达尔文PK林肯谁更重要.docVIP

Who Was More Important: Darwin or Lincoln? 达尔文PK林肯：谁更重要？ By Malcolm Jones 译/张曦 2009年是林肯和达尔文诞生两百周年，大西洋两岸的英美两国分别展开了为期一年的庆祝活动。除了同年同月同日生，林肯和达尔文还有哪些共同点？他们对世界的深远影响是怎样的？作为杰出历史人物，两者“谁更重要”？也许文中的论述可以让你一见分晓。 How’s this for a coincidence? Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were born in the same year, on the same day: Feb. 12, 1809. As historical facts go, it amounts to little more than a footnote. Still, while it’s just a coincidence, it’s a coincidence that’s guaranteed to make you do a double take1) the first time you run across it. Everybody knows Darwin and Lincoln were near-mythic figures in the 19th century. But who ever thinks of them in tandem 2)? But instinctively, we want to say that they belong together. It’s not just because they were both great men, and not because they happen to be exact coevals 3). Rather, it’s because the scientist and the politician each touched off 4) a revolution that changed the world. As soon as you do start comparing this odd couple, you discover there is more to this birthday coincidence than the same astrological 5) chart. Both lost their mothers in early childhood. Both suffered from depression, and both wrestled with religious doubt. Each had a strained relationship with his father, and each of them lost children to early death. Both spent the better part of their 20s trying to settle on a career, and neither man gave much evidence of his future greatness until well into middle age: Darwin published The Origin of Species when he was 50, and Lincoln won the presidency a year later. Both men were private and guarded 6). Most of Darwin’s friendships were conducted through the mail, and after his five-year voyage on HMS 7) Beagle 8) as a young man, he rarely left his home in the English countryside. Lincoln, though a much more public man, carefully cultivated a bumpkin 9) persona that encouraged both friends and enemies to underestimate his considerable, almost Machiavellian 10) skill as a politician. Self-Made Men Darwin, the man who wou