Passage Completion Questions and Answers

Answer: A

Correct answer: alike

The sentence says no two individuals are the same, and alike is the predicative adjective for that. Close would need to, liked is a different word entirely, and equal anticipates the sentence's own contrast with equality, which comes next.

Answer: D

Correct answer: even though

The two halves of the sentence pull against each other: equality is the norm society fosters, yet men are in fact unequal. Only a concessive connective can join them, and even though is the one offered. When, since and as would make equality the cause or the occasion of inequality.

Answer: B

Correct answer: are

The subject is the plural men, and the sentence states a present, general truth, so the present plural are is required. Is fails to agree, and the past and future forms would take the claim out of the present.

Answer: B

Correct answer: varying

Men are unequal to different extents, which is what varying hues or degrees says. High and total would fix a single level and so contradict degrees, and no would reverse the sentence.

Answer: C

Correct answer: However, if you like, you can phone me

B has to bridge I cannot see you tomorrow and there is only a simple laboratory test to be done. Offering the telephone instead does that: the visit is unnecessary because nothing but a test remains. The options about the diagnosis and about following instructions look ahead to a stage the exchange has not reached.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Then, many years later, the petrol engine was invented

C says his invention was used later by other clever men, so B must keep the focus on later inventions built on Watt's work. Then, many years later supplies exactly that step. The options about motor cars, aeroplanes and jets jump past the railway engine that C is about to introduce.

Answer: C

Correct answer: Today they are a relatively rare species

C explains this drastic fall in their numbers, so B must be the statement of that fall. Only the keyed option reports it. The others describe reserves and national parks, which are remedies rather than the fall itself.

Answer: D

Correct answer: The quake's force was measured at 7.8 on the Richter scale

C compares this earthquake with the one in Chile for severity, so B must give the measure that makes the comparison possible. The options counting collapsed and unsafe buildings describe damage, which is not what a comparison of severity on a scale rests on.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Four years of study in the college changed him completely

A describes him on arrival and C says he learnt a lot there, so B must cover the span between: the years at college and the change they produced. The option about leaving college looks past C, and the ones about a job leave the college behind altogether.

Answer: B

Correct answer: You must invest them wisely

Them must refer to the limited resources named in A, and C then moves to a second consequence of that limitation. Only the keyed option carries the pronoun back to A; the others introduce other people, whom C brings in for the first time.