Who that cares much to know the history of man, and how the mysterious mixture behaves under the varying experiments of Time, has not dwelt, at least briefly, on the life of Saint Theresa, has not smiled with some gentleness at the thought of the little girl walking forth one morning hand-in-hand with her still smaller brother, to go and seek martyrdom in the country of the Moors? —-
谁若在意人类历史，想要了解神秘的人类混合体在时间不同实验中的表现，都会至少略微地沉浸在圣女德蕾莎的生平上，想象着那个小姑娘同她更小的弟弟手牵手地早晨出门，前往摩尔人的国度寻找殉道。 —-

Out they toddled from rugged Avila, wide-eyed and helpless-looking as two fawns, but with human hearts, already beating to a national idea; —-
他们从崎岖的阿维拉走了出来，眼睛瞪得大大的，看起来毫无助，就像两只小鹿，但内心却已经激荡着一个民族理想的心跳。 —-

until domestic reality met them in the shape of uncles, and turned them back from their great resolve. —-
直到家庭的现实以伯父们的形象迎接他们，并将他们从伟大的决心中拔回。 —-

That child-pilgrimage was a fit beginning. —-
那次孩童朝圣是一个合适的开始。 —-

Theresa’s passionate, ideal nature demanded an epic life: —-
德蕾莎充满激情和理想的天性渴望着史诗般的人生： —-

what were many-volumed romances of chivalry and the social conquests of a brilliant girl to her? —-
对她来说，骑士传奇的多卷小说以及一个聪颖女孩在社交上的征服算得了什么呢？ —-

Her flame quickly burned up that light fuel; —-
她的热情很快将那点轻薄的燃料燃尽； —-

and, fed from within, soared after some illimitable satisfaction, some object which would never justify weariness, which would reconcile self-despair with the rapturous consciousness of life beyond self. —-
并且，从内心滋养着，她飞翔追求那某种无穷尽的满足，某种永远不会让疲倦感到正当的对象，那种既可以与自我绝望相调和，又可以使她意识到自我以外生命的狂喜。 —-

She found her epos in the reform of a religious order.
她在一个宗教团体改革中找到了自己的史诗。

That Spanish woman who lived three hundred years ago, was certainly not the last of her kind. —-
那位生活在三百年前的西班牙女人显然不是她种类中的最后一个。 —-

Many Theresas have been born who found for themselves no epic life wherein there was a constant unfolding of far-resonant action; —-
许多德蕾莎出现过，她们找不到一个不断展开战歌般生活的机会； —-

perhaps only a life of mistakes, the offspring of a certain spiritual grandeur ill-matched with the meanness of opportunity; —-
或许只是一生错误的结果，源于一定的精神伟大与机会的卑微不匹配； —-

perhaps a tragic failure which found no sacred poet and sank unwept into oblivion. —-
或许是一场悲剧性的失败，找不到神圣诗人，默默沉入遗忘之中。 —-

With dim lights and tangled circumstance they tried to shape their thought and deed in noble agreement; —-
在昏暗的光芒和混乱的环境中，她们试图使自己的思想和行动保持高尚的一致； —-

but after all, to common eyes their struggles seemed mere inconsistency and formlessness; —-
但归根结底，在普通人眼中，她们的挣扎似乎只是不连贯和零乱。 —-

for these later-born Theresas were helped by no coherent social faith and order which could perform the function of knowledge for the ardently willing soul. —-
因为这些后生的特蕾莎们没有得到任何能为热切渴望的灵魂提供知识的连贯社会信仰和秩序的帮助。 —-

Their ardor alternated between a vague ideal and the common yearning of womanhood; —-
她们的热情在模糊的理想和女人的普遍渴望之间交替; —-

so that the one was disapproved as extravagance, and the other condemned as a lapse.
因此一个被指责为过分奢侈，另一个被谴责为失误。

Some have felt that these blundering lives are due to the inconvenient indefiniteness with which the Supreme Power has fashioned the natures of women: —-
有些人认为这些错误的生活是由于至高无上的力量创造女性的本质不明确; —-

if there were one level of feminine incompetence as strict as the ability to count three and no more, the social lot of women might be treated with scientific certitude. —-
如果有一个严格如能数三不多的女性无能水平，女性的社会命运就可以被科学确定。 —-

Meanwhile the indefiniteness remains, and the limits of variation are really much wider than any one would imagine from the sameness of women’s coiffure and the favorite love-stories in prose and verse. —-
与此同时，不确定性依然存在，变化的范围实际上比人们从女性发式的单调和散文诗中最喜欢的爱情故事所能想象的要宽广得多。 —-

Here and there a cygnet is reared uneasily among the ducklings in the brown pond, and never finds the living stream in fellowship with its own oary-footed kind. —-
在褐色的池塘里，会有一只天鹅雏鸟在鸭群中焦躁地长大，却永远找不到与自己有着同样脚浮的伙伴关系的活水流。 —-

Here and there is born a Saint Theresa, foundress of nothing, whose loving heart-beats and sobs after an unattained goodness tremble off and are dispersed among hindrances, instead of centring in some long-recognizable deed.
偶尔会有一位圣女特蕾莎诞生，但她创立的东西为零，她那充满爱的心跳和为一种未能实现的善念而哽咽的声音在障碍中颤动着，并没有集中于某种长期识别的行为之中。