https://online2.tingclass.net/lesson/shi0529/0009/9734/bjj871.mp3
https://image.tingclass.net/statics/js/2012
When I stand among these mighty Leviathan skeletons, skulls, tusks, jaws, ribs, and vertebrae, all characterized by partial resemblances to the existing breeds of sea-monsters; but at the same time bearing on the other hand similar affinities to the annihilated antichronical Leviathans, their incalculable seniors; I am, by a flood, borne back to that wondrous period, ere time itself can be said to have begun; for time began with man. Here Saturn's grey chaos rolls over me, and I obtain dim, shuddering glimpses into those Polar eternities; when wedged bastions of ice pressed hard upon what are now the Tropics; and in all the 25,000 miles of this world's circumference, not an inhabitable hand's breadth of land was visible. Then the whole world was the whale's; and, king of creation, he left his wake along the present lines of the Andes and the Himmalehs. Who can show a pedigree like Leviathan? Ahab's harpoon had shed older blood than the Pharaoh's. Methuselah seems a schoolboy. I look round to shake hands with Shem. I am horror-struck at this antemosaic, unsourced existence of the unspeakable terrors of the whale, which, having been before all time, must needs exist after all humane ages are over.
當我置身在這些大鯨的骷髏、頭殼、牙齒、嘴巴、肋骨和脊骨堆里時,我看到全都多少有點跟現(xiàn)存的那些海里巨獸相似的特征,不過,同時,另一方面,也有跟那些早已湮滅的反年紀的大鯨,它們的難測的先輩相似的特點。我仿佛被一陣洪水泛回到那種奇妙的時期里去了,那是早在時間本身還剛開始的時候,因為時間總是與人類共始。這時我頭上滾著土星的陰慘的渾沌之氣,我朦朧而戰(zhàn)顫地瞥到那些北極的永久不變的事物,當時冰霜象楔形的棱堡似的緊壓著現(xiàn)在稱做熱帶的地方;而在整個二萬五千英里的世界圓周中,卻連一小片可以居住的地方都看不到。當時整個世界是大鯨的世界;而萬物之靈的人已沿著現(xiàn)在的安第斯和喜馬拉雅山脈走去了。誰能給象大鯨這樣的生物提出家系來呢?亞哈(亞哈——這里是指《舊約》所載以色列的第七代王。)的標槍早在法老(法老——古代埃及國王。)的標槍之先染了血滴?,斖寥隼ì斖寥隼?mdash;—挪亞洪水時代的族長,活到九百六十九歲,見《舊約·創(chuàng)世記》第五章二十七節(jié)。)似乎還是個小學生呢。我四處尋找,想跟閃(閃——挪亞的長子;見《舊約·創(chuàng)世記》第五章三十二節(jié)。)握一握手。我給這些摩西以前的(摩西以前——典出《舊約·出埃及記》中,上帝遣摩西到埃及把以色列人帶出來。)、來路不明的大鯨那種不可言喻的恐怖嚇慌了,它既然是早就一直存在著,那就一定會在人類已經消滅以后的年代里繼續(xù)存在下去了。