Question

Do you want to live with a strong sense of peacefulness, happiness, goodness, and self-respect? The collection of happiness actions broadly categorized as “honor” help you create this life of good feelings.

Here is an example to show how honorable actions create happiness.

Say a store clerk fails to charge us for an item. If we keep silent, and profit from the clerk’s mistake, we would drive home with a sense of mean excitement. Later we might tell our family of friends about our good fortune. On the other hand, if we tell the clerk about the uncharged item, the clerk would be grateful and thank us for our honesty. We would leave the store with a quiet sense of honor that we might never share with another soul.

Then, what is it to do with our sense of happiness?

In the first case, where we don’t tell the clerk, a couple of things would happen. Deep down inside we would know ourselves as a type of thief. In the process, we would lose some peace of mind and self-respect. We would also demonstrate that we cannot be trusted, since we advertise our dishonor by telling our family and friends. We damage our own reputations by telling others. In contrast, bringing the error to the clerk’s attention causes different things to happen. Immediately the clerk knows us to be honorable. Upon leaving the store, we feel honorable and our self-respect is increased. Whenever we take honorable action we gain the deep internal rewards of goodness and a sense of nobility.

There is a beautiful positive cycle that is created by living a life of honorable actions. Honorable thoughts lead to honorable actions. Honorable actions lead us to a happier existence. And it’s easy to think and act honorably again when we’re happy. While the positive cycle can be difficult to start, once it’s started ,it’s easy to continue. Keeping on doing good deeds brings us peace of mind, which is important for our happiness.

1.According to the passage, the positive action in the example contributes to our ______.

A．self-respect                           B．financial rewards

C．advertising ability                       D．friendly relationship

2.The author thinks that keeping silent about the uncharged item is equal to ______.

A．lying             B．stealing           C．cheating          D．advertising

3.The underlined phrase “bringing the error to the clerk’s attention” means ______.

A．telling the truth to the clerk

B．offering advice to the clerk

C．asking the clerk to be more attentive

D．reminding the clerk of the charged item

4.How will we feel if we let the clerk know her mistake?

A．We’ll be very excited.

B．We’ll feel unfortunate.

C．We’ll have a sense of honor.

D．We’ll feel sorry for the clerk.

5.Which of the following can be the best title of this passage?

A．How to Live Truthfully

B．Importance of Peacefulness

C．Ways of Gaining Self-respect

D．Happiness through Honorable Actions

Answer

1.A

2.B

3.A

4.C

5.D

【解析】

试题分析：本文是篇议论文，文章指出过高尚的生活，造就美好的正循环生活。高尚思想造就高尚行为，高尚行为造就幸福的存在。有了幸福感，再次思想高尚，行为得体就很容易。尽管正循环开始难，而一旦开始了，就容易持续下去。不断做好事给我们以心灵的宁静，这对幸福非常重要。

1.细节题，根据文章例子中所讲的positive action 有助于什么？答案可在第1段和第2段中找到，positive actions=文中提到的honorable actions，BCD所提及的内容均未在第1，2段中出现，排除法，只有A，而self-respect确实在第一段的第一句话就提到过，故选A。

2.细节题，作者认为对没有收费的东西，保持沉默不告诉收银员相当于…?第5段开始的部分就围绕这一点展开论述，用了 deep down inside we would know ourselves as a type of thief. ，故选B。

3.词汇语义题，这种题目20题中也就会出现1-2题，考查语境下来的单词，短语或句子的理解。在第5段中，用了对比法，先讲如果不告诉收银员意味着什么，如果告诉收银员意味着什么，中间用了in contrast 来连接，形成对比，bring…to…，也就是答案A telling the truth to the clerk’s attention。故选A。

4.细节题，还是对第5段的内容进行提问，如果告诉收银员，我们会有什么感觉，倒数第2句话说到 we feel honorable and our respect is increased.故选C。

5.主旨题，问文章的标题应该是哪个，也就是问文章主题，happiness和honorable 是文章中出现频率比较高的词，也就是标题happiness through honorable，故选D。

考点：议论文阅读理解。