In a nation where people work more than anyone else in the industrialized world, the two-day weekend helps keep us sane.
工业化世界，大家都争相拼工作量，在这样的国家里，双休日有助我们保持理智。

No matter how exhausted you are at your nine-to-five, the promise of two full days set aside for socializing, sleeping in, and brunching in the afternoon always looms on the horizon.
无论你朝九晚五有多劳累，都保证能匀出两整天时间参与社交、睡个懒觉、下午的时候早餐午餐并作一顿，而这正有愈演愈烈之势。

People working 200 years ago weren't so lucky.The modern work week began to emerge during the industrial revolution—thanks in part to our hard-partying predecessors.
两百多年前的人可没那么幸运。现代工作周在工业革命期间应运而生，这多亏了我们夜夜笙歌的先祖们。

Reserving one holy day a week for rest and worship is an ancient tradition. Things took a turn in Britain during the 19th century when workers started using their one day off for pleasure. After cramming a week's worth of fun and debauchery into a single day, employees would often come into work the next morning hungover or end up taking the whole day off to recuperate.
一周留出一天瞻礼日休息休息、做做礼拜是一古老传统。在19世纪的英国，事情发生了转折，工人们开始花一天时间享乐，而把整个星期的玩乐和逍遥压缩成一天后，员工们第二天早晨上班常常是宿醉未醒、或者要请上一天假恢复疲劳。

In the face of newly-formed labor unions and pressure from religious groups to keep Sundays holy, the five-day, 40-hour work week was signed into law with the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.
当时工会成立不久、宗教团体又施加压力要求礼拜天作瞻礼，一周五天工作制、每周四十小时的工作量签署成为法律，写入了1938年颁布的《公平劳动标准法》中。

The practice of playing hooky on the first day of the work week, also known as "Saint Monday," became so common in the 19th century that many employers started making Saturdays a half-day as a compromise.
工作日第一天偷个懒，即人们所知的“圣周一”在19世纪非常普遍，不少雇主开始安排周六干半天活，作为折衷。

While the two-day weekend is a fairly recent phenomenon, today some people are working to extend it even longer.
尽管双休日这一现象近年才有，如今仍有人想要延长双休。

声明：本双语文章的中文翻译系沪江英语原创内容，转载请注明出处。中文翻译仅代表译者个人观点，仅供参考。如有不妥之处，欢迎指正。