每天分享一篇中英雙語閱讀，對英語口語的練習很有幫助，也是積累英語考試中寫作，翻譯素材的好資料，加油吧!

Life Struggle

生命的拼搏

Once upon a time in a land far far away, there was a wonderful old man who loved everything. Animals, spiders, insects...

從前，在一個非常非常遙遠的國度，有一位心地善良的老人。他喜愛一切東西，動物啦、蜘蛛啦、昆蟲啦。

One day while walking through the woods the nice old man found a cocoon of a butterfly. He took it home.

一天，這位善良的老人在樹林里散步的時候，發現了一個蝴蝶的繭。他把繭帶回了家。

A few days later, a small opening appeared; he sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no farther.

幾天后，繭裂開了一道小縫。老人幾小時地坐在那里，看著蝴蝶掙扎著讓自己的身體從小縫中擠出來。后來，蝴蝶破繭好象停了下來，沒有什么進展了。看來蝴蝶好象是撐到了最后，再也不可能前進了。

Then the man decided to help the butterfly, so he took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon.

看到這里，老人決定幫助蝴蝶。于是他找出一把剪刀，把繭剩余的部分剪破了。

The butterfly then emerged easily.

這樣，蝴蝶就輕易地從繭中脫出來了。

But it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time. Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings.

但是，蝴蝶的身子腫脹著，翅膀又小又皺。老人繼續觀察著蝴蝶，因為他期望著這樣一個時刻的到來：蝴蝶的翅膀會變大，大到能支持它的身體，而蝴蝶的身體屆時也會縮小。可是什么也沒有發生。事實上，這只蝴蝶的余生中就只能拖著臃腫的身體和萎縮的翅膀爬來爬去了。

It never was able to fly.

它永遠也不能飛起來了。

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were Nature’s way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

在好心和匆忙間，老人并不理解，蝴蝶破繭而出時需要的那種束縛和掙扎其實是大自然用來將蝴蝶的體液擠到翅膀中的方法，這樣，蝴蝶一旦能從繭中脫出，就能準備好飛翔了。

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If we were allowed to go through our life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as what we could have been.

有時候，掙扎正是我們生活中所需要的。如果我們能得以毫無障礙地走過一生，這會使我們軟弱。我們就不可能變得強壯。

And we could never fly.

重要的是，我們就不可能騰飛。