Reading Comprehension Questions and Answers

Answer: D

We should not despise the savage tribes because we are no less superstitious than they are.

The passage says that if we are tempted to look down on savage tribes for such ideas, we should remember that 'even today, among most civilised nations, a great many equally stupid superstitions exist'. The reason for not despising them is that civilised people share their weakness.

Disbelief in science, useless arguments and stopping superstition are not given in the passage as reasons. The passage in fact says the tribes hold such ideas, so the third option is the reverse.

Answer: D

The statement with a scientific basis is Fridays are as good as other days.

The passage lists believing that Friday is a bad day to start anything, walking under a ladder, sitting down thirteen at a table and buying charms for luck as superstitions. There is no evidence that any day of the week differs in luck from another, so saying all days are alike is the claim that fits observation.

The other three, avoiding a ladder, thinking thirteen is inauspicious and holding that charms always bring luck, are the superstitions the passage names.

Answer: D

The key takes it that all tribals and some civilized nations believe in superstitions.

The passage says savage tribes hold such ideas, and that a great many people in civilised nations also believe equally stupid superstitions, though not that every civilised person does. So the believers are the tribes, taken together, and some people in civilised nations.

'All civilised nations' goes too far, since the passage says many people, not all. 'Only some civilised nations' and 'only some tribals' leave out one of the two groups.

Answer: B

Statement (a) is wrong and (b) is right, so the answer is (a) is wrong and (b) is right.

The passage says the ancient Greeks believed that they were superior to the people of Northern and Western Europe, offered as an example of an unproved principle. It does not say they were superior, so (a) is wrong. It also says that the increase of scientific knowledge does reduce superstition, so science helps us fight it, and (b) is right.

Answer: B

The statement that best sums up the passage is irrational beliefs decline with the advancement of science.

The passage opens by saying superstitions ought to grow less as science progresses, notes that they linger, and closes by saying that more scientific knowledge does reduce superstition and baseless guessing. The central point is that science reduces irrational belief.

'Superstitions disappear' overstates it, since the passage shows they linger. The comparison with savage tribes is only an illustration in the middle of the passage, and the tribes are not said to be very different from us, so the last two options do not capture the whole passage.

Answer: B

On the key's reading, the cities, gardens, cliffs and isles show that the Earth is friendly.

The poet addresses the Earth as 'You friendly Earth' just before listing the wheat-fields, rivers, cities, gardens, cliffs and isles, and these are things that nourish and shelter people. The list is offered as the evidence of that friendly nature.

Huge and well populated also fit the lines ('how far do you go', 'people upon you for thousands of miles'), and the poet is aware of the Earth's size, but the stanza starts from the word friendly. Small is the poet's description of himself and of the Earth only in the last stanza, as 'such a dot' next to a human being.

Answer: A

In the extract the poet has compared man with the Earth.

In the last stanza the speaker says 'You are so great and I am so small', then hears a whisper: 'You are more than the Earth, though you are such a dot, you can love and think, and the Earth cannot'. The comparison is between the human being, who can love and think, and the Earth.

The world and the Earth are the same thing here, so they are not compared with each other, and the air is described in the second stanza but never set against the world or the Earth.

Answer: B

On the key's reading, the mood of the speaker is joyous.

The poem is a string of delighted exclamations: 'wonderful' is repeated for the water, the grass, the air and the wind, and the Earth is a 'friendly' and 'beautifully drest' world. The speaker's tone is one of wonder and happiness throughout.

The last stanza turns inward, as the speaker trembles at the Earth's greatness and then says a prayer, so introspective is the nearest rival; but the question asks about the mood in all of the lines, and the wonder and delight run through every stanza. Nothing in the lines is sad, and serious does not fit the playful repetition.

Answer: D

The figure of speech in the first stanza is personification.

The stanza speaks to the world as a person: the water is 'around you curled', the grass lies 'upon your breast', and the world is 'beautifully drest'. A breast and clothes belong to a human being, so human qualities are given to a thing.

There is no like or as, so there is no simile. Synecdoche uses a part for the whole, and onomatopoeia uses words that imitate sounds; neither is found in these four lines.

Answer: C

On the key's reading, the figure of speech in 'and whirls the mills' is onomatopoeia.

The verb 'whirls' is taken to echo the sound and motion of turning, which is how the key reads it. The question is hard to settle, because the line is part of a stanza in which the wind 'walks on the water' and 'talks to itself', which is personification, and a reader may feel that the phrase quoted belongs with that. The words alone do not prove either reading, and the key's choice could not be confirmed from a reference source.

There is no like or as, so it is not a simile, and the phrase does not use a part for a whole, so it is not synecdoche.