“Do people feel truly happy when their achievements benefit others?”

　　这是个常考的题目：关于成功+幸福+个人与集体。解题思路难度并不是很大。和2009年11月的一道题很像：Do society and other people benefit when individuals pursue their own goals?

　　同学们可以分三步走：

　　一、首先抓关键词：our achievement；benefit others；our happiness。

　　二、分析这三者的关系： 1、没关系 (不能惠及别人的成就不太能够让我们觉得幸福，也不好举例)；2、有积极的影响(这可以极大的成就我们的幸福)；3、有消极的影响(对别人有害的成就是极大的自私)。

　　三、选择：本文选取后两者。选取的例子一个是有积极的影响，另一个是有消极影响的。分别说明我们成功对别人有积极影响时我们获得的幸福，以及当对别人有消极影响时我们也会承担相应的不幸。

　　Achievement, regarded by many as equivalent to success, is what people have been persistently pursuing throughout recorded human history. That said, achievement itself is too broad a sense: it can be both positive and negative. To put it more specifically, achievement of some kind may benefit others, but other kinds may very well bring disaster. Therefore, to avoid causing disaster and to get our real happiness, we should define our achievement as what benefits others. This thesis can be illustrated by the cases of Alexander Fleming and Sarah Winchester.

　　The achievement of Alexander Fleming, a Scottish biologist, pharmacologist and botanist who discovered penicillin, has offered benefit by saving millions people around the world. Before the discovery, fatal diseases, such as pneumonia, meningitis, and, most notably, childbed fever, had seized human beings, causing untold sufferings. After women delivered their babies, childbed fever came and haunted them, even if they kept themselves cleansed. People felt desperately helpless once infected, and waiting for death was their last resort because even doctors then could do nothing. Among those doctors was Alexander Fleming, who at that time studied bacteria. In 1928, he first chanced upon a discovery that an active ingredient in a kind of mould turned out to be an infection-fighting agent of enormous potency. And then he furthered his study with other two scientists. By the middle of the century, Fleming's discovery had spawned a huge pharmaceutical industry, churning out synthetic penicillins that would conquer some of mankind's most ancient scourges. Fleming has long been privileged by ranking among the top pharmacologists worldwide, the simple reason being the benefit that his achievement has offered to others.

　　The story of Sarah Winchester, whose husband was ascribed to a notorious deadly weapon, namely, Winchester Model, manifests that people’s achievement that causes sufferings of others will ultimately be a curse on their own happiness. Her husband, William Winchester, was the owner of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, which designed and produced Winchester Model, a kind of rifle. The Model, due to its excellent design, and performance, quickly caught on among military business. It can be said to gain a huge success. Be that as it may, after the death of William Winchester, Sarah Winchester, the wife, felt that her family was cursed by the spirits of all the people who had been killed by the Winchester rifle. And she was convinced that spirits would kill her, so she followed a fortune teller’s advice of using her fortune to continue uninterrupted, round-the-clock construction on it for 38 consecutive years, till her death. The Winchesters’ achievement, which caused great sufferings of others, did not even bring Sarah peace, let alone happiness.

　　From what has been illustrated through the two examples of Alexander Fleming and Sarah Winchester, we can come to the conclusion that our achievement must, above all, benefit others, and that only by this way can we be happy.

编辑：张雨

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