亞伯拉罕·林肯“The Gettysburg Address”

今天是亞伯拉罕·林肯“The Gettysburg Address” 的日子。1863年的11月19日，亞伯拉罕·林肯總統，在Pennsylvania 的 Gettysbuger 發表了演講。林肯總統在演講中，悼念那些陣亡的將士。並在演講的最後說：這個國家在上帝的統治下，將獲得新生的自由——人民的政府，民治，民享，不會從地球上消亡。

這場演講名垂青史，聲震寰宇。被稱為史上最精彩的演講。

因為當時林肯總統寫了兩份不同的講稿，並分別抄寫與五個不同的人。因此，五稿之間略有出入。

這裏就選取其中的一份。

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. 

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. 

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln
November 19, 1863

八十七年前，我們的先輩們在這個大陸上建立了一個全新的國家，它受孕於自由的理念，並獻身於人人生而平等的。