第九十二课 论学问
Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability.
学问的用途体现在娱乐、装点门面和增长能力上。
Their chief use for delight is in privateness, and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse;
在娱乐上学问的主要用处是处静而心安;在装点门面上学问的用处在于辞令;
and for ability, is in the judgment and disposition of business;
在增长能力上学问的用处则体现在对事务的判断和驾驭上;
for expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of the particulars, one by one;
因为能干的人令行即动,也许对特别的事情要一件一件地进行判断;
but the general counsels, and the plots and marshaling of affairs, come best from those that are learned.
但是,概括性的议论以及对事物的谋划与安排,皆系有才学的人所为。
To spend too much time in studies, is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation;
在学问上花过多时间系偷懒的表现,把学问过多用于装点门面是虚假;
to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar;
完全依学问上的规则而断事是书生的诙谐之举;
they perfect nature and are perfected by experience,
学问历练天性,而其本身又受经验的历练,
for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by study;
因为人的自然能力恰似自然状态下手的花草植物,需要学问的修剪;
and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.
而学问本身,除非受经验的限制,不然的话指引的纲挈未免失于笼统。
Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them, for they teach not their own use;
狡猾的人蔑视学问,头脑简单的人则羡慕学问,聪明的人懂得如何运用。这是因为,学问不会教人们如何运用;
but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation.
这是学问以外而高于学问的一种智慧,系由观察获得。