Part B: Information Matching (2012)

“Universal history, the history of what man has accomplished in this world, is at bottom the History of the Great Men who have worked here,” wrote the Victorian sage Thomas Carlyle. Well, not any more it is not.

Suddenly, Britain looks to have fallen out with its favourite historical form. This could be no more than a passing literary craze, but it also points to a broader truth about how we now approach the past: less concerned with learning from our forefathers and more interested in feeling their pain. Today, we want empathy, not inspiration.

41 & 42

From the earliest days of the Renaissance, the writing of history meant recounting the exemplary lives of great men. In 1337, Petrarch began work on his rambling writing De Viris Illustribus-On Famous Men, highlighting the virtus (or virtue) of classical heroes. Petrarch celebrated their greatness in conquering fortune and rising to the top. This was the biographical tradition which Niccolò Machiavelli turned on its head. In The Prince, he championed cunning, ruthlessness, and boldness, rather than virtue, mercy and justice, as the skills of successful leaders.

Over time, the attributes of greatness shifted. The Romantics commemorated the leading painters and authors of their day, stressing the uniqueness of the artist’s personal experience rather than public glory. By contrast, the Victorian author Samuel Smiles wrote Self-Help as a catalogue of the worthy lives of engineers, industrialists and explorers. “The valuable examples which they furnish of the power of self-help, of patient purpose, resolute working, and steadfast integrity, issuing in the formation of truly noble and manly character, exhibit,” wrote Smiles, “what it is in the power of each to accomplish for himself.” His biographies of James Watt, Richard Arkwright and Josiah Wedgwood were held up as beacons to guide the working man through his difficult life.

This was all a bit bourgeois for Thomas Carlyle, who focused his biographies on the truly heroic lives of Martin Luther, Oliver Cromwell and Napoleon Bonaparte. These epochal figures represented lives hard to imitate, but to be acknowledged as possessing higher authority than mere mortals.

Not everyone was convinced by such bombast. “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles,” wrote Marx and Engels in The Communist Manifesto. For them, history did nothing, it possessed no immense wealth nor waged battles: “It is man, real, living man who does all that.” And history should be the story of the masses and their record of struggle. As such, it needed to appreciate the economic realities, the social contexts and power relations in which each epoch stood. For: “Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly found, given and transmitted from the past.”

This was the tradition which revolutionized our appreciation of the past. In place of Thomas Carlyle, Britain nurtured Christopher Hill, EP Thompson and Eric Hobsbawm. History from below stood alongside biographies of great men. Whole new realms of understanding-from gender to race to cultural studies- were opened up as scholars unpicked the multiplicity of lost societies. And it transformed public history too: downstairs became just as fascinating as upstairs.

Matching Questions

41. Petrarch

42. Niccolò Machiavelli

43. Samuel Smiles

44. Thomas Carlyle

45. Marx and Engels

[A]emphasized the virtue of classical heroes.

[B]highlighted the public glory of the leading artists.

[C]focused on epochal figures whose lives were hard to imitate.

[D]opened up new realms of understanding the great men in history.

[E]held that history should be the story of the masses and their record of struggle.

[F]dismissed virtue as unnecessary for successful leaders.

[G]depicted the worthy lives of engineers, industrialists and explorers.

答案解析 (Answers & Explanations)

41. Petrarch 对应 [A]
【解析】定位第3段。文中指出 Petrarch 的著作是“highlighting the virtus (or virtue) of classical heroes（突出古典英雄的美德）”。选项 [A] 中的 “emphasized（强调）” 完美同义替换了 “highlighting”，后半句内容完全一致。

42. Niccolò Machiavelli 对应 [F]
【解析】定位第3段后半部分。文中指出 Machiavelli 彻底颠覆了传统，他在《君主论》中“championed cunning... rather than virtue... as the skills of successful leaders（拥护狡猾……而不是美德……作为成功领导者的技能）”。选项 [F] “认为美德对于成功的领导者是不必要的（dismissed virtue as unnecessary）”正是对其观点的准确概括。

43. Samuel Smiles 对应 [G]
【解析】定位第4段。文中指出 Samuel Smiles 创作了《自助》一书，作为“a catalogue of the worthy lives of engineers, industrialists and explorers（工程师、实业家和探险家有价值的生活目录）”。选项 [G] 的后半句字面完全一致，“depicted（描绘）”同义替换了写书记录的行为。

44. Thomas Carlyle 对应 [C]
【解析】定位第5段。文中明确指出 Thomas Carlyle 聚焦于马丁·路德、拿破仑等人的英雄生活：“These epochal figures represented lives hard to imitate（这些划时代的人物代表了难以模仿的生活）”。这与选项 [C] “聚焦于那些生活难以模仿的划时代人物”完全吻合。

45. Marx and Engels 对应 [E]
【解析】定位第6段。文中提到 Marx and Engels 在《共产党宣言》中的观点：“And history should be the story of the masses and their record of struggle（并且历史应该是大众的故事和他们斗争的记录）”。这与选项 [E] 在字面表达上完全一致。

【干扰项排除】
[B] 强调了领先艺术家的公共荣誉：第4段讲到浪漫主义者时说他们强调个人经验“rather than public glory（而不是公共荣誉）”，这属于反向干扰。
[D] 开辟了理解历史伟人的新领域：最后一段确实提到了“Whole new realms of understanding... were opened up”，但这是 Christopher Hill 等学者的贡献，且他们研究的是大众史（History from below）而非伟人（great men）。