61] Reading & Writing (Egypt GCSE) 1997 Special Course

Read the following text and then answer the questions:

Most of the people who appear most often and most gloriously in the history books are great conquerors and generals, whereas the people who really helped civilisation forward are often never mentioned at all. We do not know who first set a broken leg or calculated the of the year, but we know all about the killers and destroyers. People think a great deal of them, so much that on all the highest pillars in the great cities of the world you will find the figure of a
conqueror. I think most people believe that the greatest countries are those that have beaten in battle the greatest number of other countries and ruled over them as conquerors. But they are not the most civilized. Animals fight; and savages also fight; hence to be good at fighting is to be good in the way in which an animal or a savage is good, but it is not to be civilized. Nations and countries should behave properly to each other; in a civilised way.

Suppose that we reckon the whole past of living creatures on the earth as one hundred years, then the whole past of man works out at about one month, and during that month there have been civilizations for between seven and eight hours. So you see there has been little time to learn in, but there will be oceans of time in which to learn better. Taking man's civilized past at about seven or eight hours, we may estimate his future, that is to say, the whole period between now and when the sun grows too cold to maintain life any longer on the earth, at about one hundredthousand years. Thus mankind is only at the beginning of its civilized life, and I do not expect much as the past of man has been a beastly business: fighting and bullying and hurting.

A) Answer the following questions: 

1. Why is man mistaken when he glorifies conquerors?

2. What is the significance of referring to the person who first set a broken leg or calculated the length of the year?

3. Why is the writer pessimistic at the end of his article? 4. Which point of view is the writer against, and which one does he support?

B) Choose the right answer from A, B, C or D:

5. On all the highest pillars in the great cities of the world, we find 

A) the figure of a civilised person

B) the figure of the same conqueror or general 

C) the figure of a conqueror or a general

D) a figure representing the number of conquerors in that country 

6. According to the writer's criterion, the greatest countries are those that......

A) build the highest pillars

B) conquer as many countries as possible

C) glorify conquerors 

D) develop civilisation

Writing:

6. Write an essay of not less than Twenty-five (25) lines on:

Billions of dollars go into space exploration projects yearly. Some peopl feel that this money should be used to solve problems on Earth. Discuss reasons supporting both views. State and support your point of view.