严格说，美国是一种理念
America Is an Ideal


每日一语：

Freedom, as we understand it in America, is not an economic discovery. It is not...even a political discovery. Freedom, in the last analysis, is a religious discovery. --- William J. Grede, Board president, National Association of Manufactures

自由，如我们美国人所理解，并不是一个经济上的发现。 它也不是一个政治上的发现。 我们对自由的最终分析所做的结论是： 它是一个人信仰的发现。 --- William J. Grede, Board president, National Association of Manufactures

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Dear Visitors:

Morally and intellectually confused folks often "compare" China and America. They don't understand between China and America there is only "Contrast", there is no "comparison". I often said that if China is a nation, America is not, and if America is a nation, China is not.

And strictly speaking, America is an ideal, an ideal of man but from God, an ideal that points the objective direction of history and provides the locomotion for advancing that human history. Americans are composed of men and women who have come from every corner of the world who, for one reason or another, cannot fulfill their dreams and destinies in their own homelands. They came to America, powered by the irresistable ideal of individual freedom, driven by the appeal of a vision for a more fulfilled life in one's own pursuit of meaning from his or her existence.

America is the sanctuary for the most ambitious, most creative, most driven mind in the world. America is the oasis for the spiritually starved and oppressed. America is the battle ground of Good against Evil. America is the fountainhead for the creative and imaginative. America is the ocean of romance for the passionate. America is the pinnacle of human self-knowledge and discovery. America is the land of the optimists. America is the sacred shrine for the faithful....

I had often wondered what was in George Washington's mind and vision at the eve of victory over the British, what he was seeing when he returned home from the battle ground of Yorktown to tend his dying son. He never wanted to be a king or an emperor. He never wanted power for power's sake. He was only a real man, a normal loving man, a great man of vision and courage, so he had a vision for that exact same quality in himself, in his mind for a new nation -- a nation, unlike any other nation in form and essence, that had ever existed on the planet of earth. He had never been the creature of his own environment, his own culture and that old mentality for slaves and masters. He had never been constrained by his own life experiences. He had a vision for a nation built upon ideals, built for ideal human beings, built with the guidance of ideals only from God - our creator. He was not created by America, he, indeed, by his ideals and conducts, created America.

In contrast, what Qin emperor and Mao did in China was only following their own life experiences of "power struggle with other men" to create a land of small men, a land of parasites and bandits, a land of passive slaves of their own cultural environment, just like themselves. They had no vision, no ideal, no morals and God, for they pretended themselves as Gods. The single most powerful drive in their quest for domination over others is power alone, nothing else. They reacted moment to moment to avoid being eaten by others. There had never had a shred of faith in God, an iota of decency, a crumb of intelligence in their mind. They were the smallest human beings, but the dirtiest anti-existence nihilists ever lived.

Now the world is being thrust into another great struggle of good against evil, existence against nothingness, virtues of life against power of death and destruction, as the post 9/11 era dawned upon this planet earth. And in the forefront of this struggle stands that ever-present force of ideals - the force of Good and God - America. With this enduring symbol of freedom, humans can proud declare to themselves:

We are never intended, by God, to be the slaves of our own environment, our own culture, our own birth, our own history, our own existing mindset by our ancestors. We are free beings to create an entirely new, progressive history and environment, according, not to men, but only to God.

Best. Kai Chen 陈凯