Passage 1

Since the Second World War, there has been an obvious trend, especially among the growing group of college students, toward early marriage. Many youths begin dating in the first stages of adolescence, "go steady" through high school, and marry before their formal education has been completed. In some quarters, there is much shaking of graying heads over the ways of rebellious youth. However, emotional maturity does not grow with age; it does not arrive automatically at twenty-one or twenty-five. Some achieve it surprisingly early, while others never do, even in three-score years and ten.

 Many students are marrying as an escape, not only from an unsatisfying home life, but also from their own personal problems of isolation and loneliness. However, any marriage entered into as an escape cannot prove entirely successful. The sad fact is that marriage seldom solves one's problems; more often, it merely worsens them. Furthermore, it is doubtful whether the home is capable of carrying all that the young are seeking to put into it; one might say that they are abandoning one idol only to worship another. Young people correctly understand that their parents are wrong in believing that success is the ultimate good, but they themselves are wrong in believing that they have found the of life's meaning. Their expectations of marriage are essentially unrealistic and therefore incapable of fulfillment. They want too much, and tragic disillusionment is often bound to follow.

 Shall we, then, join the chorus of those against early marriages? One cannot generalize: all ages are not bad any more than all later ones are good. Satisfactory marriages are determined not by how old one is, but by the emotional maturity of the partners. Therefore, each case must be judged on its own merits. If the early marriage is not an escape, if it is entered into with relatively few illusions or false expectations, and if it is economically feasible, why not? Good marriages can be made from sixteen to sixty and so can bad ones.

The phrase" go steady"(Para. 1) can be replaced by( )

(63)And speaking of freedom is not the author free, as few men are free? Is he not secure, as few men are secure?The tools of his industry are so common and so cheap that they have almost ceased to have commercial value. He needs no bulky pile of raw material, no elaborate apparatus, no service of men or animals. (64)He is dependent for his occupation upon no one but himself, and nothing outside him that matters.He is the sovereign of an empire, self-supporting, self-containeD。 No one can sequestrate his estates. (65)No one can deprive him of his stock in trade; no one can force him to exercise his faculty against his will; no one can prevent him exercising it as he chooses.The pen is the great liberator of men and nations. No chains can bind, no poverty can choke, no tariff can restrict the free play of his mind, and even the Times Book Club can only exert a moderately depressing influence upon his rewards. (66)Whether his work is good or bad, so long as he does his best he is happy.I often fortify myself amid the uncertainties and vexations of political life by believing that possess a line of retreat into a peaceful and fertile country where no rascal can and where one need never be dull or idle or ever wholly without power. (67)It is then, indeed, that I feel devoutly thankful to have been born fond of writing.It is then, indeed, that I feel grateful to all the brave and generous spirits who, in every age and in every land, have fought to establish the now unquestioned freedom of the pen.

For what reason is this capability for acquiring language remarkable?

Passage 4

Children display an amazing ability to become fluent speakers of any language consistently spoken around them. Every normal child who is not brought up in virtual isolation from language use soon comes to speak one or more languages natively.

 The child's acquisition of his or her native language is not dependent on any special tutoring. Parents may spend many hours "reinforcing every recognizable bit of their child's verbal activity with smile or some other reward. But there is no particular reason to believe that such activity affects the child's ultimate success in becoming a native speaker of his parents' language. Children can pick up a language by playing with other children who happen to speak it just as well as they can through the concentrated efforts of doting parents. All they seem to need is sufficient exposure to the language in question.

  This capacity for acquiring language is remarkable for number of reasons. It is remarkable firstly because of its uniformity throughout the human race. There simply are no cases of normal children who, when they are given the chances, fail to acquire native language. By way of comparison, it is not at all unusual for a child to fail to master arithmetic, reading, swimming, or gymnast a considerable amount of instruction. Language acquisition, in other words, is "inherently, It is also species specific

 Every normal person learns a human language but no other animals, not even the most intelligent apes, has been shown to be capable of making the slightest progress in this direction, although some animals can learn to solve problems, use tools, and so on. Language acquisition thus appears to be kind from acquisition of the other skills mentioned

 The progress is further remarkable for its comparative speed and perfection. When we actually attempt to take a language apart to see how it works, we find it is extraordinarily complex and it involves highly abstract organizational principles. Yet, within the first few years of his life, every child has succeeded in mastering at least one such system. Furthermore, the linguistic system that the child masters is identical to the one employed by the people around him or her. If a child is regularly exposed to two languages, he will very probably learn both. Moreover, they will succeed in keeping the two linguistic systems separate, which is a considerable achievement.

According to the passage, what is the children's amazing ability in learning any language? How do they acquire their native language?

(sincerity) She wasn't entirely( ) when she said she liked me.

meaningful meaningless consistent  publish truthful appreciate

embarrass figurative symbolically recover relevant loss

 What Bible reading I did was (51)( ) and superficial. Yet, if I had been asked, "What is the most important book ever (52) ( ) "I would say, "The Bible. "Nevertheless, I did not give it much attention.As a freshman in college, I took a course studying the Bible as literature. But rather than this experience leading me to a greater(53)( ) of the Bible, it convinced me the Bible was irrelevant. I remember wanting the Bible to really mean something to me and being disappointed that it did not. I did not talk about this disappointment; I guess I was ashamed or (54)( ) that this book so many said was great seemed irrelevant and out of date to me.so, placed it on the shelf, both literally and(55)( ) along with other souvenirs from the past. And it was not just the Bible that seemed irrelevant and meaningless to me, it was also church liturgy and church talk. And, of course, in the confidence of my youth I was sure that if I could not understand it, the Bible and church jargon must be just so much rubbish.

 I had grown up assuming life was(56)( )and assuming the Bible and the church would provide me with the key to discovering that meaning. So, when I viewed both the Bible and the language of the church as more or less meaningless I was on the edge of viewing life and my own life as more or less(57)( ) My viewing the Bible and the language of the church as (58)( )

 to contemporary life was a significant factor but not the only one)contributing to a crisis of faith and significant depression that described as the(59)( )of hope.

 My greatest motivation for going to seminary was the hope of finding hope. And just as there were more factors involved in my becoming depressed than my problems with the Bible, so there were more factors involved in my recovering hope than my (60)( ) of the Bible and meaning in church language. But these were significant factors.

(relax) The PC and TV will remain two different experiences: one you interact with and sit close to; the other you turn to for

(horrify) We were( )by what we saw.

(fortunate) I was( ) enough to lose my keys.

(occupy) She has many( )including gardening and wine-making.

(commerce) ( )television has mixed entertainment and advertising.