的确,正如我之前体味到的,在小王子居住的星球上,也和别的星球一样,存在着好的植物和坏的植物,是以,也就存在来自好的植物的好的种子,和来自坏的植物的坏的种子。但是,我们是看不见种子的。
As each day passed I would learn, in our talk, something about the little prince’s planet, his departure from it, his journey. The information would come very slowly, as it might chance to fall from his thoughts. It was in this way that I heard, on the third day, about the catastrophe of the baobabs.
"We would have to put them one on top of the other," he said.
If it is only a sprout of radish or the sprig of a rose-bush, one would let it grow wherever it might wish. But when it is a bad plant, one must destroy it as soon as possible, the very first instant that one recognizes it.
有一天,小王子劝我无妨画一幅标致的丹青,好让地球上的孩子们对于猴面包树的风险有一个深切的印象。“如果他们出表面光的时候,”他对我说,“你的画对他们是很有效的。偶然候,人们把本身的事情提早到今后去做,并没有甚么风险,但要碰到拔猴面包树苗这类事,迟延就非形成大灾害不成。我体味到一个星球,上面住着一个怠惰的家伙,他忽视了三棵小猴面包树苗……”
"It is a question of discipline," the little prince said to me later on. "When you’ve finished your own toilet in the morning, then it is time to attend to the toilet of your planet, just so, with the greatest care. You must see to it that you pull up regularly all the baobabs, at the very first moment when they can be distinguished from the rosebushes which they resemble so closely in their earliest youth. It is very tedious work," the little prince added, "but very easy."And one day he said to me: "You ought to make a beautiful drawing, so that the children where you live can see exactly how all this is. That would be very useful to them if they were to travel some day. Sometimes," he added, "there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day.