Most people have heard of shakespeare and probably know something of the plays that he wrote. However, not everybody knows much about the life of this remarkable man. Except perhaps that he was born in the market town of stratforduponAvon and that he married a woman called Anne Hathaway,We know nothing of his school life.We do not know,for example,how long it lasted,but we presume  that he attended the local grammar school,where the principal subject taught was Latin.    Nothing certain is known of what he did between the time he left school and his departure  for London.According to a local legend,he was beaten and even put in prison for stealing rabbits and deer from the estate of neighbouring landowner, Sir Thomas Lucy, It is said that because of this he was forced to run away from his native place.A different legend says that he was apprenticed  to a Strstford butcher, but did not like the life and for this reason decided to leave Strstford.    Whatever caused him to leave the town of his birth, the world could be grateful that he did so.What is certain is that he set his foot on the road to fame when he arrived in London, It is said that at first he was without money or friends there, but that he earned a little by taking care of the horses of the gentleman who attended the plays at the theatre.They stopped and spoke to him.They found his conversations so brilliant  that finally he was invited to join their compeny. What is the reason why the world could be grateful? A) He wrote many world famous plays. B) He was an actor. C) He lived a hard life. D) He liked to travel all over the world.
A


In the 19th century, there used to be a model of how to be a good person. There are all these torrents of passion flowing through you. Your job, as captain of your soul, is to erect dams to keep these passions in check. Your job is to just say no to laziness, lust, greed, drug use and the other sins. These days that model is out of fashion. You usually can't change your behavior by simply resolving to do something. Knowing what to do is not the same as being able to do it. Your willpower is not like a dam that can block the torrent of self-indulgence. It's more like a muscle, which tires easily. Moreover, you're a social being. If everybody around you is overeating, you'll probably do so, too. The 19th-century character model was based on an understanding of free will. Today, we know that free will is bounded. People can change their lives, but ordering change is not simple because many things, even within ourselves, are beyond our direct control. Much of our behavior, for example, is guided by unconscious habits. Researchers at Duke University calculated that more than 40 percent of the actions we take are governed by habit, not actual decisions. Researchers have also come to understand the structure of habits--cue, routine, reward. You can change your own personal habits. If you leave running shorts on the floor at night, that'll be a cue to go running in the morning. Don't try to ignore your afternoon snack craving. Every time you feel the cue for a snack, insert another routine. Take a walk. Their research thus implies a different character model, which is supposed to manipulate the neuralnetworks inside. To be an effective person, under this model, you are supposed to coolly examine your own unconscious habits, and the habits of those under your care. You are supposed to devise strategies to alter the cues and routines. Every relationship becomes slightly manipulative, including your relationship with yourself. You're trying to arouse certain responses by implanting certain cues. This is a bit... Which of the following is the first-to-none element in the 19th-century character model? A) Action. B) Capacity. C) Resolution. D) Enthusiasm.
C


Q: Two new studies suggest that modern running shoes could increase the risk of injuries to runners. One study involved sixty-eight healthy young women and men who ran at least twenty-four kilometers a week. The runners were observed on a treadmill machine  . Sometimes they wore running shoes. Other times they ran barefoot  . Researchers from the JKM Technologies company in Virginia, the University of Virginia and the University of Colorado did the study. They found that running shoes create more stress that could damage knees, hips and ankle joints than running barefoot. They observed that the effect was even greater than the effect reported earlier for walking in high heels. The study appeared in the official scientific journal of The American Academy of Physical Medicine. The other study appeared in the journal Nature. It compared runners in the United States and Kenya. The researchers were from Harvard University in Massachusetts, Moi University in Kenya and the University of Glasgow in Scotland. They divided the runners into three groups. One group had always run shoeless. Another group had always run with shoes. And the third group had changed to shoeless running. Runners who wear shoes usually come down heel first. That puts great force on the back of the foot. But the study found that barefoot runners generally land on the front or middle of their foot. That way they ease into their landing and avoid striking their heel. Harvard's Daniel Lieberman led the study. He says the way most running shoes are designed may explain why those who wear them land on their heels. The heel of the shoe is bigger and heavier than other parts of the shoe, so it would seem more likely to come down first. Also, the heel generally has thick material under it to soften landings. But the researchers do not suggest that runners immediately start running barefoot. They say it takes some training. And there can be risks, like running when your feet are too cold to feel if you get injured. The study was partly supported by Vibram,... What's the main idea of the passage? A) Walking in high heels could cause less serious effects than running barefoot. B) Two new discoveries encourage people to run in high heels. C) Running in shoes is partly good to runners. D) Two new studies prove running without shoes is beneficial to runners in most cases.
A: D


Renaissance is a French word. It means "rebirth". It's a strange name for a period of history. What was exactly " reborn" during the Renaissance? To answer this question, we need to look back at the time of the Roman Empire. At this time Roman artists, scientists and writers influenced by Greek ideas were the world's most advanced. They had become skilled observers of the natural world around them, and had become experts in studying animals, plants, the human body or the stars and planets. They wrote down their ideas about what they saw, and based their theories about the world on their observations. During the fourth and fifth centuries the Roman Empire slowly broke down. Many of the Romans' art and sculptures were destroyed and some manuscripts were lost as well. But most importantly, some of the ancient attitudes were lost. A questioning approach to the world was replaced by an unquestioning one. Why did this happen? One reason was to do with the influence of the Christian Church. Through the thousand years following the fall of the Roman Empire, the Church controlled many aspects of life including education and learning. The Church ran all the universities and thought that the aim of a university should be to teach old ideas more clearly, not to introduce new ones. The scholars in the universities were expected to study God and heaven from the Bible and ancient books, rather than the world around them. Take medicine for example. The main textbook for doctors had been written by a Greek doctor called Galen more than a thousand years earlier. But when Roger Bacon, a thirteenth-century priest , said that a new approach to medicine was needed --- doctors should do their own original research instead of reading writers from the past such as Galen-the Church put him in prison. By the time of the fourteenth century, however, some parts of the Christian Church were becoming less strict about their ideas and there was a new state of mind among artists, doctors and scientist. People wanted to find out more about... Roger Bacon was put in prison because he  _  . A) gave up being a priest B) showed no respect for Galen C) did some research secretly D) challenged the Church

D