如果所有人都失去理智,并归咎于你,你依然能不迷失自己,保持冷静;
如果所有人都怀疑你,而你依然能信任自己,并体谅他们的疑心;
如果你能等待而不疲倦,如果你有梦想而不迷失自我;
如果你有神思,又不至于走火入魔;
如果你不用谎言去应付谎言,也不用仇恨去回击仇恨;
不在成功中忘形于色,在不幸悲伤后起身向前;
如果你看着毕生心血的东西被毁坏后,你能俯下身,用破烂的工具去修复,对自己的损失只字不提;
如果你辛苦劳作,功成名就,为了新目标,你依然冒险一搏,哪怕功名成乌有;
如果你跟村夫交谈而不变谦恭之态,和王侯散步而不露谄媚之颜;
如果好友和仇敌都不能加害于你,如果所有人都和你有关,但没有亲疏远近之分;
如果你能把握每一个片刻的当下,不浪费虚度光阴,你就拥有了一切,而且更重要的是,你将成为一个真正的男人,我的儿子!
诺贝尔得奖的 Rudyard 写给儿子的诗歌
Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!