The Social Cancer: A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere — Page 13

在与文明潮流接触更多、更易受母国革命影响的国家，这种分离是从内部产生的；而在较偏远的地区，那陈旧过时的制度则苟延残喘，直到外部更强大的力量将其摧毁。

In the countries more in contact with the trend of civilization and more susceptible to revolutionary influences from the mother country this separation came from within, while in the remoter parts the archaic and outgrown system dragged along until a stronger force from without destroyed it.

形式与原则的固化在宗教生活中表现得最为突出，它给母国套上了一副令一切进步都步履维艰的沉重枷锁；而在殖民地，尤其是在菲律宾，几乎将其政府变成了一个面朝过去、不能或不愿随时代潮流前行的神权统治。

Nowhere was the crystallization of form and principle more pronounced than in religious life, which fastened upon the mother country a deadening weight that hampered all progress, and in the colonies, notably in the Philippines, virtually converted her government into a hagiarchy that had its face toward the past and either could not or would not move with the current of the times.

因此，当"响彻全球的枪声"——那宣告人类有权生存与发展的宣言——在其席卷一切的浪潮中传至她所管辖的土地时，却遭到了统治势力的冷漠接待与盲目拒绝，于是只剩下一条更为缓慢、更为隐秘、却同样坚定不移的道路：在民间悄然蔓延，终将在某一时刻以反抗的形式爆发，摧毁那些意图压制它的保守势力。

So, when "the shot heard round the world," the declaration of humanity's right to be and to become, in its all-encircling sweep, reached the lands controlled by her it was coldly received and blindly rejected by the governing powers, and there was left only the slower, subtler, but none the less sure, process of working its way among the people to burst in time in rebellion and the destruction of the conservative forces that would repress it.

在十九世纪初，菲律宾的修士修道会已达到其权力与影响力的顶峰。他们的势力无处不在，广受认可，而彼时的菲律宾仍在上个世纪安达与巴尔加斯那充满活力、锐意进取的施政成果的滋养下繁荣昌盛。

In the opening years of the nineteenth century the friar orders in the Philippines had reached the apogee of their power and usefulness. Their influence was everywhere felt and acknowledged, while the country still prospered under the effects of the vigorous and progressive administrations of Anda and Vargas in the preceding century.