評(píng)論
打印
It is plain, then, that phrenologically the head of this Leviathan, in the creature's living intact state, is an entire delusion. As for his true brain, you can then see no indications of it, nor feel any. The whale, like all things that are mighty, wears a false brow to the common world.
于是，很明白，從骨相學(xué)上說(shuō)來(lái)，在大鯨活著而毫無(wú)損傷的時(shí)候，它的頭就全然是一種使人迷惑的東西。至于它的真正的頭腦，你根本就一點(diǎn)也找不到什么跡象，一點(diǎn)也覺(jué)察不到。跟凡是偉大的一切東西一樣，大鯨也是對(duì)人間戴起一副假面具的。
If you unload his skull of its spermy heaps and then take a rear view of its rear end, which is the high end, you will be struck by its resemblance to the human skull, beheld in the same situation, and from the same point of view. Indeed, place this reversed skull (scaled down to the human magnitude) among a plate of men's skulls, and you would involuntarily confound it with them; and remarking the depressions on one part of its summit, in phrenological phrase you would say—This man had no self-esteem, and no veneration. And by those negations, considered along with the affirmative fact of his prodigious bulk and power, you can best form to yourself the truest, though not the most exhilarating conception of what the most exalted potency is.
如果你拿掉了它腦殼里那些鯨油塊，然后，打它后邊（也就是它那隆起的地方）看一看它的后形，那么，它那跟你從同樣角度、同樣觀點(diǎn)來(lái)看人類的后腦而結(jié)果卻是完全相似的情況，一定會(huì)教你大吃一驚。老實(shí)說(shuō)，如果把這只倒置的腦殼（把它縮得跟人類的腦殼一般大小）放在裝有許多人類腦殼的一只器皿里，你準(zhǔn)會(huì)不自覺(jué)地把它跟人頭混淆不清；同時(shí)，看到它腦頂那地方的凹處后，你準(zhǔn)會(huì)照骨相學(xué)的術(shù)語(yǔ)說(shuō)——這家伙是毫無(wú)自尊心，毫無(wú)虔敬心的了。而你把這些否定的斷語(yǔ)，跟它那巨大的軀干和威力的肯定的事實(shí)一起考慮一下的話，你自己就會(huì)對(duì)那具有最高的威力的道理所在，出乎意料地得出雖然不是最痛快的然而卻是最正確的概念來(lái)。
But if from the comparative dimensions of the whale's proper brain, you deem it incapable of being adequately charted, then I have another idea for you. If you attentively regard almost any quadruped's spine, you will be struck with the resemblance of its vertebrae to a strung necklace of dwarfed skulls, all bearing rudimental resemblance to the skull proper.
不過(guò)，如果你從原來(lái)的鯨腦的相當(dāng)容積上，還認(rèn)為不能對(duì)它獲得適當(dāng)?shù)妮喞脑挘敲矗医o你另外出個(gè)主意。如果你對(duì)差不多任何一種四足動(dòng)物的背脊都留心地注意一下，那么，就它那脊骨跟一串結(jié)在項(xiàng)鏈里的許多縮小的腦殼，全都跟發(fā)育不全的正式的腦殼極相仿佛這一點(diǎn)說(shuō)來(lái)，又要叫你大吃一驚了。
