Pre-reading Activities
1. Talk about the president inauguration in the United States.
2. How much do you know about the differences between Democratic Party and Republican Party in the States?
Text
My fellow citizens;
同胞们：
1. Today we celebrate the mystery of American renewa. (renewal [ri'nju:al] n. giving new life and freshness to.
今天，我们庆祝美国复兴的奇迹。
2. This ceremony is held in the depth of winter. But, by the words we speak and the faces we show the world, we force the spring.
这个仪式虽在隆冬举行，然而，我们通过自己的语言和面向世界的面容，却促使春回大地。
3. A spring reborn in the world's oldest democracy, which brings forth the vision and courage to reinvent America.
回到了世界上这个最古老的民主国家，并带来了重新创造美国的远见和勇气。
4. When our founders boldly declared America's independence to the world and our purposes to the Almighty, they knew that America, to endure, would have to change.
当我国的缔造者勇敢地向世界宣布美国独立，并向上帝表明自己的目的时，他们知道，美国若要永存，就必须变革。
5. Not change for change's sake, but change to preserve"' America's ideals - life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Though we march to the music of our time, our mission is timeless.
不是为变革而变革，而是为了维护美国的理想—为了生命、自由和追求幸福而变革。尽管我们随着当今时代的节拍前进，但是我们的使命永恒不变。
6. Each generation of Americans must define what it means to be an American.
每一代美国人，都必须为作为一个美国人意味着什么下定义。
7. On behalf of our nation, I salute my predecessor, President Bush, for his half-century of service to America.
我谨代表我们的国家，向我的前任，布什总统致意，感谢他半个世纪以来为美国所做出的贡献。
8. And I thank the millions of men and women whose steadfastness and sacrifice triumphed over depression and fascism.
我也感谢千千万万的民众，他们用坚定和奉献战胜了经济大萧条和法西斯主义。
9. Today, a generation raised in the shadows of the Cold War assumes new responsibilities in a world warmed by the sunshine of freedom but threatened still by ancient hatreds and new plagues.
今天，在冷战阴影下成长起来的一代人，在世界上负起了新的责任。这个世界虽然沐浴着自由的阳光，但仍受到旧仇宿怨和新的祸患的威胁。
10. Raised in unrivaled prosperity, we inherit an economy that is still the world's strongest, but is weakened by business failures, stagnant wages, increasing inequality, and deep divisions among our people.
我们在无与伦比的繁荣中长大，继承了仍然是世界上最强大的经济。但由于企业倒闭，工资增长停滞，不平等状况加剧，人民的分歧加深，我们的经济已经被削弱。
11. When George Washington first took the oath I moving have just sworn to uphold, news traveled slowly across the land by horseback and across the ocean by boat. Now, the sights and sounds of this ceremony are broadcast instantaneously to billions around the world.
当乔治?华盛顿第一次宣读我刚才宣读的誓言时，人们骑马把那个信息缓慢地传遍大地，继而又乘船把它传过海洋。而现在，这个仪式的情景和声音即刻向全球几十亿人播放。
12. Communications and commerce are global; investment is mobile; technology is almost magical; and ambition for a better life is now universal. We earn our livelihood in peaceful competition with people all across the earth. Profound and powerful forces are shaking and remaking our world, and the urgent question of our time is whether we can make change our friend and not our enemy.
通信和商务具有全球性；投资具有流动性；技术几乎拥有魔力；改善生活的理想现在具有普遍性。今天，我们美国人通过同世界各地人民进行和平竞争来谋求生存。各种深远而强大的力量正在震撼和改造我们的世界，当今时代的当务之急是我们能否使变革成为我们的朋友，而不是成为我们的敌人。
13. This new world has already enriched the lives of millions of Americans who are able to compete and win in it. But when most people are working harder for less; when others cannot work at all; when the cost of health care devastates families and threatens to bankrupt many of our enterprises, great and small; when fear of crime robs law-abiding citizens of their freedom; and when millions of poor children cannot even imagine the lives we are calling them to lead – we have not made change our friend.
这个新世界已经使几百万能够参与竞争并且取胜的美国人过上了富裕的生活。但是，当多数人干得越多反而挣得越少的时候；当有些人根本不可能工作的时候；当保健费用的重负使众多家庭不堪承受、使大大小小的企业濒临破产的时候；当犯罪活动的恐惧使守法公民不能自由行动的时候；当千百万贫穷儿童甚至不能想象我们呼唤他们过的那种生活的时候，我们就没有使变革成为我们的朋友。
14. We know we have to face hard truths and take strong steps. But we have not done so. Instead, we have drifted, and that drifting has eroded our resources, fractured our economy, and shaken our confidence.
我们知道，我们必须面对严酷的事实真相，并采取强有力的步骤。但我们没有这样做，而是听之任之，以致损耗了我们的资源，破坏了我们的经济，动摇了我们的信心。
15. Though our challenges are fearsome, so are our strengths. And American have ever been a restless, questing, hopeful people. We must bring to our task today the vision and will of those who came before us.
我们面临惊人的挑战，但我们同样具有惊人的力量。美国人历来是不安现状、不断企求和充满希望的民族。今天，我们必须把前人的远见卓识和坚强意志带到我们的任务中去。
16. From our revolution, the Civil War, to the Great Depression to the civil rights movement, our people have always mustered the determination to construct from these crises the pillars of our history.
从革命，内战，大萧条，直到民权运动，我国总是下定决心，从历次危机中构筑我国历史的支柱。
17. Thomas Jefferson believed that to preserve the very foundations of our nation, we would need dramatic change from time to time. Well, my fellow citizens, this is our time. Let us embrace it.
托马斯?杰斐逊认为，为了维护我国的根基，我们需要时常进行激动人心的变革。美国同胞们，我们的时代就是变革的时代，让我们拥抱这个时代吧！
18. Our democracy must be not only the envy of the world but also the engine of our own renewal. There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.
我们的民主制度不仅要成为举世称羡的目标，而且要成为举国复兴的动力。美国没有任何错误的东西不能被正确的东西所纠正。
19. And so today, we pledge an end to the era of deadlock and drift - a new season of American renewal has begun.
因此，我们今天立下誓言，要结束这个僵持停顿、放任自流的时代，一个复兴美国的新朝代已经开始。
20. To renew America, we must be bold.
我们要振兴美国，我们就必须鼓足勇气。
21. We must do what no generation has had to do before. We must invest more in our own people, in their jobs, in their future, and at the same time cut our massive debt. And we must do so in a world in which we must compete for every opportunity.
我们必须做前人无需做的事情。我们必须更多地投资于人民，投资于他们的工作和未来。与此同时，我们必须减少巨额债务。而且，我们必须在一个需要为每个机会而竞争的世界上做到这一切。
22. It will not be easy; it will require sacrifice. But it can be done, and done fairly, not choosing sacrifice for its own sake, but for our own sake. We must provide for our nation the way a family provides for its children. Our Founders saw themselves in the light of posterity. We can do no less. Anyone who has ever watched a child's eyes wander into sleep knows what posterity is. Posterity is the world to come—the world for whom we hold our ideals, from whom we have borrowed our planet, and to whom we bear sacred responsibility.
这样做并不容易，这样做要求做出牺牲。但是这是可以做到的，并且可以做得公平合理。我们不是为牺牲而牺牲，我们必须像家庭供养子女那样来供养自己的国家。我国的缔造者是用子孙后代的眼光来审视自己的，我们也必须这样做。凡是注意过孩子朦胧入睡的人，都知道后代意味着什么。后代就是将要到来的世界—我们为之坚持自己的理想，我们向之借用这个星球，我们对之负有神圣的责任。
23. We must do what America does best: offer more opportunity to all and demand responsibility from all.
我们必须做美国最拿手的事情：为所有的提供更多的机会，要让所有的人负起更多的责任。
24. It is time to break the bad habit of expecting something for nothing, from our government or from each other. Let us all take more responsibility, not only for our families and ourselves but also for our communities and our country.
现在是破除只求向政府和别人免费索取的恶习的时候了。让我们大家不仅为自己和家庭，而且社会和国家担负更多的责任吧。
25. To renew America, we must revitalize our democracy.
我们要复兴美国，就必须恢复我们民主制度的活力。
26. This beautiful capital, like every capital since the dawn of civilization, is often a place of intrigue and calculation. Powerful people maneuver for position and worry endlessly about who is in and who is out, who is up and who is down, forgetting those people whose toil and sweat sends us here and pays our way.
这个美丽的首都，就像文明的曙光出现以来的每一个首都一样，常常是尔虞我诈、明争暗斗之地。大腕人物争权夺势，没完没了地为官员的更替升降而烦神，却忘记了那些用辛勤和汗水把我们送到这里来，并养活我们的人。
27, Americans deserve better, and in this city today, there are people who want to do better. And so I say to all of us here, let us resolve to strategies in gaining reform our politics, so that power and privilege no longer shout down the voice of the people. Let us put aside personal advantage so that we can feel the pain and see the promise of America.
美国人民理应得到更好的回报。在这个城市里，今天有人想把事情做得更好一些。因此，我要对所有在场的人说，让我们下定决心改革我们的政治，使权力和特权的喧嚣不再压倒人民的呼声。让我们撇开个人利益，这样我们就能觉察美国的病痛，并看到它的希望。
28. Let us resolve to make our government a place for what Franklin Roosevelt called "bold, persistent experimentation," a government for our tomorrows, not our yesterdays.
让我们下定决心，使政府成为富兰克林?罗斯福所说的进行“大胆而持久试验”的地方，成为一个面向未来而不是留恋过去的政府。
29. Let us give this capital back to the people to whom it belongs.
我们要复兴美国，就必须迎接国内外的种种挑战。
30. To renew America, we must meet challenges abroad as well as at home. There is no longer division between what is foreign and what is domestic - the world economy, the world environment, the world AIDS crisis, the world arms race - they affect us all.
国外和国内事务已不再有明显的界线—世界经济、世界环境、世界艾滋病危机、世界军备竞赛，这一切都影响着我们每一个人。
31. Today, as an old order passes, the new world is freer but less stable. Clearly America must continue to lead the world we did so much to make.
今天，旧秩序已经瓦解了，新世界更加自由，但更加不稳定。很明显，美国必须继续像以前一样领导世界。
32. While America rebuilds at home, we will not shrink from the challenges, nor fail to seize the opportunities, of this new world. Together with our friends and allies, we will work to shape change, lest it engulf us.
我们在国内进行重建的同时，面对这个新世界的挑战不会退缩不前，也不会坐失良机。我们将与盟友一起努力进行变革，以免被变革所吞没。
33. When our vital interests are challenged, or the will and conscience of the international community is defied, we will act - with peaceful diplomacy whenever possible, with force when necessary. The brave Americans serving our nation today in the Persian Gulf, in Somalia, and wherever else they stand are testaments to our resolve.
当我们的重要利益受到挑战时，或者，当国际社会的意志和良知受到蔑视，我们将采取行动—可能时就采用和平外交手段，必要时就使用武力。今天，在波斯湾、索马里和任何其他地方为国效力的勇敢的美国人，都证明了我们的决心。
34. But our greatest strength is the power of our ideas, which are still new in many lands. Across the world, we see them embraced – and we rejoice. Our hopes, our hearts, our hands, are with those on every continent who are building democracy and freedom. Their cause is America’s cause.
我们最伟大的力量就我们思想的威力。这些思想在许多国家仍然处于萌芽阶段。看到这些思想在世界各地被接受，我们感到欢欣鼓舞。我们的希望、我们的心，与每一个大陆正在建立民主和自由的人们连结在一起，他们的事业就是美国的事业。
35. The American people have summoned the change we celebrate today. You have raised your voices in an unmistakable chorus. You have cast your votes in historic numbers. And you have changed the face of Congress, the presidency and the political process itself. Yes, you, my fellow Americans have forced the spring. Now, we must do the work the season demands.
美国人民唤来了我们今天所庆祝的变革。你们毫不含糊的齐声疾呼。你们以前所未有的人数参加了投票。你们使国会、总统职务和政治进程本身全都面目一新。是的，是你们，我的美国同胞们，促使春回大地。现在，我们必须做这个季节需要做的工作。
36. To that work I now turn, with all the authority of my office. I ask the Congress to join with me. But no president, no Congress, no keeping company with those in need, reconnecting our torn communities. There is so much to be done – enough indeed for millions of others who are still young in spirit to give of themselves in service, too.
我以总统的名义请求国会和我同心合力做好工作。因为没有一位总统、一个国会、一个政府能够单独完成这样的任务。要做的事情实在很多—确实够多的，让千百万精神年轻、愿意参加服务的人们都来做吧！
37. In serving, we recognize a simple but powerful truth – we need each other. And we must care for one another. Today, we do more than celebrate America; we rededicate ourselves to the very idea of America.
在奉献中，我们认识到相互需要这一简单而强大的真理：我们必须相互关心。今天，我们不仅是在赞颂美国，我们再一次把自己奉献给美国的理想。
38. An idea born in revolution and renewed through two centuries of challenge. An idea tempered by the knowledge that, but for fate, we – the fortunate and the unfortunate - might have been each other. An idea ennobled by the faith that our nation can summon from its myriad diversity the deepest measure of unity. An idea infused with the conviction that America's long heroic journey must go forever upward.
这个理想在革命中诞生，在两个世纪以来的挑战中不断更新；这个理想经受了认识的考验，大家认识到，若不是命运的安排，幸运者和不幸者有可能互换位置；这个理想由于一种信念而变得崇高，即美国能够在纷繁的多样性中实现最深刻的统一性；这个理想包含着一种坚定的信念；美国漫长而英勇的旅程必将永远继续。
39. And so, my fellow Americans, at the edge of the 21st century, let us begin with energy and hope, with faith and discipline, and let us work until our work is done. The scripture says, "And let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season, we shall reap, if we faint not .
同胞们，在我们即将跨入21世纪之际，让我们以旺盛的精力和满腔的希望，以坚定的信心和严明的纪律开始工作，直到把工作完成。《圣经》说：“我们行善，不可丧志，若不灰心，到了时候，就要收成。”
40. From this joyful mountaintop of celebration, we hear a call to service in the valley. We have heard the trumpets. We have changed the guard. And now, each in our way, and with God's help, we must answer the call.
在这个欢乐的山巅，我们听到山谷里传来了要我们做出奉献的召唤。我们听到了号角声。我们已经换岗。现在，我们必须以各自的方式，在上帝的帮助下响应这一召唤。
41. Thank you and God bless you all.
谢谢各位！上帝保佑你们！