我的生命大概不会很长久罢。 然而在短促的过去的回顾中却有一盏明灯, 照彻了我的灵魂的黑暗, 使我的生存有一点光彩。 这盏灯就是友情。 我应该感谢它, 因为靠了它我才能够活到现在; 而且把旧家庭给我留下的阴影扫除了的也正是它。
世间有不少的人为了家庭抛弃朋友, 至少也会在家庭和朋友之间画一个界限, 把家庭看得比朋友重过若干倍,这似乎是很自然的事情。 我也曾亲眼看见一些人结婚以后就离开朋友, 离开事业...
朋友是暂时的, 家庭是永久的。 在好些人的行为里我发现了这个信条。 这个信条在我实在是不可理解的。 对于我, 要是没有朋友, 我现在会变成怎样可怜的东西, 我自己也不知道。
然而朋友们把我救了。 他们给了我家庭所不能给的东西, 他们的友爱, 他们的帮助, 他们的鼓励, 几次把我从深渊的边沿救回来。 他们对我表示了无限的慷慨。
我的生活曾经是悲苦的, 黑暗的, 然而朋友们把多量的同情, 多量的爱, 多量的欢乐, 多量的眼泪分给了我,这些东西都是生存所必需的。 这些不要报答的慷慨的施舍, 使我的生活里也有了温暖, 有了幸福。 我默默地接受了他们。 我并不曾说过一句感激的话, 我也没有做过一件报答的行为。 但是朋友们却不把自私的形容词加到我的身上, 对于我, 他们太慷慨了。
The length of my days will not be unlimited. However, whenever I look back on brief past life, I find a beacon illuminating my soul and thereby lending a little brightness to my being. That beacon is friendship. I should be grateful to it because it has helped me keep alive up to now and clear away the shadow left on me by my old family.
Many people forsake their friends in favor of their own families, or at least draw a line of demarcation between families and friends, considering the former to be many times more important than the latter. That seems to be a matter of course. I have also seen with my own eyes how some people abandon their friends as well as their own careers soon after they get married…
Friends are transient whereas family are lasting—that is the tenet, as I know, guiding the behavior of many people. To me, that is utterly inconceivable. Without friends, I would have been reduced to I don‟t know what a miserable creature.
Friends are my saviors. They give me things which it is beyond my family to give me. Thanks to their fraternal love,assistance and encouragement, I have time and again been saved from falling into an abyss while on its verge. They have been enormously generous towards me.
There was a time when my life was miserable and gloomy. My friends then gave me in large quantities sympathy,love, joy and tears—things essential for existence. It is due to their bountiful free gifts that I also have my share of warmth and happiness in my life. I accepted their kindnesses quietly without ever saying a word of thanks and without ever doing anything in return. In spite of that, my friends never used the epithet “self-centered” when referred to me.They are only too generous towards me.