英语演讲稿四篇
以下是小编为大家整理的英语演讲稿四篇，希望能对大家有所帮助。
If There Were No After Life
whether there’s afterlife, the answer has never been the same. the atheists deny after life, believing that our life is no more than from the cradle to the grave. they may care about their illustrious names after death; they may feel attached to the affection of their offspring, but they never lay their hopes on their afterlife. they may also say that good will be rewarded with good, and evil with evil, but they don’t really believe any retribution in their after life.
however, in the religious world or among the superstitious people, the belief in afterlife is very popular. they do not only believe in afterlife, but thousands of reincarnations as well. in the mysterious world, there are the paradise and the hell, the celestial beings and the gods, the buddha and the bodhisattvas.
maybe they really believed it, or maybe they just wanted to make use of people’s veneration, the ancient emperors always declared that they were the real dragons, the sons of god, while the royal ministers claimed to be the reincarnations of various constellations. but can the stars reincarnate?
many people burn incense and kowtow, do good deeds and strive for virtues, not just for the present, but mainly to let god see their sincerity so as to be reborn into a better afterlife, or to achieve the highest enlightenment after several lives of practice. they do believe in afterlife. but i can’t help asking: suppose there were no afterlife, would you still do good deeds and strive for virtues? and if god does not see what you are doing, would you still be so upright and selfless? if you work, not for serving the public and liberating the others, but just for a better afterlife of your own, isn’t it a little too selfish? comparing with this kind of believers, those who don’t believe in afterlife, but still keep doing good deeds, are the most sincere and honest philanthropists, because they do them not for themselves but for other.
you may wonder if i believe in afterlife. my answer is: i know nothing about my previous life, so i dare not make improper comments on afterlife. but i do hope there’s afterlife! because our present life is so short that so many things slip away before our proper understanding. i have so many dreams, so many wishes, so many ambitions, as well as so many regrets and concerns. if there were no afterlife, all of them will remain unrealized!
i’m not contented with the present commonplace life, i’m very much attached to the affections that should have been mine but have been washed away by the hurrying time, and i yearn for the perfection and maturity if i could start all over again. so believe it or not, i’d rather there were afterlife.
Good bye and good luck
today, i speak from this podium a final time as your president. as i depart, i want to thank all of you - students, faculty, alumni and staff - with whom i have been privileged to work over these past years. some of us have had our disagreements, but i know that which unites us transcends that which divides us.
some things look different to me than they did five years ago. the world that today’s harvard’s graduates are entering is a profoundly different one than the world administrators entered.
it is a world where opportunities have never been greater for those who know how to teach children to read, or those who know how to distribute financial risk; never greater for those who understand the cell and the pixel; never greater for those who can master, and navigate between, legal codes, faith traditions, computer platforms, political viewpoints.
it is also a world where some are left further and further behind - those who are not educated, those trapped in poverty and violence, those for whom equal opportunity is just a hollow phrase.
scientific and technological advances are enabling us to comprehend the furthest reaches of the cosmos, the most basic constituents of matter, and the miracle of life.
at the same time, today, the actions, and inaction, of human beings imperil not only life on the planet, but the very life of the planet.
globalization is making the world smaller, faster and richer. still, 9/11, avian flu, and iran remind us that a smaller, faster world is not necessarily a safer world.
our world is bursting with knowledge - but desperately in need of wisdom. now, when sound bites are getting shorter, when instant messages crowd out essays, and when individual lives grow more frenzied, college graduates capable of deep reflection are what our world needs.
for all these reasons i believed - and i believe even more strongly today - in the unique and irreplaceable mission of universities.
universities are where the wisdom we cannot afford to lose is preserved from generation to generation. among all human institutions, universities can look beyond present norms to future possibilities, can look through current considerations to emergent opportunities.
and among universities, harvard stands out. with its great tradition, its iconic reputation, its remarkable network of 300,000 alumni, harvard has never had as much potential as it does now.
and yet, great and proud institutions, like great and proud nations at their peak, must surmount a very real risk: that the very strength of their traditions will lead to caution, to an inward focus on prerogative and to a complacency that lets the world pass them by.
and so i say to you that our university today is at an inflection point in its history. at such a moment, there is temptation to elevate comfort and consensus over progress and clear direction, but this would be a mistake. the university’s matchless resources - human, physical, financial - demand that we seize this moment with vision and boldness. to do otherwise would be a lost opportunity. we can spur great deeds that history will mark decades and even centuries from now. if harvard can find the courage to change itself, it can change the world.
Discover Yourself
i never think speaking in front of other people on the stage is possible for me, a shy girl, when i was ten. so when my teacher asked me to host a party of school, i refused immediately, with saying “you must be kidding.”
the opportunity went to another girl from another class, who actually has nothing better than me. after the program, my teacher said to me, “i still believe that if you had been the hostess, it would be a lot better. your voice is really beautiful, what you are short of is confidence. ”
i was abandoned into thinking hearing the words, wanted to find something against her opinion. unfortunately, she was right. i was always refusing chances like that, even never try once, but confidently saying i can’t. in another word, i was unconfident.
you can. my teacher said to me. i can? i asked, wondering, but really made a dear decision to have a try.
then, things went easy; i tried to announce some notice in front of the class, smile to everyone appeared in my life, and took part in my first english speech contest. little by little, i changed my mind, when my teacher asked me to try to be the hostess, i replied “sure”! indeed confidently with a big smile.
i’m no longer that shy little girl. i changed and discovered my own talent.
to make something special, you just have to believe it special. kongfu panda’s ducking father told him in the film, which is also suitable for us. to discover your own talent, you must believe that you can do it. everyone is like an undiscovered jade, you hide yourself with an ugly appearance, no one, not even yourself, know how beautiful you are inside the stone, you just have to believe and discover yourself, after that, you will be considered as the most beautiful jewel in the world.
discover yourself needs confidence, and confidence is the way leads to your dream and success. as your dream is right in front of you, why not discover yourself to realize it! we have no excuse to give our dream up!
discover yourself, follow your own step, nothing is impossible.
even a little girl with no experience can hold a program successfully, what about you?
even a fat lazy panda can realize his kongfu dream, what about you?
even a black people can confidently stand on the stage showing his ability and be the president of america, what about you?
discover yourself! show your confident smile!
now, it’s the time for us to say”yes we can!”
thank you very much.
A Time to Break Silence
i come to this magnificent house of worship tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice. i join you in this meeting because i am in deepest agreement with the aims and work of the organization which has brought us together: clergy and laymen concerned about vietnam. the recent statements of your executive committee are the sentiments of my own heart, and i found myself in full accord when i read its opening lines: "a time comes when silence is betrayal." and that time has come for us in relation to vietnam.
the truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexed as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must move on.
and some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak. we must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak. and we must rejoice as well, for surely this is the first time in our nation's history that a significant number of its religious leaders have chosen to move beyond the prophesying of smooth patriotism to the high grounds of a firm dissent based upon the mandates of conscience and the reading of history. perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. if it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us.
over the past two years, as i have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as i have called for radical departures from the destruction of vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. at the heart of their concerns this query has often loomed large and loud: "why are you speaking about the war, dr. king?" "why are you joining the voices of dissent?" "peace and civil rights don't mix," they say. "aren't you hurting the cause of your people," they ask? and when i hear them, though i often understand the source of their concern, i am nevertheless greatly saddened, for such questions mean that the inquirers have not really known me, my commitment or my calling. indeed, their questions suggest that they do not know the world in which they live.
in the light of such tragic misunderstanding, i deem it of signal importance to try to state clearly, and i trust concisely, why i believe that the path from dexter avenue baptist church -- the church in montgomery, alabama, where i began my pastorate -- leads clearly to this sanctuary tonight.