Once there was a fish who lived in the great ocean, and because the water was transparent and always conveniently got out of the way of his nose when he moved along, he didn’t know he was in the ocean. Well, one day the fish did a very dangerous thing, he began to think: “Surely I am a most remarkable being, since I can move around like this in the middle of empty space.” Then the fish became confused because of thinking about moving and swimming, and he suddenly had an anxietyconvulsion and thought he had forgotten how.

從前大海里有一條魚。由于海水是透明的，而且他總能方便地游來游去，所以他不知道自己在海洋里。有一天，他萌生了一個非常危險的想法：“我一定是最了不起的生物了，因為我可以在這樣空曠的地方隨意移動。”接著小魚就一直思考著游泳的事兒，越想越困惑。突然，他由于焦慮發生了痙攣，以為自己忘記了怎么游泳。

At that moment he looked down and saw the yawning chasm of the ocean depths, and he was terrified that he would drop. Then he thought: “If I could catch hold of my tail in my mouth, I could hold myself up.” And so he curled himself up and snapped at his tail. Unfortunately, his spine wasn’t quite suppleenough, so he missed. As he went on trying to catch hold of his tail, the yawning black abyss below became ever more terrible, and he was brought to the edge of total nervous breakdown.

那時，他看著自己下方那深不可測的大峽谷，如同張著血盆大口一般，他好害怕自己會掉下去。他想：“如果我可以用我的嘴巴接住尾巴，那我就可以抓住自己，不會往下掉啦!”于是，他把身子蜷成一團，去咬他的尾巴。不幸的是，他的脊椎不夠靈活，并沒有咬住。他繼續嘗試著，下方黑色的深淵顯得更可怕了，小魚覺得自己快要崩潰了。

The fish was about to give up, when the ocean, who had been watching with mixed feelings of pity and amusement, said, “What are you doing?” “Oh,” said the fish, “I’m terrified of falling into the deep dark abyss, and I’m trying to catch hold of my tail in my mouth to hold myself up.” So the ocean said, “Well, you’ve been trying that for a long time now, and still you haven’t fallen down. How come?” “Oh, of course, I haven’t fallen down yet,” said the fish, “because, because--I’m swimming!”

在小魚快要放棄的時候，大海發話了，他一直觀察的小魚的一舉一動，感到同情又好笑。大海說：“你在干什么?”“噢,"小魚回答，"我怕自己會掉進下面那個大峽谷里，所以我試著用嘴巴接住尾巴，這樣就不會掉下去。”然后大海說：“那么，你已經試了這么久了，卻還沒有掉下去，這又是為什么呢?”“噢，我當然還沒有掉下去，”小魚說，“那是因為，因為我在游泳呀!”

“Well,” came the reply, “I am the Great Ocean, in which you live and move and are able to be a fish, and I have given all of myself to you in which to swim, and I support you all the time you swim. Instead of exploring the length, breadth, depth, and height of my expanse, you are wasting your time pursuing your own end.” From then on, the fish put his own end behind him (where it belonged) and set out to explore the ocean.

“是啊。”大海回答，“我是偉大的海洋，你在我里面生活，在我里面游動，因為我你才能身為一條魚而存在。我已經把我的全部都給了你，供你自由自在地游動、在你游泳的時候時刻支持著你。你不盡情地去探索我的深邃、浩瀚、寬廣，卻在這里庸人自擾地追自己的尾巴!”從那一刻起，小魚把他的尾巴放到它應放的位置——身后，然后啟程去探索整個海洋。