take a
hand in its matters, and nobody ALLOWED to do it? Fine republic,
ain't it?"
"Well, yes - it IS a little different from the idea I had - but I
thought I might go around and get acquainted with the grandees,
anyway - not exactly splice the main-brace with them, you know, but
shake hands and pass the time of day."
"Could Tom, Dick and Harry call on the Cabinet of Russia and do
that? - on Prince Gortschakoff, for instance?"
"I reckon not, Sandy."
"Well, this is Russia - only more so. There's not the shadow of a
republic about it anywhere. There are ranks, here. There are
viceroys, princes, governors, sub-governors, sub-sub-governors, and
a hundred orders of nobility, grading along down from grand-ducal
archangels, stage by stage, till the general level is struck, where
there ain't any titles. Do you know what a prince of the blood is,
on earth?"
"No."
"Well, a prince of the blood don't belong to the royal family
exactly, and he don't belong to the mere nobility of the kingdom;
he is lower than the one, and higher than t'other. That's about
the position of the patriarchs and prophets here. There's some
mighty high nobility here - people that you and I ain't worthy to
polish sandals for - and THEY ain't worthy to polish sandals for
the patriarchs and prophets. That gives you a kind of an idea of
their rank, don't it? You begin to see how high up they are, don't
you? just to get a two-minute glimpse of one of them is a thing for
a body to remember and tell about for a thousand years. Why,
Captain, just think of this: if Abraham was to set his foot down
here by this door, there would be a railing set up around that
foot-track right away, and a shelter put over it, and people would
flock here from all over heaven, for hundreds and hundreds of
years, to look at it. Abraham is one of the parties that Mr.
Talmage, of Brooklyn, is going to embrace, and kiss, and weep on,
when he comes. He wants to lay in a good stock of tears, you know,
or five to one he will go dry before he gets a chance to do it."
"Sandy," says I, "I had an idea that I was going to be equals with
everybody here, too, but I will let that drop. It don't matter,
and I am plenty happy enough anyway."
"Captain, you are happier than you would be, the other way. These
old patriarchs and prophets have got ages the start of you; they
know more in two minutes than you know in a year. Did you ever try
to have a sociable improving-time discussing winds, and currents
and variations of compass with an undertaker?"
"I get your idea, Sandy. He couldn't interest me. He would be an
ignoramus in such things - he would bore me, and I would bore him."
"You have got it. You would bore the patriarchs when you talked,
and when they talked they would shoot over your head. By and by
you would say, 'Good morning, your Eminence, I will call again' -
but you wouldn't. Did you ever ask the slush-boy to come up in the
cabin and take dinner with you?"
"I get your drift again, Sandy. I wouldn't be used to such grand
people as the patriarchs and prophets, and I would be sheepish and
tongue-tied in their company, and mighty glad to get out of it.
Sandy, which is the highest rank, patriarch or prophet?"
"Oh, the prophets hold over the patriarchs. The newest prophet,
even, is of a sight more consequence than the oldest patriarch.
Yes, sir, Adam himself has to walk behind Shakespeare."
"Was Shakespeare a prophet?"
"Of course he was; and so was Homer, and heaps more. But
Shakespeare and the rest have to walk behind a common tailor from
Tennessee, by the name of Billings; and behind a horse-doctor named
Sakka, from Afghanistan. Jeremiah, and Billings and Buddha walk
together, side by side, right behind a crowd from planets not in
our astronomy; next come a dozen or two from Jupiter and other
worlds; next come Daniel, and Sakka and Confucius; next a lot from
systems outside of ours; next come Ezekiel, and Mahomet, Zoroaster,
and a knife-grinder from ancient Egypt; then there is a long
string, and after them, away down toward the bottom, come
Shakespeare and Homer, and a shoemaker named Marais, from the back
settlements of France."
"Have they really rung in Mahomet and all those other heathens?"
"Yes - they all had their message, and they all get their reward.
The man who don't get his reward on earth, needn't bother - he will
get it here, sure."
"But why did they throw off on Shakespeare, that way, and put him
away down there below those shoe-makers and horse-doctors and
knife-grinders - a lot of people nobody ever heard of?"
"That is the heavenly justice of it - they warn't rewarded
according to their deserts, on earth, but here they get their
rightful rank. That tailor Billings, from Tennessee, wrote poetry
that Homer and Shakespeare couldn't begin to come up to; but nobody
would print it, nobody read it but his neighbors, an ignorant lot,
- charming [´tʃɑ:miŋ]
a.可爱的；极好的 (初中英语单词) - reckon [´rekən] v.计算；认为；估计 (初中英语单词)
- ashamed [ə´ʃeimd] a.惭愧；不好意思 (初中英语单词)
- instance [´instəns] n.例子，实例，例证 (初中英语单词)
- considerable [kən´sidərəbəl] a.重要的；值得重视 (初中英语单词)
- disappointment [,disə´pɔintmənt] n.失望；挫折 (初中英语单词)
- emotional [i´məuʃənəl] a.易动感情的；情感的 (初中英语单词)
- liberal [´libərəl] a.大方的 n.开明的人 (初中英语单词)
- convert [kən´və:t, ´kɔnvə:t] v.转变 n.改变信仰者 (初中英语单词)
- tradition [trə´diʃən] n.传统；惯例；传说 (初中英语单词)
- glimpse [glimps] n.&v.瞥见 (初中英语单词)
- jersey [´dʒə:zi] n.毛织运动衫；毛线衫 (初中英语单词)
- mixture [´mikstʃə] n.混合；混合比；混合物 (初中英语单词)
- absurd [əb´sə:d] a.荒谬的，可笑的 (初中英语单词)
- republic [ri´pʌblik] n.共和国；共和政体 (初中英语单词)
- absolute [´æbsəlu:t] a.绝对的 n.绝对 (初中英语单词)
- parliament [´pɑ:ləmənt] n.议(国)会 (初中英语单词)
- cabinet [´kæbinit] n.橱，柜；内阁 (初中英语单词)
- prince [´prins] n.王子；亲王；君主 (初中英语单词)
- anywhere [´eniweə] ad.无论何处；任何地方 (初中英语单词)
- worthy [´wə:ði] a.有价值的；值得的 (初中英语单词)
- embrace [im´breis] vt.&n.拥抱；采纳；信奉 (初中英语单词)
- compass [´kʌmpəs] n.指南针；圆规 (初中英语单词)
- consequence [´kɔnsikwəns] n.结果；后果；推断 (初中英语单词)
- shakespeare [´ʃeikspiə] n.莎士比亚 (初中英语单词)
- tailor [´teilə] n.裁缝 vt.裁制(衣服) (初中英语单词)
- jupiter [´dʒu:pitə] n.朱庇特；木星 (初中英语单词)
- reward [ri´wɔ:d] n.&v.报答；报酬；奖赏 (初中英语单词)
- bother [´bɔðə] v.打扰 n.麻烦(事) (初中英语单词)
- ignorant [´ignərənt] a.无知的，愚昧的 (初中英语单词)
- saying [´seiŋ, ´sei-iŋ] n.言语；言论；格言 (高中英语单词)
- preacher [´pri:tʃə] n.讲道者，传教士 (高中英语单词)
- mighty [´maiti] a.强有力的 ad.很 (高中英语单词)
- exclusive [ik´sklu:siv] a.独有的；集中的 (高中英语单词)
- earthly [´ə:θli] a.地球的；世俗的 (高中英语单词)
- reception [ri´sepʃən] n.接待；欢迎；招待会 (高中英语单词)
- heavenly [´hevənli] a.天的，天空的 (高中英语单词)
- meddle [´medl] vi.干涉(预)；乱弄 (高中英语单词)
- nobility [nəu´biliti, nə-] n.高贵；贵金属性 (高中英语单词)
- shoemaker [´ʃu:,meikə] n.鞋匠 (高中英语单词)
- reputation [repju´teiʃən] n.名誉；名声；信誉 (英语四级单词)
- polish [´pəuliʃ] a.波兰(人)的 n.波兰语 (英语四级单词)
- railing [´reiliŋ] n.栏杆 (英语四级单词)
- astronomy [ə´strɔnəmi] n.天文学 (英语四级单词)
- speaking [´spi:kiŋ] n.说话 a.发言的 (英语六级单词)
- eminence [´eminəns] n.杰出；重要人物；高处 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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