李白少读书,未成,弃去。道逢老妪磨杵,白问其故。曰:“欲作针。”白感其言。遂卒业。
——《潜确类书》
Grinding an Iron Pestle into a
Needle
A
schoolboy was playing truant in the street when he saw an old woman grinding an
iron pestle on a stone. Being
curious, he asked her what she was doing. “I
am going to grind it into a needle to sew cloth with,” answered the old woman. The
child laughed. “But this is much a big pestle, how can you hope to grind it
down to a needle?” “It
doesn’t matter,” replied the old woman. “Today I grind it, tomorrow I’ll grind
it again, and the day after tomorrow again. The pestle will get smaller every
day, and one day it will be a needle.” The
child saw the point and went to school.
Qian
Que Lei Shu (杨宪益、戴乃迭 译) |