每日英语 · 2026-10-18
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, / But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
William Shakespeare · Julius Caesar · 1599 · 第一幕第二场，Cassius 劝说 Brutus 时说的台词；剧本约 1599 年首演，1623 年收入第一对开本。斜杠表示原文的分行。
译文
亲爱的布鲁图斯，错不在我们的命运，而在我们自己，是我们甘居人下。
语法
- 句子主干是 The fault is not in our stars, but in ourselves（过错不在星辰，而在我们自己）。dear Brutus 是插入的称呼语，两边用逗号隔开，去掉后主干不变。is in 表示“在于、存在于”，比如 The problem is in the driver.
- not A but B 结构：意思是“不是 A，而是 B”，A 和 B 要是同类成分，这里两边都是介词短语 in our stars 和 in ourselves，对得很整齐。but 后面省略了重复的 the fault is，这是英语常见的承前省略。
- that we are underlings 是对 the fault 的补充说明，说明“过错”具体是什么：是我们甘心做下属这件事。our stars 指占星意义上的星辰，也就是命运，所以整句是在说，别把处境怪给命运。
词汇
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fault /fɔːlt/ n.
过错，责任（句中义）；也指故障、缺陷
搭配：It's not my fault / find fault with / at fault / a hard fault
The crash was a hard fault caused by a null pointer, not the hardware's fault.
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stars /stɑːz/ n.
星辰；引申为命运、运气
搭配：thank your lucky stars / born under a lucky star
You can thank your lucky stars that you had a backup.
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underling /ˈʌndəlɪŋ/ n.
下属，手下（带贬义，指地位低、听人使唤的人）
搭配：treat sb as an underling / one of his underlings
He never treated the junior engineers as underlings.
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not ... but ... phr.
不是……而是……
搭配：not because ... but because ... / not A but B
The bug is not in the compiler but in my code.
笔记
小结：这句话常被用来提醒人，与其怪运气，不如先看自己能改变什么。小练习：用 not ... but ... 造一句，比如 The problem is not in the chip but in my timing configuration. 试着写一句你最近遇到的问题吧。