Dear Readers,
Welcome to Online English Section in letsstudytogether.co . Here we are providing a set of English Quiz for SBI PO 2017 on Reading Comprehension.
Q.Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words are given in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.
What do we mean by fear? Fear of what? There are various types of fear and we need not analyse every type. But we can see that fear comes into being when our comprehension of Relationship is not complete. Relationship is not only between people but between ourselves and nature, between ourselves and property, between ourselves and ideas; as long as that relationship is not fully understood, there must be fear. Life is relationship. To be is to be related and without relationship there is no life. Nothing can exist in isolation; so long as the mind is seeking isolation, there must be fear. Fear is not an abstraction; it exists only in relation to something.
The question is, how to be rid of fear? First of all, anything that is overcome has to be conquered again and again. No problem can be finally overcome, conquered; it can be understood but not conquered. They are two completely different processes and the conquering process leads to further confusion, further fear. To resist, to dominate, to do battle with a problem or to build a defence against it is only to create further conflict, whereas if we can understand fear, go into it fully step by step, explore the whole content of it, then fear will never return in any form.
As I said, fear is not an abstraction; it exists only in relationship. What do we mean by fear? Ultimately we are afraid, are we not, of not being, of not becoming. Now, when there is fear of not being, of not advancing, or fear of the unknown, of death, can that fear be overcome by determination, by a conclusion, by any choice? Obviously not. Mere suppression, sublimation, or substitution, creates further resistance, does it not? Therefore fear can never by overcome through any form of discipline, through any form of resistance. That fact must be clearly seen, felt and experienced: fear cannot be overcome through any form of defence or resistance nor can there be freedom from fear through the search for an answer or through mere intellectual or verbal explanation.
Now what are we afraid of? Are we afraid of a fact or of an idea about the fact? Are we afraid of the thing as it is, or are we afraid of what we think it is? Take death, for example. Are we afraid of the fact of death or of the idea of death? The fact is one thing and the idea about the fact is another. Am I afraid of the word ‘death’ or of the fact itself? Because I am afraid of the word, of the idea, I never understand the fact, I never look at the fact, I am never in direct relation with the fact. It is only when I am in complete communion with the fact that there is no fear. If I am not in communion with the fact, then there is fear, and there is no communion with the fact so long as I have an idea, an opinion, a theory, about the fact, so I have to be very clear whether I am afraid of the word, the idea or of the fact. If I am face to face with the fact, there is nothing to understand about it: the fact is there, and I can deal with it. If I am afraid of the word, then I must understand the word, go into the whole process of what the word, the term, implies. For example, one is afraid of loneliness, afraid of the ache, the pain of loneliness. Surely that fear exists because one has never really looked at loneliness; one has never been in complete communion with it. The moment one is completely open to the fact of loneliness one can understand what it is, but one has an idea, an opinion about it, based on previous knowledge; it is this idea, opinion, this previous knowledge about the fact that creates fear. Fear is obviously the outcome of naming, of terming, of projecting a symbol to represent the fact; that is fear is not independent of the word, of the term.
I have a reaction, say, to loneliness; that is I say I am afraid of being nothing. Am I afraid of the fact itself or is that fear awakened because I have previous knowledge of the fact, knowledge being the word, the symbol, the image? How can there be fear of a fact? When I am face to face with a fact, in direct communion with it, I can look at it, observe it; therefore there is no fear of the fact. What causes fear is my apprehension about the fact, what the fact might be or do. It is my opinion, my idea, my experience, my knowledge about the fact that creates fear. So long as there is verbalization of the fact, giving the fact a name and therefore identifying or condemning it, so long as thought is judging the fact as an observer, there must be fear. Thought is the product of the past, it can only exist through verbalization, through symbols, through images; so long as thought is regarding or translating the fact, there must be fear. Thus it is the mind that creates fear, the mind being the process of thinking. Thinking is verbalization. You cannot think without words, without symbols, images; these images, which are the prejudices, the previous knowledge, the apprehensions of the mind, are projected upon the fact, and out of that there arises fear. There is freedom from fear only when the mind is capable of looking at the fact without translating it, without giving it a name, a label. This is quite difficult, because the feelings, the reactions, the anxieties that we have, are promptly identified by the mind and given a word. The feeling of jealousy is identfied by that word. Is it possible not to identify a feeling, to look at that feeling without naming it? It is the naming of the feeling that gives it continuity, that gives it strength. The moment you give a name to that which you call fear, you strengthen it; but if you can look at that feeling without terming it, you will see that it withers away. Therefore if one would be completely free of fear it is essential to understand this whole process of terming, of projecting symbols, images, giving names to facts.
1.Which statement best expresses the meaning of fear as explained in the passage?
A. Fear is experienced because we do not form and understand relationships.
B. Fear occurs in the mind and needs to be confronted.
C. Fear is caused when we engage more closely with ideas about a fact, than with trying to understand the fact.
D. Fear is an act of suppression of understanding of facts.
E. None of the above
2.Human beings are victims of ………….. because of which they experience fear. (Choose an option to fill the blank)
A. Conditioning
B. Deconditioning
C. Suppression
D. Isolation
E. Intelligibility
3.We can eradicate fear if we do any one of the following:
A. Verbalize and think about the fact that causes fear
B. Look at the fact that causes fear and experience it fully
C. Withhold judgements about a fact or situation while experiencing it
D. All of the above
E. None of the above
4.Which set of key words, when put to practice will help us overcome fear?
A. Minimise: suppression, sublimation, substitution
B. Avoid: naming, terming, projecting facts
C. Build: relationships, understanding, judgement of facts
D. Engage in: communion, experiencing facts, withholding judgement
E. None of the above
5.Which of the following can be concluded from the passage?
A. As long as there is any relationship, there must be fear of losing it.
B. As long as our thoughts can identify and judge a fact as an observer, there would be no fear.
C. Previous knowledge about a fact hinders dealing with the fact when it arrives.
D. Fear can be best diminished by 矃ghting it and building a defence against it.
E. None of the above
6.Which of the following can be concluded from the passage?
A. If one is in complete communion with a fact, there is little chance of fear.
B. Ideas of a fact aid us in making a communion with the fact.
C. Fear is a feeling that is independent of the tag or the symbol representing the fact.
D. All of the above
E. None of the above
7.Which of the following can be concluded from the passage?
A. Fear can be overcome by conquering it once and for all.
B. Fear of unknown can be overcome by determined resistance.
C. Freedom of fear can be achieved by a simple intellectual explanation of the phenomenon
D. All of the above
E. None of the above
8.Choose the word which is the MOST SIMILAR in meaning as the word given in bold as used in the passage-Conquered
A. liberate
B. extricate
C. disencumber
D. emancipate
E. vanquish
9.Select the word which is the MOST SIMILAR in meaning of the word printed in bold as used in the passage.– Sublimation
A. plebeian
B. proletarian
C. utter
D. obscure
E. inferior
10.Select the word which is the MOST OPPOSITE in meaning of the word printed in bold as used in the passage.– Apprehensions
A. credence
B. trepidation
C. dread
D. cognizance
E. angst
Correct Answer:
1. D
Refer the fourth paragraph of the passage which best expresses the meaning of fear through the concepts of “ideas’ and ‘facts’.
2.D
Refer the second-last sentence of the first paragraph, “Nothing can exist in isolation; so long as the mind is seeking isolation, there must be fear. Fear is not an abstraction; it exists only in relation to something”. Hence option (d) is the correct choice.
3.B
Refer the last sentence of the second paragraph, “To resist, to dominate, to do battle with a problem or to build a defence against it is only to create further conflict, whereas if we can understand fear, go into it fully step by step, explore the whole content of it, then fear will never return in any form”. Hence option (b) is the correct choice.
4.D
Engage in: communion, experiencing facts, withholding judgement is the one which will help us when put to practice overcome fear. Hence option (d) is the correct choice.
5.C
Refer the fifth paragraph, “The moment one is completely open to the fact of loneliness one an understand what it is, but one has an idea, an opinion about it, based on previous knowledge; it is this idea, opinion, this previous knowledge about the fact that creates fear”.
6.A
Stated directly in the fourth paragraph
7.E
None of the given options is correct
8.E
Conquered means successfully overcome (a problem or weakness) and vanquish means defeat Thoroughly
9.C
Sublimation means (of a person’s attitude or behaviour) extreme or unparalleled and utter means complete; absolute
10.A
Apprehensions means anxiety or fear that something bad or unpleasant will happen and credence means belief in or acceptance of something as true and something good.
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