The story begins in the most artfully artless way, like the great tales of Defoe and Swift.
正如笛福和斯威夫特的名篇一样，这篇故事也是以充满艺术感而毫无艺术的方式开头。
artfully artless way矛盾修辞法
"We sailed from Peru (where we had continued for the space of one whole year), for China and Japan by the South Sea."
“我们自秘鲁起航（开始航行了约一整年的时间），驶往南海附近的日本与中国。”
Came a great calm, in which the ships for weeks lay quietly on the boundless ocean like specks upon a mirror, while the provisions of the adventurers ebbed away.
海上风平浪静，接连几周，他们的船静静地浮在一望无际的大海上，仿佛镜子上的几个斑点，与此同时，这些探险者的储备一天天减少。
And then resistless winds drove the vessels pitilessly north and north and north, out of the island-dotted south into an endless wilderness of sea.
之后大风呼啸而至，它凶悍地把船队推向北方，一路向北。远离了布满岛屿的南方，推进了无边疯狂野蛮的汪洋大海。
north and north and north叠词使用
The rations were reduced, and reduced again, and again reduced; and disease took hold of the crew.
配给日益缺少；疾病在船员当中传播。
At last, when they had resigned themselves to death, they saw, almost unbelieving, a fair island looming up under the sky.
最后，正当他们绝望地等待死亡的时候，突然发现，不敢想象，遥远的天际隐约出现了一座美丽的岛屿。
On the shore, as their vessel neared it, they saw not savages, but men simply and yet beautifully clothed, clean, and manifestly of developed intelligence.
航船靠岸时，岸上站着的并非野蛮人，而是一些衣着简朴漂亮整洁、气度不凡的男子，显然，他们拥有非凡的智慧。
They were permitted to land, but were told that the island government allowed no strangers to remain.
船员们获准上岸，但又被告知岛国政府不让任何陌生人停留。
Nevertheless, since some of the crew were sick, they might all stay till these were well again.
但既然有船员病了，那他们能够留下来，直到生病的船员康复后再离开。
During the weeks of convalescence the wanderers unraveled, day by day, the mystery of the New Atlantis.
在等待病人康复的几周里，探险者们逐渐了解了亚特兰蒂斯的秘密。
"There reigned in this island about nineteen hundred years ago," one of the inhabitants tells them, "a King whose memory above all others we most adore... His name was Solamona, and we esteem him as the Law-giver of our nation. This King had a large heart... and was wholly bent to make his kingdom and people happy."
一位当地人对他们说：“大概1900年前，这座岛由一位国王统治，我们都永远铭记并崇拜他......他的名字叫所罗门那，我们尊奉其为国家的立法者。这位国王心胸宽广......一心为国家和人民谋福祉。”
跟柏拉图那一帮的godness很相似，有高尚的品质，有着利他主义的驱动。
"Among the excellent acts of that King one above all hath the preëminence. It was the creation and institution of the Order, or Society, which is called Solomon's House; the noblest foundation, as we think, that was ever upon the earth; and the lantherne of this kingdom."
“在国王的所有成就中，他有着预见性，这就是整个规则制度创立的机关，我们称其为‘所罗门院’，我们觉得它是世界上最崇高的机构，就是这个国家的指路明灯。”
There follows a description of Solomon's House, too complicated for a quoted abstract, but eloquent enough to draw from the hostile Macaulay the judgment that "there is not to be found in any human composition a passage more eminently distinguished by profound and serene wisdom."
下面是一段关于所罗门院的描写，由于内容太复杂，这里不能详述，但它无疑是十分精彩的，足够的雄辩，以至于怀有敌意的麦考来也写下了这样的评论：“世上再也找不出第二篇这样的文字，它包含深邃、安宁的智慧，实在卓尔不群。”
Solomon's House takes the place,in the New Atlantis, of the Houses of Parliament in London; it is the home of the island government.
在亚特兰蒂斯的所罗门院，其地位相当于伦敦的议会大厦；它其实就是这个岛政府所在地。
But there are no politicians there, no insolent "elected persons", no "national palaver", as Carlyle would say;
不过，所罗门院里不会有政治家，不会有蛮不讲理的“当选者”，或是卡莱尔口中的“国家骗局”；
no parties, caucuses, primaries, conventions, campaigns, buttons, lithographs, editorials, speeches, lies, and elections;
那里没有党派、全国大会、代表大会、竞选、警察、印刷品、社论、演讲及谎言等；
以上这些在英国议会还是美国的两院都太多了。
培根临死前两年，想重新回归科学研究。
the idea of filling public office by such dramatic methods seems never to have entered the heads of these Atlantans.
把政府的各个岗位都填满这样的人，亚特兰蒂斯人好像从未有过这种想法。
But the road to the heights of scientific repute is open to all, and only those who have traveled the road sit in the councils of the state.
不过，通向科学荣誉的道路是向所有人开放的，并且只有走过了这条路的人才能走进政府。
It is a government of the people and for the people by the selected best of the people;
这是一个属于人民与由最优秀的当选者统治的政府；（民治民有民享）
a government by technicians, architects, astronomers, geologists, biologists, physicians, chemists, economists, sociologists, psychologists and philosophers.
政府成员包括技术专家、建筑师、地质学家、天文学家、医学家、生物学家、经济学家、化学家、心理学家与哲学家。
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