AP Language and Composition Exam Skills Test

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is from a book by a nineteenth-century British writer.) I suppose none of us will doubt that everything possible should be done to improve the quality of the mind of every human being. — If it is said that the female brain is incapable of studies of an abstract nature, — that is not true: for there are many instances of women who have been good mathematicians, and good classical scholars. The plea is indeed nonsense on the face of it; for the brain which will learn French will learn Greek; the brain which enjoys arithmetic is capable of mathematics. —If it is said that women are light-minded and superficial, the obvious answer is that their minds should be the more carefully sobered by grave studies, and the acquisition of exact knowledge. —If it is said that their vocation in life does not require these kinds of knowledge, — that is giving up the main plea for the pursuit of them by boys; — that it improves the quality of their minds. — If it is said that such studies unfit women for their proper occupations, — that again is untrue. Men do not attend the less to their professional business, their counting-house or their shop, for having their minds enlarged and enriched, and their faculties strengthened by sound and various knowledge; nor do women on that account neglect the work-basket, the market, the dairy and the kitchen. If it be true that women are made for these domestic occupations, then of course they will be fond of them. They will be so fond of what comes most naturally to them that no book-study (if really not congenial to their minds) will draw them off from their homely duties. For my part, I have no hesitation whatever in saying that the most ignorant women I have known have been the worst housekeepers; and that the most learned women I have known have been among the best, — wherever they have been early taught and trained to household business, as every woman ought to be. A woman of superior mind knows better than an ignorant one what to require of her servants, how to deal with tradespeople, and how to economise time: she is more clear-sighted about the best ways of doing things; has a richer mind with which to animate all about her, and to solace her own spirit in the midst of her labours. If nobody doubts the difference in pleasantness of having to do with a silly and narrow-minded woman and with one who is intelligent and enlightened, it must be clear that the more intelligence and enlightenment there is, the better. One of the best housekeepers I know, — a simple-minded, affectionate-hearted woman, whose table is always fit for a prince to sit down to, whose house is always neat and elegant, and whose small income yields the greatest amount of comfort, is one of the most learned women ever heard of. When she was a little girl, she was sitting sewing in the window-seat while her brother was receiving his first lesson in mathematics from his tutor. She listened, and was delighted with what she heard; and when both left the room, she seized upon the Euclid that lay on the table, ran up to her room, went over the lesson, and laid the volume where it was before. Every day after this, she sat stitching away and listening, in like manner, and going over the lesson afterwards, till one day she let out the secret. Her brother could not answer a question which was put to him two or three times; and, without thinking of anything else, she popped out the answer. The tutor was surprised, and after she had told the simple truth, she was permitted to make what she could of Euclid. Some time after, she spoke confidentially to a friend of the family, — a scientific professor, — asking him, with much hesitation and many blushes, whether he thought it was wrong for a woman to learn Latin. "Certainly not," he said; "provided she does not neglect any duty for it. — But why do you want to learn Latin?" She wanted to study Newton's Principia: and the professor thought this a very good reason. Before she was grown into a woman, she had mastered the Principia of Newton. And now, the great globe on which we live is to her a book in which she reads the choice secrets of nature; and to her the last known wonders of the sky are disclosed: and if there is a home more graced with accomplishments, and more filled with comforts, I do not know such an one. Will anybody say that this woman would have been in any way better without her learning? — while we may confidently say that she would have been much less happy. Which of the following best describes a strategy the author uses to win the favor of her audience?

Addressing readers from the outset as being reasonable people of goodwill

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is from a book by a nineteenth-century British writer.) I suppose none of us will doubt that everything possible should be done to improve the quality of the mind of every human being. — If it is said that the female brain is incapable of studies of an abstract nature, — that is not true: for there are many instances of women who have been good mathematicians, and good classical scholars. The plea is indeed nonsense on the face of it; for the brain which will learn French will learn Greek; the brain which enjoys arithmetic is capable of mathematics. —If it is said that women are light-minded and superficial, the obvious answer is that their minds should be the more carefully sobered by grave studies, and the acquisition of exact knowledge. —If it is said that their vocation in life does not require these kinds of knowledge, — that is giving up the main plea for the pursuit of them by boys; — that it improves the quality of their minds. — If it is said that such studies unfit women for their proper occupations, — that again is untrue. Men do not attend the less to their professional business, their counting-house or their shop, for having their minds enlarged and enriched, and their faculties strengthened by sound and various knowledge; nor do women on that account neglect the work-basket, the market, the dairy and the kitchen. If it be true that women are made for these domestic occupations, then of course they will be fond of them. They will be so fond of what comes most naturally to them that no book-study (if really not congenial to their minds) will draw them off from their homely duties. For my part, I have no hesitation whatever in saying that the most ignorant women I have known have been the worst housekeepers; and that the most learned women I have known have been among the best, — wherever they have been early taught and trained to household business, as every woman ought to be. A woman of superior mind knows better than an ignorant one what to require of her servants, how to deal with tradespeople, and how to economise time: she is more clear-sighted about the best ways of doing things; has a richer mind with which to animate all about her, and to solace her own spirit in the midst of her labours. If nobody doubts the difference in pleasantness of having to do with a silly and narrow-minded woman and with one who is intelligent and enlightened, it must be clear that the more intelligence and enlightenment there is, the better. One of the best housekeepers I know, — a simple-minded, affectionate-hearted woman, whose table is always fit for a prince to sit down to, whose house is always neat and elegant, and whose small income yields the greatest amount of comfort, is one of the most learned women ever heard of. When she was a little girl, she was sitting sewing in the window-seat while her brother was receiving his first lesson in mathematics from his tutor. She listened, and was delighted with what she heard; and when both left the room, she seized upon the Euclid that lay on the table, ran up to her room, went over the lesson, and laid the volume where it was before. Every day after this, she sat stitching away and listening, in like manner, and going over the lesson afterwards, till one day she let out the secret. Her brother could not answer a question which was put to him two or three times; and, without thinking of anything else, she popped out the answer. The tutor was surprised, and after she had told the simple truth, she was permitted to make what she could of Euclid. Some time after, she spoke confidentially to a friend of the family, — a scientific professor, — asking him, with much hesitation and many blushes, whether he thought it was wrong for a woman to learn Latin. "Certainly not," he said; "provided she does not neglect any duty for it. — But why do you want to learn Latin?" She wanted to study Newton's Principia: and the professor thought this a very good reason. Before she was grown into a woman, she had mastered the Principia of Newton. And now, the great globe on which we live is to her a book in which she reads the choice secrets of nature; and to her the last known wonders of the sky are disclosed: and if there is a home more graced with accomplishments, and more filled with comforts, I do not know such an one. Will anybody say that this woman would have been in any way better without her learning? — while we may confidently say that she would have been much less happy. Taken as a whole, the passage can best be regarded as

an argument for enlarging and enriching the minds of women

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is excerpted from an essay published in the early twentieth century.) Every child has to learn the language he is born to. It is certain that he will make mistakes in the process, especially as he is not taught it by any wise system, but blunders into what usage he can grasp from day 5 to day. Now, if an adult foreigner were learning our language, and we greeted his efforts with yells of laughter, we should think ourselves grossly rude. And what should we think of ourselves if we further 10 misled him by setting absurd words and phrases before him, encouraging him to further blunders, that we might laugh the more; and then, if we had visitors , inciting him to make these blunders over again to entertain the company? Yet this is common household 15 sport, so long as there is a little child to act as zany* for the amusement of his elders. The errors of a child are not legitimate grounds of humour, even to those coarse enough to laugh at them, any more than a toddling baby's falls have the same elements of the 20 incongruous as the overthrow of a stout old gentleman who sits down astonished in the snow. A baby has to fall. It is natural, and not funny. So does the young child have to make mistakes as he learns any or all of the crowding tasks before him; but 25 these are not fair grounds for ridicule. I was walking in a friend's garden, and met for the first time the daughter of the house, a tall, beautiful girl of nineteen or twenty. Her aunt, who was with me, cried out to her in an affected tone, "Come and 30 meet the lady, Janey!" The young girl, who was evidently unpleasantly impressed, looked annoyed, and turned aside in some confusion, speaking softly to her teacher who was with her. Then the aunt, who was a very muscular 35 woman, seized the young lady by her shoulders, lifted her off the ground, and thrust her blushing, struggling, and protesting into my arms—by way of introduction! Naturally enough, the girl was overcome with mortification, and conceived a violent dislike for me. 40 (This story is exactly true, except that the daughter of the house was aged two and a half.) Now why,—in the name of reason, courtesy, education, justice, any lofty and noble consideration, —why should Two-and-a-half be thus insulted? What 45 is the point of view of the insulter? How does she justify her brutal behaviour? Is it on the obvious ground of physical superiority in age and strength? It cannot be that, for we do not gratuitously outrage the feelings of all persons younger and smaller than 50 ourselves. A stalwart six-foot septuagenarian does not thus comport himself toward a small gentleman of thirty or forty. It cannot be relationship; for such conduct does not obtain among adults, be they never so closely allied. It has no basis except that the victim 55 is a child, and the child has no personal rights which we feel bound to respect. A baby, when "good," is considered as a first-rate plaything,—a toy to play with or to play on or to set going like a machine-top, that we may laugh at it. 60 There is a legitimate frolicking with small children, as the cat plays with her kittens; but that is not in the least inconsistent with respect. Grown people can play together and laugh together without jeering at each other. So we might laugh with our children, even 65 more than we do, and yet never laugh at them. The pathetic side of it is that children are even more sensitive to ridicule than grown people. They have no philosophy to fall back upon; and,—here is the hideously unjust side,—if they lose their tempers, 70 being yet unlearned in self-restraint,—if they try to turn the tables on their tormentors, then the wise "grown-up" promptly punishes them for "disrespect." They must respect their elders even in this pitiful attitude; but who is to demand the respect due to 75 youth? *a clown or acrobat The author's tone in lines 42-45 ("Now why . . . the insulter") can best be described as

exasperated

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is excerpted from an essay published in the early twentieth century.) Every child has to learn the language he is born to. It is certain that he will make mistakes in the process, especially as he is not taught it by any wise system, but blunders into what usage he can grasp from day 5 to day. Now, if an adult foreigner were learning our language, and we greeted his efforts with yells of laughter, we should think ourselves grossly rude. And what should we think of ourselves if we further 10 misled him by setting absurd words and phrases before him, encouraging him to further blunders, that we might laugh the more; and then, if we had visitors , inciting him to make these blunders over again to entertain the company? Yet this is common household 15 sport, so long as there is a little child to act as zany* for the amusement of his elders. The errors of a child are not legitimate grounds of humour, even to those coarse enough to laugh at them, any more than a toddling baby's falls have the same elements of the 20 incongruous as the overthrow of a stout old gentleman who sits down astonished in the snow. A baby has to fall. It is natural, and not funny. So does the young child have to make mistakes as he learns any or all of the crowding tasks before him; but 25 these are not fair grounds for ridicule. I was walking in a friend's garden, and met for the first time the daughter of the house, a tall, beautiful girl of nineteen or twenty. Her aunt, who was with me, cried out to her in an affected tone, "Come and 30 meet the lady, Janey!" The young girl, who was evidently unpleasantly impressed, looked annoyed, and turned aside in some confusion, speaking softly to her teacher who was with her. Then the aunt, who was a very muscular 35 woman, seized the young lady by her shoulders, lifted her off the ground, and thrust her blushing, struggling, and protesting into my arms—by way of introduction! Naturally enough, the girl was overcome with mortification, and conceived a violent dislike for me. 40 (This story is exactly true, except that the daughter of the house was aged two and a half.) Now why,—in the name of reason, courtesy, education, justice, any lofty and noble consideration, —why should Two-and-a-half be thus insulted? What 45 is the point of view of the insulter? How does she justify her brutal behaviour? Is it on the obvious ground of physical superiority in age and strength? It cannot be that, for we do not gratuitously outrage the feelings of all persons younger and smaller than 50 ourselves. A stalwart six-foot septuagenarian does not thus comport himself toward a small gentleman of thirty or forty. It cannot be relationship; for such conduct does not obtain among adults, be they never so closely allied. It has no basis except that the victim 55 is a child, and the child has no personal rights which we feel bound to respect. A baby, when "good," is considered as a first-rate plaything,—a toy to play with or to play on or to set going like a machine-top, that we may laugh at it. 60 There is a legitimate frolicking with small children, as the cat plays with her kittens; but that is not in the least inconsistent with respect. Grown people can play together and laugh together without jeering at each other. So we might laugh with our children, even 65 more than we do, and yet never laugh at them. The pathetic side of it is that children are even more sensitive to ridicule than grown people. They have no philosophy to fall back upon; and,—here is the hideously unjust side,—if they lose their tempers, 70 being yet unlearned in self-restraint,—if they try to turn the tables on their tormentors, then the wise "grown-up" promptly punishes them for "disrespect." They must respect their elders even in this pitiful attitude; but who is to demand the respect due to 75 youth? *a clown or acrobat The author's word choice in lines 14-16 ("Yet this . . . elders") serves which of the following functions?

It helps establish a characterization of children as playthings.

Note: Pay particular attention to the requirement of questions that contain the words NOT, LEAST, or EXCEPT. Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. It was not a union which seemed likely to prosper, since its chief characteristics were imprudence, youth and extreme good looks. But the married life of the young Brudenells unexpectedly turned out a rustic idyll. They chose to live quietly in the country at the Manor, Hambleden, Buckinghamshire, a Jacobean house set on gently rising ground and framed in chestnut trees. The rector of Hambleden at the time has left letters in which are glimpses of an amiable, charitable and democratic pair. They preferred not to use their title and, even after Robert had succeeded his uncle as Earl of Cardigan, they were known in Hambleden as Mr. and Mrs. Brudenell. They were much given to good works, and Robert, "ever a good friend to Hambleden," bought two and a half acres of land and presented it to the village for cottagers' gardens; "these gardens are a great benefit and much prized." Penelope interested herself in the village women and the school. "She is a sweet woman, possessing a temper both mild and engaging," wrote the rector. And at the Manor on October 16th, 1797, their second child and only male infant was born and christened James Thomas. The circumstances surrounding his arrival were Impressive. It was three generations since the succession of the Earls of Cardigan had gone direct from father to son. The much desired heir was of almost mystic importance, and, as he lay in his cradle, wealth, rank, power and honours gathered round his head. It was unfortunate that he was destined to grow up in a world that was almost entirely feminine. He already had an elder sister, and seven more girls followed his birth, of whom six survived. He remained the only son, the only boy among seven girls, unique, unchallenged, and the effect on his character was decisive. He was brought up at home among his sisters, and he grew up as such boys do, spoilt, domineering and headstrong. No arm was stronger than his. No rude voice contradicted him, no rough shoulder pushed him. From his earliest consciousness he was the most important, the most interesting, the most influential person in the world. He retained, however, from these early years a liking for the society of women and a softness in his manner toward them which, having regard to his manner with men, struck his contemporaries with surprise. For a woman, a pretty woman, above all a pretty women in distress, James Brudenell, later Lord Cardigan, had an almost medieval deference, a chivalrous turn of phrase, a sometimes embarrassing readiness to protect and defend, which, though productive of astonishment and mirth, were nevertheless rooted in a genuine sympathy. It was to be expected that his parents and sisters should be passionately attached to him, and natural affection and pride were immensely heightened by the circumstance of his extraordinary good looks. In him the Brudenell beauty had come to flower. He was tall, with wide shoulders tapering to a narrow waist, his hair was golden, his eyes flashing sapphire blue, his nose aristocratic, his bearing proud. If there were a fault it was that the lower part of his face was oddly long and narrow so that sometimes one was surprised to catch an obstinate, almost a foxy Look. But the boy had a dash and gallantry that were irresistible. He did not know what fear was. A superb and reckless horseman, he risked his neck on the most dangerous brutes. No tree was too tall for him to climb, no tower too high to scale. He excelled in swordsmanship and promised to be a first-class shot. He had in addition to courage another characteristic which impressed itself on all who met him. He was, alas, unusually stupid; in fact, as Greville pronounced later, an ass. The melancholy truth was that his glorious golden head had nothing in it. The speaker's primary purpose in the passage is to

Portray an unusual character

(1) If you live in a city, you may have seen references to sister cities in other countries and wondered what the designation means—or whether it really matters. (2) In fact, sister-city programs can matter a great deal: civic organizations and local businesses are often involved in sister-city relationships. (3) Sister-city partnerships were developed to foster international cooperation after the Second World War, and they continue to serve this purpose today. (4) Many of the earliest relationships were between cities that had previously been at war. (5) Nevertheless, the English city of Bristol and the German city of Hanover formed a partnership in 1947, with Bristol shipping relief supplies to Hanover and Hanover sending musicians to perform in Bristol. (6) The partnership evolved to include an educational exchange that continues to give English and German students experience in another culture. (7) Such relationships provide an important complement to diplomacy carried out between governments. (8) Governments can forge alliances between countries, but the particular officials charged with doing so vary from country to country. (9) What's more, as Mary Kane of Sister Cities International notes, "Foreign affairs doesn't have to be done just by the State Department." (10) By conveying international relations into people's lives, sister cities make connections with distant places feel real to citizens. (11) Although the potential benefits of sister cities are great, they can't be taken for granted. (12) Without active participation from community groups, local government, and ordinary citizens, the relationships can fall into neglect. (13) But with engagement from community stakeholders, sister-city programs provide a gratifying and profitable connection to the wider world. (14) Because trust and understanding are essential to business things, the feelings of closeness that connect sister cities can translate into economic benefits. (15) This dynamic is illustrated in the sister-city relationship between Muscatine, Iowa, and Zhengding County in China. (16) In 1985, Xi Jinping visited Muscatine on a research trip to study soybean farming. (17) When Xi later became president of China, his personal connection to Muscatine formed the basis for the sister-city relationship, which in turn led to Chinese investment in Muscatine's hospitality and tourism industries. The writer is considering adding the following sentence after sentence 9. Indeed, Kane persuasively argues that diplomacy works best "if we bring it down to our individual communities and the people in the communities." Should the writer add this sentence after sentence 9 ?

Yes, because it lends further support to the idea expressed in sentence 9 by incorporating an additional clarifying quotation from the expert.

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is from a book by a nineteenth-century British writer.) I suppose none of us will doubt that everything possible should be done to improve the quality of the mind of every human being. — If it is said that the female brain is incapable of studies of an abstract nature, — that is not true: for there are many instances of women who have been good mathematicians, and good classical scholars. The plea is indeed nonsense on the face of it; for the brain which will learn French will learn Greek; the brain which enjoys arithmetic is capable of mathematics. —If it is said that women are light-minded and superficial, the obvious answer is that their minds should be the more carefully sobered by grave studies, and the acquisition of exact knowledge. —If it is said that their vocation in life does not require these kinds of knowledge, — that is giving up the main plea for the pursuit of them by boys; — that it improves the quality of their minds. — If it is said that such studies unfit women for their proper occupations, — that again is untrue. Men do not attend the less to their professional business, their counting-house or their shop, for having their minds enlarged and enriched, and their faculties strengthened by sound and various knowledge; nor do women on that account neglect the work-basket, the market, the dairy and the kitchen. If it be true that women are made for these domestic occupations, then of course they will be fond of them. They will be so fond of what comes most naturally to them that no book-study (if really not congenial to their minds) will draw them off from their homely duties. For my part, I have no hesitation whatever in saying that the most ignorant women I have known have been the worst housekeepers; and that the most learned women I have known have been among the best, — wherever they have been early taught and trained to household business, as every woman ought to be. A woman of superior mind knows better than an ignorant one what to require of her servants, how to deal with tradespeople, and how to economise time: she is more clear-sighted about the best ways of doing things; has a richer mind with which to animate all about her, and to solace her own spirit in the midst of her labours. If nobody doubts the difference in pleasantness of having to do with a silly and narrow-minded woman and with one who is intelligent and enlightened, it must be clear that the more intelligence and enlightenment there is, the better. One of the best housekeepers I know, — a simple-minded, affectionate-hearted woman, whose table is always fit for a prince to sit down to, whose house is always neat and elegant, and whose small income yields the greatest amount of comfort, is one of the most learned women ever heard of. When she was a little girl, she was sitting sewing in the window-seat while her brother was receiving his first lesson in mathematics from his tutor. She listened, and was delighted with what she heard; and when both left the room, she seized upon the Euclid that lay on the table, ran up to her room, went over the lesson, and laid the volume where it was before. Every day after this, she sat stitching away and listening, in like manner, and going over the lesson afterwards, till one day she let out the secret. Her brother could not answer a question which was put to him two or three times; and, without thinking of anything else, she popped out the answer. The tutor was surprised, and after she had told the simple truth, she was permitted to make what she could of Euclid. Some time after, she spoke confidentially to a friend of the family, — a scientific professor, — asking him, with much hesitation and many blushes, whether he thought it was wrong for a woman to learn Latin. "Certainly not," he said; "provided she does not neglect any duty for it. — But why do you want to learn Latin?" She wanted to study Newton's Principia: and the professor thought this a very good reason. Before she was grown into a woman, she had mastered the Principia of Newton. And now, the great globe on which we live is to her a book in which she reads the choice secrets of nature; and to her the last known wonders of the sky are disclosed: and if there is a home more graced with accomplishments, and more filled with comforts, I do not know such an one. Will anybody say that this woman would have been in any way better without her learning? — while we may confidently say that she would have been much less happy. The author's rhetorical stance is characterized by a dynamic tension between her

appeal for change and her insistence that such a change does not threaten the status quo

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is excerpted from an essay published in the early twentieth century.) Every child has to learn the language he is born to. It is certain that he will make mistakes in the process, especially as he is not taught it by any wise system, but blunders into what usage he can grasp from day 5 to day. Now, if an adult foreigner were learning our language, and we greeted his efforts with yells of laughter, we should think ourselves grossly rude. And what should we think of ourselves if we further 10 misled him by setting absurd words and phrases before him, encouraging him to further blunders, that we might laugh the more; and then, if we had visitors , inciting him to make these blunders over again to entertain the company? Yet this is common household 15 sport, so long as there is a little child to act as zany* for the amusement of his elders. The errors of a child are not legitimate grounds of humour, even to those coarse enough to laugh at them, any more than a toddling baby's falls have the same elements of the 20 incongruous as the overthrow of a stout old gentleman who sits down astonished in the snow. A baby has to fall. It is natural, and not funny. So does the young child have to make mistakes as he learns any or all of the crowding tasks before him; but 25 these are not fair grounds for ridicule. I was walking in a friend's garden, and met for the first time the daughter of the house, a tall, beautiful girl of nineteen or twenty. Her aunt, who was with me, cried out to her in an affected tone, "Come and 30 meet the lady, Janey!" The young girl, who was evidently unpleasantly impressed, looked annoyed, and turned aside in some confusion, speaking softly to her teacher who was with her. Then the aunt, who was a very muscular 35 woman, seized the young lady by her shoulders, lifted her off the ground, and thrust her blushing, struggling, and protesting into my arms—by way of introduction! Naturally enough, the girl was overcome with mortification, and conceived a violent dislike for me. 40 (This story is exactly true, except that the daughter of the house was aged two and a half.) Now why,—in the name of reason, courtesy, education, justice, any lofty and noble consideration, —why should Two-and-a-half be thus insulted? What 45 is the point of view of the insulter? How does she justify her brutal behaviour? Is it on the obvious ground of physical superiority in age and strength? It cannot be that, for we do not gratuitously outrage the feelings of all persons younger and smaller than 50 ourselves. A stalwart six-foot septuagenarian does not thus comport himself toward a small gentleman of thirty or forty. It cannot be relationship; for such conduct does not obtain among adults, be they never so closely allied. It has no basis except that the victim 55 is a child, and the child has no personal rights which we feel bound to respect. A baby, when "good," is considered as a first-rate plaything,—a toy to play with or to play on or to set going like a machine-top, that we may laugh at it. 60 There is a legitimate frolicking with small children, as the cat plays with her kittens; but that is not in the least inconsistent with respect. Grown people can play together and laugh together without jeering at each other. So we might laugh with our children, even 65 more than we do, and yet never laugh at them. The pathetic side of it is that children are even more sensitive to ridicule than grown people. They have no philosophy to fall back upon; and,—here is the hideously unjust side,—if they lose their tempers, 70 being yet unlearned in self-restraint,—if they try to turn the tables on their tormentors, then the wise "grown-up" promptly punishes them for "disrespect." They must respect their elders even in this pitiful attitude; but who is to demand the respect due to 75 youth? *a clown or acrobat The primary purpose of the passage is to

critique a common practice

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. I suppose none of us will doubt that everything possible should be done to improve the quality of the mind of every human being. — If it is said that the female brain is incapable of studies of an abstract nature, — that is not true: for there are many instances of women who have been good mathematicians, and good classical scholars. The plea is indeed nonsense on the face of it; for the brain which will learn French will learn Greek; the brain which enjoys arithmetic is capable of mathematics. —If it is said that women are light-minded and superficial, the obvious answer is that their minds should be the more carefully sobered by grave studies, and the acquisition of exact knowledge. —If it is said that their vocation in life does not require these kinds of knowledge, — that is giving up the main plea for the pursuit of them by boys; — that it improves the quality of their minds. — If it is said that such studies unfit women for their proper occupations, — that again is untrue. Men do not attend the less to their professional business, their counting-house or their shop, for having their minds enlarged and enriched, and their faculties strengthened by sound and various knowledge; nor do women on that account neglect the work-basket, the market, the dairy and the kitchen. If it be true that women are made for these domestic occupations, then of course they will be fond of them. They will be so fond of what comes most naturally to them that no book-study (if really not congenial to their minds) will draw them off from their homely duties. For my part, I have no hesitation whatever in saying that the most ignorant women I have known have been the worst housekeepers; and that the most learned women I have known have been among the best, — wherever they have been early taught and trained to household business, as every woman ought to be. A woman of superior mind knows better than an ignorant one what to require of her servants, how to deal with tradespeople, and how to economise time: she is more clear-sighted about the best ways of doing things; has a richer mind with which to animate all about her, and to solace her own spirit in the midst of her labours. If nobody doubts the difference in pleasantness of having to do with a silly and narrow-minded woman and with one who is intelligent and enlightened, it must be clear that the more intelligence and enlightenment there is, the better. One of the best housekeepers I know, — a simple-minded, affectionate-hearted woman, whose table is always fit for a prince to sit down to, whose house is always neat and elegant, and whose small income yields the greatest amount of comfort, is one of the most learned women ever heard of. When she was a little girl, she was sitting sewing in the window-seat while her brother was receiving his first lesson in mathematics from his tutor. She listened, and was delighted with what she heard; and when both left the room, she seized upon the Euclid that lay on the table, ran up to her room, went over the lesson, and laid the volume where it was before. Every day after this, she sat stitching away and listening, in like manner, and going over the lesson afterwards, till one day she let out the secret. Her brother could not answer a question which was put to him two or three times; and, without thinking of anything else, she popped out the answer. The tutor was surprised, and after she had told the simple truth, she was permitted to make what she could of Euclid. Some time after, she spoke confidentially to a friend of the family, — a scientific professor, — asking him, with much hesitation and many blushes, whether he thought it was wrong for a woman to learn Latin. "Certainly not," he said; "provided she does not neglect any duty for it. — But why do you want to learn Latin?" She wanted to study Newton's Principia: and the professor thought this a very good reason. Before she was grown into a woman, she had mastered the Principia of Newton. And now, the great globe on which we live is to her a book in which she reads the choice secrets of nature; and to her the last known wonders of the sky are disclosed: and if there is a home more graced with accomplishments, and more filled with comforts, I do not know such an one. Will anybody say that this woman would have been in any way better without her learning? — while we may confidently say that she would have been much less happy. The author's chief strategy in the lines ("One of the best . . . less happy") is to

develop a point through an extended example

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (The passage below is excerpted from an essay published in the early twentieth century.) Every child has to learn the language he is born to. It is certain that he will make mistakes in the process, especially as he is not taught it by any wise system, but blunders into what usage he can grasp from day 5 to day. Now, if an adult foreigner were learning our language, and we greeted his efforts with yells of laughter, we should think ourselves grossly rude. And what should we think of ourselves if we further 10 misled him by setting absurd words and phrases before him, encouraging him to further blunders, that we might laugh the more; and then, if we had visitors , inciting him to make these blunders over again to entertain the company? Yet this is common household 15 sport, so long as there is a little child to act as zany* for the amusement of his elders. The errors of a child are not legitimate grounds of humour, even to those coarse enough to laugh at them, any more than a toddling baby's falls have the same elements of the 20 incongruous as the overthrow of a stout old gentleman who sits down astonished in the snow. A baby has to fall. It is natural, and not funny. So does the young child have to make mistakes as he learns any or all of the crowding tasks before him; but 25 these are not fair grounds for ridicule. I was walking in a friend's garden, and met for the first time the daughter of the house, a tall, beautiful girl of nineteen or twenty. Her aunt, who was with me, cried out to her in an affected tone, "Come and 30 meet the lady, Janey!" The young girl, who was evidently unpleasantly impressed, looked annoyed, and turned aside in some confusion, speaking softly to her teacher who was with her. Then the aunt, who was a very muscular 35 woman, seized the young lady by her shoulders, lifted her off the ground, and thrust her blushing, struggling, and protesting into my arms—by way of introduction! Naturally enough, the girl was overcome with mortification, and conceived a violent dislike for me. 40 (This story is exactly true, except that the daughter of the house was aged two and a half.) Now why,—in the name of reason, courtesy, education, justice, any lofty and noble consideration, —why should Two-and-a-half be thus insulted? What 45 is the point of view of the insulter? How does she justify her brutal behaviour? Is it on the obvious ground of physical superiority in age and strength? It cannot be that, for we do not gratuitously outrage the feelings of all persons younger and smaller than 50 ourselves. A stalwart six-foot septuagenarian does not thus comport himself toward a small gentleman of thirty or forty. It cannot be relationship; for such conduct does not obtain among adults, be they never so closely allied. It has no basis except that the victim 55 is a child, and the child has no personal rights which we feel bound to respect. A baby, when "good," is considered as a first-rate plaything,—a toy to play with or to play on or to set going like a machine-top, that we may laugh at it. 60 There is a legitimate frolicking with small children, as the cat plays with her kittens; but that is not in the least inconsistent with respect. Grown people can play together and laugh together without jeering at each other. So we might laugh with our children, even 65 more than we do, and yet never laugh at them. The pathetic side of it is that children are even more sensitive to ridicule than grown people. They have no philosophy to fall back upon; and,—here is the hideously unjust side,—if they lose their tempers, 70 being yet unlearned in self-restraint,—if they try to turn the tables on their tormentors, then the wise "grown-up" promptly punishes them for "disrespect." They must respect their elders even in this pitiful attitude; but who is to demand the respect due to 75 youth? *a clown or acrobat The author uses the pronoun "we" throughout the passage to

highlight norms of adult behavior

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. Pragmatism is an account of the way people think—the way they come up with ideas, form beliefs, and reach decisions. What makes us decide to do one thing when we might do another thing instead? The question seems unanswerable, since life presents us with many types of choices, and no single explanation can be expected to cover every case. Deciding whether to order the lobster or the steak is not the same sort of thing as deciding whether the defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. In the first case (assuming price is not an object) we consult our taste; in the second we consult our judgment, and try to keep our taste out of it. But knowing more or less what category a particular decision belongs to— knowing whether it is a matter of personal preference or a matter of impersonal judgment—doesn't make that decision any easier to make. "Order what you feel like eating," says your impatient dinner companion. But the problem is that you don't know what you feel like eating. What you feel like eating is precisely what you are trying to figure out. "Order what you feel like eating" is just a piece of advice about the criteria you should be using to guide your deliberations. It is not a solution to your menu problem—just as "Do the right thing" and "Tell the truth" are only suggestions about criteria, not answers to actual dilemmas. The actual dilemma is what, in the particular case staring you in the face, the right thing to do or the honest thing to say really is. And making those kinds of decisions—about what is right or what is truthful—is like deciding what to order in a restaurant, in the sense that getting a handle on tastiness is no harder or easier (even though it is generally less important) than getting a handle on justice or truth. People reach decisions, most of the time, by thinking. This is a pretty banal statement, but the process it names is inscrutable. An acquaintance gives you a piece of information in strict confidence; later on, a close friend, lacking that information, is about to make a bad mistake. Do you betray the confidence? "Do the right thing"—but what is the right thing? Keeping your word, or helping someone you care about avoid injury or embarrassment? Even in this two-sentence hypothetical case, the choice between principles is complicated—as it always is in life—by circumstances. If it had been the close friend who gave you the information and the acquaintance who was about to make the mistake, you would almost certainly think about your choice differently—as you would if you thought that the acquaintance was a nasty person, or that the friend was a lucky person, or that the statute of limitations on the secret had probably run out, or that you had acquired a terrible habit of betraying confidences and really ought to break it. In the end, you will do what you believe is "right," but "rightness" will be, in effect, the compliment you give to the outcome of your deliberations. Though it is always in view while you are thinking, "what is right" is something that appears in its complete form at the end, not the beginning, of your deliberation. When we think, in other words, we do not simply consult principles, or reasons, or sentiments, or tastes; for prior to thinking, all those things are indeterminate. Thinking is what makes them real. Deciding to order the lobster helps us determine that we have a taste for lobster; deciding that the defendant is guilty helps us establish the standard of justice that applies in this case; choosing to keep a confidence helps make honesty a principle and choosing to betray it helps to confirm the value we put on friendship. Does this mean that our choices are arbitrary or self-serving—that standards and principles are just whatever it is in our interest to say they are, pretexts for satisfying selfish ends or gratifying hidden impulses? There is no way to answer this question, except to say that it rarely feels as though this is the case. We usually don't end up deciding to do what seems pleasant or convenient at the moment; experience teaches us that this is rarely a wise basis for making a choice. ("If merely 'feeling good' could decide, drunkenness would be the supremely valid human experience," as James* once put it.) When we are happy with a decision, it doesn't feel arbitrary; it feels like the decision we had to reach. And this is because its inevitability is a function of its "fit" with the whole inchoate set of assumptions of our self understanding and of the social world we inhabit, the assumptions that give the moral weight—much greater moral weight than logic or taste could ever give—to every judgment we make. This is why, so often, we know we're right before we know why we're right. First we decide, then we deduce. *William James (1842-1910), American philosopher and psychologist, was a leader of the philosophical movement of Pragmatism. The series of parallel clauses in Paragraph 3 ("if you thought ... break it") is used to

reinforce an idea

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. (This passage is excerpted from a recent work that examines Benjamin Franklin, an eighteenth-century thinker, political leader, and scientist, from a contemporary perspective.) Franklin has a particular resonance in twenty-first century America. A successful publisher and consummate networker with an inventive curiosity, he would have felt right at home in the information revolution, and his unabashed striving to be part of an upwardly mobile meritocracy made him, in social critic David Brooks's phrase, "our founding Yuppie." We can easily imagine having a beer with him after work, showing him how to use the latest digital device, sharing the business plan for a new venture, and discussing the most recent political scandals or policy ideas. He would laugh at the latest joke ... We would admire both his earnestness and his self-aware irony. And we would relate to the way he tried to balance, sometimes uneasily, the pursuit of reputation, wealth, earthly virtues, and spiritual values.1 Some who see the reflection of Franklin in the world today fret about a shallowness of soul and a spiritual complacency that seem to permeate a culture of materialism. They say that he teaches us how to live a practical and pecuniary life, but not an exalted existence. Others see the same reflection and admire the basic middle-class values and democratic sentiments that now seem under assault from elitists, radicals, reactionaries, and other bashers of the bourgeoisie. They regard Franklin as an exemplar of the personal character and civic virtue that are too often missing in modern America. Much of the admiration is warranted, and so too are some of the qualms. But the lessons from Franklin's life are more complex than those usually drawn by either his fans or his foes. Both sides too often confuse him with the striving pilgrim he portrayed in his autobiography. They mistake his genial moral maxims for the fundamental faiths that motivated his actions. 1David Brooks, "Our Founding Yuppie," Weekly Standard, Oct. 23, 2000, 31. The word "meritocracy" is an argument-starter, and I have employed it sparingly in this book. It is often used loosely to denote a vision of social mobility based on merit and diligence, like Franklin's. The word was coined by British social thinker Michael Young (later to become somewhat ironically, Lord Young of Darlington) in his 1958 book The Rise of Meritocracy (New York: Viking Press) as a dismissive term to satirize a society that misguidedly created a new elite class based on the "narrow band of values" of IQ and educational credentials. The Harvard philosopher John Rawls, in A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), 106, used it more broadly to mean a "social order [that] follows the principle of careers open to talents." The rhetorical purpose of Paragraph 1 ("And we ... values") is to

suggest that Franklin did not balance his pursuits particularly well

(The following passage is excerpted from an essay first published by an American historian in the 1980s.) The end of World War II left two superpowers with their respective spheres of influence and control, vying for military and political power. Yet they were unable to control events, even in those parts of the world considered to be their respective spheres of influence. The failure of the Soviet Union to have its way in Afghanistan, its decision to withdraw after almost a decade of ugly intervention, was the most striking evidence that even the possession of thermonuclear weapons does not guarantee domination over a determined population. The United States has faced the same reality. It waged a full-scale war in Indochina, conducting the most brutal bombardment of a tiny peninsula in world history, and yet was forced to withdraw. In the headlines every day we see other instances of the failure of the presumably powerful over the presumably powerless, as in Brazil, where a grass-roots movement of workers and the poor elected a new president pledged to fight destructive corporate power. Looking at this catalogue of huge surprises, it's clear that the struggle for justice should never be abandoned because of the apparent overwhelming power of those who have the guns and the money and who seem invincible in their determination to hold on to it. That apparent power has, again and again, proved vulnerable to human qualities less measurable than bombs and dollars: moral fervor, determination, unity, organization, sacrifice, wit, ingenuity, courage, patience—whether by blacks in Alabama and South Africa, peasants in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Vietnam, or workers and intellectuals in Poland, Hungary, and the Soviet Union itself. No cold calculation of the balance of power need deter people who are persuaded that their cause is just. I have tried hard to match my friends in their pessimism about the world (is it just my friends?), but I keep encountering people who, in spite of all the evidence of terrible things happening everywhere, give me hope. Especially young people, in whom the future rests. Wherever I go, I find such people. And beyond the handful of activists there seem to be hundreds, thousands, more who are open to unorthodox ideas. But they tend not to know of one another's existence, and so, while they persist, they do so with the desperate patience of Sisyphus endlessly pushing that boulder up the mountain. I try to tell each group that it is not alone; and that the very people who are disheartened by the absence of a national movement are themselves proof of the potential for such a movement. Revolutionary change does not come as one cataclysmic moment (beware of such moments!) but as an endless succession of surprises, moving zigzag toward a more decent society. We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world. Even when we don't "win," there is fun and fulfillment in the fact that we have been involved, with other good people, in something worthwhile. We need hope. An optimist isn't necessarily a blithe, slightly sappy whistler in the dark of our time. To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. Associate Agent By starting three successive sentences with "If" clauses in the last paragraph ("If we see only the worst . . . some grand utopian future"), the author primarily emphasizes that

the audience has the power to shape the future

(1) If you live in a city, you may have seen references to sister cities in other countries and wondered what the designation means—or whether it really matters. (2) In fact, sister-city programs can matter a great deal: civic organizations and local businesses are often involved in sister-city relationships. (3) Sister-city partnerships were developed to foster international cooperation after the Second World War, and they continue to serve this purpose today. (4) Many of the earliest relationships were between cities that had previously been at war. (5) Nevertheless, the English city of Bristol and the German city of Hanover formed a partnership in 1947, with Bristol shipping relief supplies to Hanover and Hanover sending musicians to perform in Bristol. (6) The partnership evolved to include an educational exchange that continues to give English and German students experience in another culture. (7) Such relationships provide an important complement to diplomacy carried out between governments. (8) Governments can forge alliances between countries, but the particular officials charged with doing so vary from country to country. (9) What's more, as Mary Kane of Sister Cities International notes, "Foreign affairs doesn't have to be done just by the State Department." (10) By conveying international relations into people's lives, sister cities make connections with distant places feel real to citizens. (11) Although the potential benefits of sister cities are great, they can't be taken for granted. (12) Without active participation from community groups, local government, and ordinary citizens, the relationships can fall into neglect. (13) But with engagement from community stakeholders, sister-city programs provide a gratifying and profitable connection to the wider world. (14) Because trust and understanding are essential to business things, the feelings of closeness that connect sister cities can translate into economic benefits. (15) This dynamic is illustrated in the sister-city relationship between Muscatine, Iowa, and Zhengding County in China. (16) In 1985, Xi Jinping visited Muscatine on a research trip to study soybean farming. (17) When Xi later became president of China, his personal connection to Muscatine formed the basis for the sister-city relationship, which in turn led to Chinese investment in Muscatine's hospitality and tourism industries. Which version of the underlined text in sentence 2 (reproduced below) provides the most effective claim to set up the discussion that follows in the passage? In fact, sister-city programs can matter a great deal: civic organizations and local businesses are often involved in sister-city relationships.

when effectively cultivated, they bring people together to create mutually beneficial cultural and economic ties.

(1) There is a long-running debate about whether or not vegetarianism improves the health of people who do not otherwise require special diets. (2) People thinking about becoming vegetarians should consider both sides of the debate, because each makes important points about our dietary needs. (3) Many studies have found that vegetarianism has important health benefits. (4) For example, a vegetarian diet is connected to lower rates of heart disease and diabetes as well as lower cholesterol levels. (5) Some studies have also shown that cancer rates are lower in vegetarians than in meat eaters and that vegetarians tend to live longer than nonvegetarians. (6) However, the typical vegetarian diet has drawbacks as well. (7) Vegetarians sometimes experience deficiencies in nutrients, including iron, calcium, fatty acids, protein, vitamin B12, and zinc. (8) The effects of these deficiencies can range from mild to severe and include fatigue, sleep issues, and delayed recovery from illness and injury. (9) Vegetarians draw on a variety of national cuisines: quinoa contains protein, many sea vegetables are rich in iron, and tofu and green leafy vegetables provide adequate amounts of calcium. (10) But certain nutrients are more readily available to meat eaters. (11) Occasional meat eating tends to provide the body with every essential amino acid needed for good health. (12) In addition, meat, fish, and poultry contain iron that is absorbed more easily than the iron contained in plants. (13) As a result, nonvegetarians suffer from anemia less frequently than vegetarians do. (14) Furthermore, the protein in meat has been proven more effective than the protein in plant-based foods at preventing the muscle loss that is common with aging. (15) Finally, vitamin B12, an integral aid to nervous system function and brain development, is naturally found in animal products and is not found in most plant foods. (16) When you put all this evidence together, it seems foolish to become a vegetarian. (17) Both vegetarian and nonvegetarian diets have benefits. (18) It seems, then, that the healthiest option may be a flexitarian diet, one that consists mostly of plants but occasionally includes meats so that all of the body's nutritional needs can be met. The writer wants to revise the passage so that it does not contain any inappropriate shifts in tone. To achieve this goal, which of the following sentences should the writer delete?

Sentence 16

(1) For centuries, art scholars have studied the renowned works of Leonardo da Vinci, the Renaissance artist, pondering how he created three-dimensional figures with such depth on flat canvases. (2) If da Vinci did have exotropia, in which an eye turns outward, he would not have been the only artist in history with that condition. (3) Christopher Tyler, a visual neuroscientist at City University of London, noticed a pattern in da Vinci's portraits and in works depicting the great artist. (4) While few self-portraits of da Vinci exist, Tyler argues that many of da Vinci's portraits reflect his appearance. (5) As the great artist himself said, the soul "guides the painter's arm and makes him reproduce himself, since it appears to the soul that this is the best way to represent a human being." (6) To test his theory that da Vinci had exotropia, Tyler studied the eye alignments of the subjects of six pieces of art that purportedly depict the Renaissance artist himself, including da Vinci's Vitruvian Man and Salvator Mundi and Andrea del Verrocchio's sculpture David. (7) The results confirmed Tyler's suspicions: da Vinci likely had exotropia, with one eye turning out at -10.3 degrees. (8) Tyler's findings, which he published in JAMA Ophthalmology, created a stir in both the art and science communities. (9) Only about 1 percent of the population has exotropia, yet previous studies have suggested that other famous artists—like Rembrandt, Picasso, and Degas—had it as well, which indicates that the eye condition was more common in centuries past than it is now. (10) Tyler believes that da Vinci's condition was intermittent—that is, his eye drifted out of alignment when he was relaxed, but when he focused, it would realign. (11) If Tyler is right and da Vinci could control his exotropia, then the artist could switch from 2-D to 3-D vision, enhancing his ability to accurately capture three-dimensional figures on a two-dimensional canvas. The writer is working on a revision of the passage and has written the following thesis statement for it. Based on the evidence from Tyler's studies, it is clear that this condition was the primary reason for da Vinci's success. Which of the following is most likely the main claim that the writer is planning to make in the new version of the passage?

Da Vinci was a great artist because he had exotropia.

Read the following passage carefully before you choose your answers. How easy is it to call rogue and villain, and that wittily! But how hard to make a man appear a fool, a blockhead, or a knave without using any of those opprobrious terms! To spare the grossness of the names, and to do the thing yet more severely, is to draw a full face, and to make the nose and cheeks stand out, and yet not to employ any depth of shadowing. This is the mystery of that noble trade, which yet no master can teach to his apprentice; he may give the rules, but the scholar is never the nearer in his practice. Neither is it true that this fineness of raillery is offensive. A witty man is tickled while he is hurt in this manner, and a fool feels it not. The occasion of an offense may possibly be given, but he cannot take it. If it be granted that in effect this way does more mischief; that a man is secretly wounded, and though he be not sensible himself, yet the malicious world will find it out for him; yet there is still a vast difference betwixt the slovenly butchering of a man, and the fineness of a stroke that separates the head from the body, and leaves it standing in its place. A man may be capable, as Jack Ketch's1 wife said of his servant, of a plain piece of work, a bare hanging; but to make a male-factor die sweetly was only belonging to her husband. I wish I could apply it to myself, if the reader would be kind enough to think it belongs to me. 1 A notorious public executioner In the context of the passage, the author probably intends the reader to find the words of Jack Ketch's wife

humorous

(1) For centuries, art scholars have studied the renowned works of Leonardo da Vinci, the Renaissance artist, pondering how he created three-dimensional figures with such depth on flat canvases. (2) If da Vinci did have exotropia, in which an eye turns outward, he would not have been the only artist in history with that condition. (3) Christopher Tyler, a visual neuroscientist at City University of London, noticed a pattern in da Vinci's portraits and in works depicting the great artist. (4) While few self-portraits of da Vinci exist, Tyler argues that many of da Vinci's portraits reflect his appearance. (5) As the great artist himself said, the soul "guides the painter's arm and makes him reproduce himself, since it appears to the soul that this is the best way to represent a human being." (6) To test his theory that da Vinci had exotropia, Tyler studied the eye alignments of the subjects of six pieces of art that purportedly depict the Renaissance artist himself, including da Vinci's Vitruvian Man and Salvator Mundi and Andrea del Verrocchio's sculpture David. (7) The results confirmed Tyler's suspicions: da Vinci likely had exotropia, with one eye turning out at -10.3 degrees. (8) Tyler's findings, which he published in JAMA Ophthalmology, created a stir in both the art and science communities. (9) Only about 1 percent of the population has exotropia, yet previous studies have suggested that other famous artists—like Rembrandt, Picasso, and Degas—had it as well, which indicates that the eye condition was more common in centuries past than it is now. (10) Tyler believes that da Vinci's condition was intermittent—that is, his eye drifted out of alignment when he was relaxed, but when he focused, it would realign. (11) If Tyler is right and da Vinci could control his exotropia, then the artist could switch from 2-D to 3-D vision, enhancing his ability to accurately capture three-dimensional figures on a two-dimensional canvas. The writer is considering changing the passage to argue that Tyler does not have enough evidence to support the assertion that da Vinci had exotropia. The writer drafted the following thesis statement, which is intended to preview the line of reasoning the new passage would have. Though it is true that Tyler studied six separate works of art, including such famous works as Vitruvian Man and Salvator Mundi, there is not enough evidence to prove that da Vinci suffered from exotropia. Should the writer include the underlined portion of the thesis statement?

No, because a thesis does not need to provide specifics of an argument or evidence to be a good preview.

(1) In the early twentieth century, many authors felt that traditional literature could not capture the rapidly changing modern world and argued that new, experimental forms of writing were necessary. (2) Their movement, which came to be known as modernism, was influenced by many historical factors, including changing social norms and advances in science and technology. (3) But perhaps the most important factor in convincing authors that they needed new ways of writing was the First World War. (4) Some writers, such as the poets Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, had firsthand experiences as soldiers that led them to depart from shopworn stuff that made warfare seem all right and depict the ugly realities of war. (5) When Owen described the "shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells" in the poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth," for example, both the subject matter and its frank presentation signaled a departure from earlier representations of war. (6) Even writers who did not experience combat were deeply affected by the First World War, because the unexpectedly long-lasting and destructive conflict undermined faith in traditional ways of storytelling. (7) Some writers, such as Virginia Woolf and James Joyce, turned away from straightforward narration and toward a stream-of-consciousness style that recorded characters' confused rush of thoughts and impressions. (8) Explaining this style, Woolf noted that "the mind, exposed to the ordinary course of life, receives upon its surface a myriad impressions . . . From all sides they come, an incessant shower of innumerable atoms, composing in their sum what we might venture to call life itself." (9) Portraying life as a bombardment of impressions on the mind, Woolf was one of the most important modernist novelists. (10) The disruption of war was not the only stimulus for modernism in the early twentieth century. (11) As literature professor Laura Frost points out, modernist literary works are "conspicuously labor intensive." (12) But the First World War changed people's lives and perceptions like no other factor at the time did, and for this reason the war should be seen as the primary impetus for modernism. In sentence 4 (reproduced below), which of the following versions of the underlined text is most consistent with the overall tone and style of the passage? Some writers, such as the poets Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, had firsthand experiences as soldiers that led them to depart from shopworn stuff that made warfare seem all right and depict the ugly realities of war.

the glorified images of combat seen in older literary works

(1) If you live in a city, you may have seen references to sister cities in other countries and wondered what the designation means—or whether it really matters. (2) In fact, sister-city programs can matter a great deal: civic organizations and local businesses are often involved in sister-city relationships. (3) Sister-city partnerships were developed to foster international cooperation after the Second World War, and they continue to serve this purpose today. (4) Many of the earliest relationships were between cities that had previously been at war. (5) Nevertheless, the English city of Bristol and the German city of Hanover formed a partnership in 1947, with Bristol shipping relief supplies to Hanover and Hanover sending musicians to perform in Bristol. (6) The partnership evolved to include an educational exchange that continues to give English and German students experience in another culture. (7) Such relationships provide an important complement to diplomacy carried out between governments. (8) Governments can forge alliances between countries, but the particular officials charged with doing so vary from country to country. (9) What's more, as Mary Kane of Sister Cities International notes, "Foreign affairs doesn't have to be done just by the State Department." (10) By conveying international relations into people's lives, sister cities make connections with distant places feel real to citizens. (11) Although the potential benefits of sister cities are great, they can't be taken for granted. (12) Without active participation from community groups, local government, and ordinary citizens, the relationships can fall into neglect. (13) But with engagement from community stakeholders, sister-city programs provide a gratifying and profitable connection to the wider world. (14) Because trust and understanding are essential to business things, the feelings of closeness that connect sister cities can translate into economic benefits. (15) This dynamic is illustrated in the sister-city relationship between Muscatine, Iowa, and Zhengding County in China. (16) In 1985, Xi Jinping visited Muscatine on a research trip to study soybean farming. (17) When Xi later became president of China, his personal connection to Muscatine formed the basis for the sister-city relationship, which in turn led to Chinese investment in Muscatine's hospitality and tourism industries. Which version of the underlined text in sentence 8 (reproduced below) provides commentary that logically connects to the evidence in the paragraph? Governments can forge alliances between countries, but the particular officials charged with doing so vary from country to country.

these acts do not necessarily encourage feelings of closeness between the countries' citizens