我們都是地球的乘客

理查德-尼克松 第一次就職演講

星期一,1969年1月20日

歷史的每一個時刻轉(zhuǎn)瞬即逝，它既珍貴又獨特�？墒�，其中某些顯然是揭開序幕的時刻，此時，一代先河得以開創(chuàng)，它決定了未來數(shù)十年或幾個世紀的航向。

現(xiàn)在可能就是這樣一個時刻。

現(xiàn)在，各方力量正在匯聚起來，使我們第一次可以期望人類的許多夙愿最終能夠?qū)崿F(xiàn)。

不斷加快的變革速度，使我們能在我們這一代期望過去花了幾百年才出現(xiàn)的種種進步。

由于開辟了大空的天地，我們在地球上也發(fā)現(xiàn)了新的天地。

由于世界人民希望和平，而世界各國領(lǐng)袖害怕戰(zhàn)爭，因此，目前形勢第一次變得有利于和平。

從現(xiàn)在起，再過8年，美國將慶祝建國200周年。在現(xiàn)在大多數(shù)人的有生之年，人類將慶祝千載難逢的、輝煌無比的新年——第三個百年盛世的開端。

我們的國家將變成怎樣的國家，我們將生活在怎樣的世界上，我們要不要按照我們的希望鑄造未來，這些都將由我們根據(jù)自己的行動和選擇來決定。

歷史所能賜予我們的最大榮譽，莫過于和平締造者這一稱號。這一榮譽現(xiàn)在正在召喚美國——這是領(lǐng)導(dǎo)世界最終脫離動亂的幽谷，走向自文明開端以來人類一直夢寐以求的和平高壇的一個機會。

我們?nèi)臬@成功，下幾代人在談及現(xiàn)在在世的我們時會說，正是我們掌握了時機，正是我們協(xié)力相助，使普天之下國泰民安。

這是要我們創(chuàng)立宏偉大業(yè)的召喚。

我相信，美國人民準備響應(yīng)這一召喚。

經(jīng)過一段對抗時期，我們正進入一個談判時代。

讓所有國家都知道，在本屆政府任期內(nèi)，交流通道是敞開的。

我們謀求一個開放的世界——對各種思想開放，對物資和人員的交流開放，在這個世界中，任何民族，不論大小，都不會生活在怏怏不樂的孤立之中。

我們不能指望每個人都成為我們的朋友，可是我們能設(shè)法使任何人都不與我們?yōu)閿场?

我們邀請那些很可能是我們對手的人進行一場和平競賽——不是要征服領(lǐng)土或擴展版圖，而是要豐富人類的生活。

在探索宇宙空間的時候，讓我們一起走向新的世界——不是走向被征服的新世界，而是共同進行一次新的探險。

讓我們同那些愿意加入這一行列的人共同合作，減少軍備負擔(dān)，加固和平大廈，提高貧窮挨餓的人們的生活水平。

但是，對所有那些見軟就欺的人來說，讓我們不容置疑地表明，我們需要多么強大就會多強大：需要強大多久，就會強大多久。

自從我作為新當選的國會議員首次來到國會大廈之后的20多年來，我已經(jīng)出訪過世界上大多數(shù)國家。

我結(jié)識了世界各國的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人，了解到使世界陷于四分五裂的各種強大勢力，各種深仇大恨，各種恐懼心理。

我知道，和于不會單憑愿望就能到來——這需要日復(fù)一日，甚至年復(fù)一年地進行耐心而持久的外交努力，除此別無他法。

我也了解世界各國人民。

我見到過無家可歸的兒童在忍饑挨餓，戰(zhàn)爭中掛彩負傷的男人在痛苦呻吟，失去孩子的母親在無限悲傷。我知道，這些并沒有意識形態(tài)和種族之分。

我了解美國。我了解美國的心是善良的。

我從心底里，從我國人民的心底里，向那些蒙受不幸和痛苦的人們表達我們的深切關(guān)懷。

今天，我在上帝和我國同胞面前宣誓，擁護和捍衛(wèi)合眾國憲法。除了這一誓言，我現(xiàn)在還要補充一項神圣的義務(wù)：我將把自己的職責(zé)、精力以及我所能使喚的一切智慧，一并奉獻給各國之間的和平事業(yè)。

讓強者和弱者都能聽到這一信息：

我們企求贏得的和平不是戰(zhàn)勝任何一個民族，而是“和平天使”帶來的為治愈創(chuàng)傷的和平：是對遭受苦難者予以同情的和平；是對那些反對過我們的人予以諒解的和平；是地球上各族人民都有選擇自己命運的機會的和平。

就在幾星期以前，人類如同上帝凝望這個世界一樣，第一次端視了這個世界，一個在冥冥黑暗中輝映發(fā)光的獨特的星球。我們分享了這一榮光。

阿波羅號上的字航員在圣誕節(jié)前夕飛越月球灰色的表面時，向我們說起地球的美麗——從穿過月距而傳來的如此清晰的聲音中，我們聽到他們在祈禱上帝賜福人間。

在那一時刻，他們從月球上發(fā)出的意愿，激勵著詩人阿奇博爾德•麥克利什寫下了這樣的篇章：

“在永恒的寧靜中，那渺小、斑斕、美麗的地球在浮動。要真正地觀望地球，就得把我們自己都看作是地球的乘客，看作是一群兄弟，他們共處于漫漫的、寒冷的字宙中。仰賴著光明的摯愛——這群兄弟懂得，而今他們是真正的兄弟�！�

在那個比技術(shù)勝利更有意義的時刻，人們把思緒轉(zhuǎn)向了家鄉(xiāng)和人類——他們從那個遙遠的視角中發(fā)現(xiàn)，地球上人類的命運是不能分開的；他們告訴我們，不管我們在宇宙中走得多遠，我們的命運不是在別的星球上，而是在地球上，在我們自己手中，在我們的心頭。

我們已經(jīng)度過了一個反映美國精神的漫漫長夜�？墒�，當我們瞥見黎明前的第一縷曙光，切莫詛咒那尚未消散的黑暗。讓我們迎接光明吧。

我們的命運所賜予的不是絕望的苦酒，而是機會的美餐。因此，讓我們不是充滿恐懼，而是滿懷喜悅地去抓住這個機會吧——“地球的乘客們”，讓我們以堅定的信念，朝著穩(wěn)定的目標，在提防著危險中前進吧！我們對上帝的意志和人類的希望充滿了信心，這將使我們持之以恒。

First Inaugural Address of Richard Milhous Nixon

MONDAY, JANUARY 20, 1969

Senator Dirksen, Mr. Chief Justice, Mr. Vice President, President Johnson, Vice President Humphrey, my fellow Americans--and my fellow citizens of the world community:

I ask you to share with me today the majesty of this moment. In the orderly transfer of power, we celebrate the unity that keeps us free.

Each moment in history is a fleeting time, precious and unique. But some stand out as moments of beginning, in which courses are set that shape decades or centuries.

This can be such a moment.

Forces now are converging that make possible, for the first time, the hope that many of man's deepest aspirations can at last be realized. The spiraling pace of change allows us to contemplate, within our own lifetime, advances that once would have taken centuries.

In throwing wide the horizons of space, we have discovered new horizons on earth.

For the first time, because the people of the world want peace, and the leaders of the world are afraid of war, the times are on the side of peace.

Eight years from now America will celebrate its 200th anniversary as a nation. Within the lifetime of most people now living, mankind will celebrate that great new year which comes only once in a thousand years--the beginning of the third millennium.

What kind of nation we will be, what kind of world we will live in, whether we shape the future in the image of our hopes, is ours to determine by our actions and our choices.

The greatest honor history can bestow is the title of peacemaker. This honor now beckons America--the chance to help lead the world at last out of the valley of turmoil, and onto that high ground of peace that man has dreamed of since the dawn of civilization.

If we succeed, generations to come will say of us now living that we mastered our moment, that we helped make the world safe for mankind.

This is our summons to greatness.

I believe the American people are ready to answer this call.

The second third of this century has been a time of proud achievement. We have made enormous strides in science and industry and agriculture. We have shared our wealth more broadly than ever. We have learned at last to manage a modern economy to assure its continued growth.

We have given freedom new reach, and we have begun to make its promise real for black as well as for white.

We see the hope of tomorrow in the youth of today. I know America's youth. I believe in them. We can be proud that they are better educated, more committed, more passionately driven by conscience than any generation in our history.

No people has ever been so close to the achievement of a just and abundant society, or so possessed of the will to achieve it. Because our strengths are so great, we can afford to appraise our weaknesses with candor and to approach them with hope.

Standing in this same place a third of a century ago, Franklin Delano Roosevelt addressed a Nation ravaged by depression and gripped in fear. He could say in surveying the Nation's troubles: "They concern, thank God, only material things."

Our crisis today is the reverse.

We have found ourselves rich in goods, but ragged in spirit; reaching with magnificent precision for the moon, but falling into raucous discord on earth.

We are caught in war, wanting peace. We are torn by division, wanting unity. We see around us empty lives, wanting fulfillment. We see tasks that need doing, waiting for hands to do them.

To a crisis of the spirit, we need an answer of the spirit.

To find that answer, we need only look within ourselves.

When we listen to "the better angels of our nature," we find that they celebrate the simple things, the basic things--such as goodness, decency, love, kindness.

Greatness comes in simple trappings.

The simple things are the ones most needed today if we are to surmount what divides us, and cement what unites us.

To lower our voices would be a simple thing.

In these difficult years, America has suffered from a fever of words; from inflated rhetoric that promises more than it can deliver; from angry rhetoric that fans discontents into hatreds; from bombastic rhetoric that postures instead of persuading.

We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another--until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.

For its part, government will listen. We will strive to listen in new ways--to the voices of quiet anguish, the voices that speak without words, the voices of the heart--to the injured voices, the anxious voices, the voices that have despaired of being heard.

Those who have been left out, we will try to bring in.

Those left behind, we will help to catch up.

For all of our people, we will set as our goal the decent order that makes progress possible and our lives secure.

As we reach toward our hopes, our task is to build on what has gone before--not turning away from the old, but turning toward the new.

In this past third of a century, government has passed more laws, spent more money, initiated more programs, than in all our previous history.

In pursuing our goals of full employment, better housing, excellence in education; in rebuilding our cities and improving our rural areas; in protecting our environment and enhancing the quality of life--in all these and more, we will and must press urgently forward.

We shall plan now for the day when our wealth can be transferred from the destruction of war abroad to the urgent needs of our people at home.

The American dream does not come to those who fall asleep.

But we are approaching the limits of what government alone can do.

Our greatest need now is to reach beyond government, and to enlist the legions of the concerned and the committed.

What has to be done, has to be done by government and people together or it will not be done at all. The lesson of past agony is that without the people we can do nothing; with the people we can do everything.

To match the magnitude of our tasks, we need the energies of our people--enlisted not only in grand enterprises, but more importantly in those small, splendid efforts that make headlines in the neighborhood newspaper instead of the national journal.

With these, we can build a great cathedral of the spirit--each of us raising it one stone at a time, as he reaches out to his neighbor, helping, caring, doing.

I do not offer a life of uninspiring ease. I do not call for a life of grim sacrifice. I ask you to join in a high adventure--one as rich as humanity itself, and as exciting as the times we live in.

The essence of freedom is that each of us shares in the shaping of his own destiny.

Until he has been part of a cause larger than himself, no man is truly whole.

The way to fulfillment is in the use of our talents; we achieve nobility in the spirit that inspires that use.

As we measure what can be done, we shall promise only what we know we can produce, but as we chart our goals we shall be lifted by our dreams.

No man can be fully free while his neighbor is not. To go forward at all is to go forward together.

This means black and white together, as one nation, not two. The laws have caught up with our conscience. What remains is to give life to what is in the law: to ensure at last that as all are born equal in dignity before God, all are born equal in dignity before man.

As we learn to go forward together at home, let us also seek to go forward together with all mankind.

Let us take as our goal: where peace is unknown, make it welcome; where peace is fragile, make it strong; where peace is temporary, make it permanent.

After a period of confrontation, we are entering an era of negotiation.

Let all nations know that during this administration our lines of communication will be open.

We seek an open world--open to ideas, open to the exchange of goods and people--a world in which no people, great or small, will live in angry isolation.

We cannot expect to make everyone our friend, but we can try to make no one our enemy.

Those who would be our adversaries, we invite to a peaceful competition--not in conquering territory or extending dominion, but in enriching the life of man.

As we explore the reaches of space, let us go to the new worlds together--not as new worlds to be conquered, but as a new adventure to be shared.

With those who are willing to join, let us cooperate to reduce the burden of arms, to strengthen the structure of peace, to lift up the poor and the hungry.

But to all those who would be tempted by weakness, let us leave no doubt that we will be as strong as we need to be for as long as we need to be.

Over the past twenty years, since I first came to this Capital as a freshman Congressman, I have visited most of the nations of the world.

I have come to know the leaders of the world, and the great forces, the hatreds, the fears that divide the world.

I know that peace does not come through wishing for it--that there is no substitute for days and even years of patient and prolonged diplomacy.

I also know the people of the world.

I have seen the hunger of a homeless child, the pain of a man wounded in battle, the grief of a mother who has lost her son. I know these have no ideology, no race.

I know America. I know the heart of America is good.

I speak from my own heart, and the heart of my country, the deep concern we have for those who suffer, and those who sorrow.

I have taken an oath today in the presence of God and my countrymen to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States. To that oath I now add this sacred commitment: I shall consecrate my office, my energies, and all the wisdom I can summon, to the cause of peace among nations.

Let this message be heard by strong and weak alike:

The peace we seek to win is not victory over any other people, but the peace that comes "with healing in its wings"; with compassion for those who have suffered; with understanding for those who have opposed us; with the opportunity for all the peoples of this earth to choose their own destiny.

Only a few short weeks ago, we shared the glory of man's first sight of the world as God sees it, as a single sphere reflecting light in the darkness.

As the Apollo astronauts flew over the moon's gray surface on Christmas Eve, they spoke to us of the beauty of earth--and in that voice so clear across the lunar distance, we heard them invoke God's blessing on its goodness.

In that moment, their view from the moon moved poet Archibald MacLeish to write:

"To see the earth as it truly is, small and blue and beautiful in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold--brothers who know now they are truly brothers."

In that moment of surpassing technological triumph, men turned their thoughts toward home and humanity--seeing in that far perspective that man's destiny on earth is not divisible; telling us that however far we reach into the cosmos, our destiny lies not in the stars but on Earth itself, in our own hands, in our own hearts.

We have endured a long night of the American spirit. But as our eyes catch the dimness of the first rays of dawn, let us not curse the remaining dark. Let us gather the light.

Our destiny offers, not the cup of despair, but the chalice of opportunity. So let us seize it, not in fear, but in gladness-- and, "riders on the earth together," let us go forward, firm in our faith, steadfast in our purpose, cautious of the dangers; but sustained by our confidence in the will of God and the promise of man.