There are two major parties in Britain today,the Conservative Party and the Labour Party,which have been in power by turns since 1945.The two—party system of Britain was formed in the course of the development of the capitalist state and the political parties.In order to strengthen the state machine,the British bourgeosie have let it come into being and exist in one form or another form since the 17th century.P.S.Tregidgo once said:“The more parties there are,the less likely it is that any one of them will be strong enough in Parliament to outvote all the others;but when there are only two,one of them is sure to have a majority o f seats.This helps to ensure a strong and stable government.”This may be the reason why the British have the two party system.The division into two parties grew out the establishment of a Protestant Church of England in the 16th century.Because of a purely religious difference of opinion,the Puritans were separated from the broad body of the Anglican Church.The non Puritan Anglicans were on the side of the King and Church,and their supporters were called by their opponents “Tories.”The Puritans were for Parliament and trade,and their supporters were called by the “Tories”“Whigs”.The Tories and the Whigs were in power a long time.In 1833,the Tory party split into two and its name was changed to Conservative.In the 1860s the Whigs became Liberals.From that time on,the Liberals and the Conservatives were in office by turns until 1922.The policies they put into effect were sometimes different,but they were both controlled by the rich.The working class became more and more unwilling to follow the Conservatives and the Liberals.They wanted to have their own party.So the Labour party was formed by the trade unions.After 1922 the Labour Party gradually replaced the Liberal Party to become one of the two major parties in Great Britain.1.What does “it” stand for in the third line?A)The two party system. B)The state machine.C)The Partiament. D)The capitalist state.2.We can learn from what P.S Tregidgo once said that ____.A)if there are parties in Britain,none of them will be strong enough to have con trol in the governmentB)the more patients there are,the more likely it is that they will have the deci sive say in the governmentC)the two party system contributes to the establishment of a powerful and long lasting governmentD)if there are only two parties in Britain,it will be easy for the government to control them3.What can we infer from the forming of the Tory Party and the Whig Party?A)These two parties originally believed in different religions.B)These two parties were established under the influence of different religious believes.C)The British King and the Parliament supported different religions becaused they were for the two party system.D)The British King and the Parliament were supported by different parties for political reasons.4.According to the passage,why was the Labour Party established in Britain?A)Because the trade unions did not do much good for the working people.B)Because the Liberal Party were not strong enough to defeat the Conservative Party.C)Because the working people would not like to be members outside the Liberal Party.D)Because neither of the two major parties was the parties for the working people.5.Which of the following is true concerning the Tory Party or the Whig Party?A)The Whig Party no longer exists in Britain.B)The Tory Party has kept its unity until the present day.C)The Whig Party has taken the place of the Liberal Party.D)The Tory Party has taken the place of the Conservative Party.答案与解析：1.A 本题要求读者指出第3行的“it”指代什么。

A为两党制，B为国家机器，C 为议会，D 为资本主义政府，从原文可知，资产阶级是为了强化国家机器，而让两党制形成并存在的。

故答案为A。

2.C 本题要求读者指出从P.S.特莱吉欧说的话中可得知什么。

A意思是：如果英国有政党的话，哪个党也不能控制政府。

B意思是：政党越多，他们就越有可能在政府中有决定性的发言权。

C意思是：两党制有利于建立一个有力的持久的政府。

D意思是：如果英国只有两个政党，政府会很容易控制他们。

从原文可知，A，B，D都不符合原文，故正确答案为C。

3.B 本题要求读者指出从托利党和辉格党的形成可得出什么推论。

A意思是：这两个党原来属于不同的宗教信仰。

B意思是：这两个党是受不同的宗教信仰影响而建立起来的。

C意思是：英国的国王和议会支持不同的宗教因为他们拥护两党制。

D意思是：英国的国王和议会由于政治上的原因受不同的党派的支持。

从原文可知，由于继宗教上的原因，英国国教分化为清教徒和非清教徒，这两支后来发展为辉格党和托利党。

所以正确答案为B。

4.D 本题要求读者指出英国工党是为什么建立的。

A意思是：因为工会没有为工人阶级谋多少利益。

B意思是：因为自由党对抗不过保守党。

C意思是：因为工人阶级不想成为自由党外的成员。

D意思是：因为当时的两大政党都不代表工人阶级利益。

从原文可知，工党的建立起因是工人阶级不愿受自由党和保守党的控制，且这两大党都是富人的党。

所以正确答案为D。

5.A 本题要求读者指出关于托利党和辉格党的正确叙述。

A意思是：在英国辉格党已经不存在了。

B意思是：直到今天托利党还保持着完整统一。

C意思是：辉格党取代了自由党。

D 意思是：托利党取代了保守党。

从原文可知，辉格党发展成后来的自由党，自由党又为工党取代。

所以正确答案为A。

CET-6Directions: In this part, you will have 15 minutes to go over the pas sage quickly and answer the questions on Answer sheet 1. For question s 1-4, markY (for YES) if the statement agrees with the information given in the passage;N (for NO) if the statement contradicts the information given in the passage;NG (for NOT GIVEN) if the information is not given in the passage.For questions 5-10, complete the sentences with the information given in the passage.April Fools’ Special: History’s HoaxesHappy April Fools’ Day. To mark the occasion, National Geographic Ne ws has compiled a list of some of the more memorable hoaxes in recent history. They are the lies, darned(可恨的) lies, and whoppers(弥天大谎)that have been perpetrated on the gullible(易受骗的)and unsuspecting to fulfill that age-old desire held by some to put the joke on others.Internet HoaxesThe Internet has given birth to a proliferation(增殖)of hoaxes. E-mail inboxes are bombarded on an almost daily basis with messages warning of terrible computer viruses that cause users to delete benign(良性)chunks of data from their hard drives, or of credit card scams that entice the naive to give all their personal information, including passwords and bank account details, to identity thieves. Other e-mails give rise to wry(歪曲的)chuckles, which is where this list begins.Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide(一氧化二氢)City officials in Aliso Viejo, California, were so concerned about the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide that they scheduled a vote last month on whether to ban foam(泡沫)cups from city-sponsored events after they learned the chemical was used in foam-cup production.Officials called off the vote after learning that dihydrogen monoxide is the scientific term for water."It’s embarrassing," city manager David J. Norman told the Associated Press. "We had a paralegal(律师助手)who did bad research."Indeed, the paralegal had fallen victim to an official-looking Website touting the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide. An e-mail originally authored in 1990 by Eric Lechner, then a graduate student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, claimed that dihydrogen monoxide "is used as an industrial solvent and coolant, and is used in the production of Styrofoam(聚苯乙烯泡沫塑料)."Other dangers pranksters(爱开玩笑的人)associated with the chemical included accelerated corrosion and rusting, severe burns, and death from inhalation.Versions of the e-mail continue to circulate today, and several Web sites, including that of the Coalition to Ban DHMO, warn, tongue-in-cheek, of water’s dangers.Alabama Changes Value of PiThe April 1998 newsletter put out by New Mexicans for science and Rea son contains an article titled "Alabama Legislature Lays Siege to Pi" . It was penned by April Holiday of the Associmated Press (sic) and t old the story of how the Alabama state legislature voted to change th e value of the mathematical constant Pi from 3.14159 to the round num ber of 3.The ersatz(假的)news story was written by Los Alamos National Laboratory physicist Mark Boslough to parody(滑稽地模仿)legislative and school board attacks on the teaching of evolution in New Mexico.At Boslough’s suggestion, Dave Thomas, the president of New Mexicans for science and Reason, posted the article in its entirety to the In ternet newsgroup Talk. Origins on April 1. (The newsgroup hosts a liv ely debate on creation vs. evolution.) Later that evening Thomas post ed a full confession to the hoax. He thought he had put all rumors to bed.But to Thomas’s surprise, however, several newsgroup readers forward ed the article to friends and posted it on other newsgroups.When Thomas checked in on the story a few weeks later, he was surpris ed to learn that it had spread like wildfire. The telltale signs of t he article’s satirical intent, such as the April 1 date and misspell ed "Associmated Press" dateline, had been replaced or deleted.Alabama legislators were bombarded with calls protesting the law. The legislators explained that the news was a hoax. There was not and ne ver had been such a law.TV and Newspaper HoaxesBefore the advent of the Internet, and even today, traditional media outlets such as newspapers, radio, and television, have sometimes hoa xed their audiences. The deceptions run the gamut from purported natu ral disasters to wishful news.Swiss Spaghetti (意大利式细面条) HarvestAlex Boese, curator of the Museum of Hoaxes, a regularly updated Web site that also appeared in book form in November 2002, said one of hi s favorite hoaxes remains one perpetrated by the British Broadcasting Company.On April 1, 1957, the BBC aired a report on the television news show Panorama about the bumper spaghetti harvest in southern Switzerland.Viewers watched Swiss farmers pull pasta off spaghetti trees as the s how’s anchor, Richard Dimbleby, attributed the bountiful harvest to the mild winter and the disappearance of the spaghetti weevil.The broadcaster detailed the ins and outs of the life of the spaghetti farmer and anticipated questions about how spaghetti grows on trees . Thousands of people believed the report and called the BBC to inqui re about growing their own spaghetti trees, to which the BBC replied, "Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.""It was a great satirical effect about British society," Boese said. "British society really was like that at that time. The British havea tendency to be a bit insulated(绝缘的) and do not know that much about the rest of Europe."Taco Liberty BellOn April 1, 1996, readers in five major U.S. cities opened their news papers to learn from a full page announcement that the Taco Bell Corp oration had purchased the Liberty Bell from the U.S. government. The announcement reported that the company was relocating the historic bell from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Irvine, California. The move, the corporation said in the advertisement, was part of an "effort to help the national debt".Hundreds of other newspapers and television shows ran stories related to the press release on the matter put out by Taco Bell’s public re lations firm, PainePR. Outraged citizens called the Liberty Bell Nati onal Historic Park in Philadelphia to express their disgust. A few ho urs later the public relations firm released another press announceme nt stating that the stunt was a hoax.White House press secretary Mike McCurry got into the act when he rem arked that the government would also be "selling the Lincoln Memorial to Ford Motor Company and renaming it the Lincoln-Mercury Memorial".Crop CirclesStrange, circular formations began to appear in the fields of southern England in the mid-1970s, bringing busloads of curious onlookers, media representatives, and believers in the paranormal out to the countryside for a look.A sometimes vitriolic(讽刺的)debate on their origins has since ensued(跟着发生), and the curious formations have spread around the world, becoming more and more elaborate as the years go by.Some people consider the crop formations to be the greatest works of modern art to emerge from the 20th century, while others are convince d they are signs of extraterrestrial communications or landing sites of UFOs.The debate rages even today, although in 1991 Doug Bower and Dave Cho rley, two elderly men from Wiltshire County, came forward and claimed responsibility for the crop circles that appeared there over the pre ceding 20 years. The pair made the circles by pushing down nearly rip e crops with a wooden plank suspended from a rope.Moon Landing—a Hoax?Ever since NASA sent astronauts to the moon between 1969 and 1972, sk eptics have questioned whether the Apollo missions were real or simpl y a ploy to one-up(领先)the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The debate resurfaced and re ached crescendo levels in February 2001, when For television aired a program called Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon?Guests on the show argued that NASA did not have the technology to la nd on the moon. Anxious to win the space race, NASA acted out the Apo llo program in movie studios, they said. The conspiracy theorists poi nted out that the pictures transmitted from the moon do not include s tars and that the flag the Americans planted on the moon is waving, e ven though there is though to be no breeze on the moon.NASA quickly refuted these claims in a series of press releases, stat ing that any photographer would know it is difficult to capture somet hing very bright and very dim on the same piece of film. Since the ph otographers wanted to capture the astronauts striding across the luna r surface in their sunlit space suits, the background stars were too faint to see.As for the flag, NASA said that the astronauts were turning it back and forth to get in firmly planted in the lunar soil, which made it wa ve.1. Some people have the age-old desire to put the joke on others.2. According to the passage, the only form of Internet hoaxes is e-ma il hoax.3. Dihydrogen monoxide is a very dangerous chemical, which is often u sed as an industrial solvent.4. Dihydrogen monoxide can accelerate corrosion and rusting, and cause sever burns and even death from inhalation.5. The reason why the ersatz news that Alabama changed the value of Pi spread wildly was that ________ forwarded the article to friends an d posted it on other newsgroups.6. Traditional media outlets such as ________ may still hoax their au diences nowadays.7. According to Boese, many people believed the report of Swiss spagh etti harvest because the British did not know ________.8. According to a hoax announcement, the Taco Bell Corporation bough the Liberty Bell and moved it to Irvine to help ________.9. The crop circles were thought to be the greatest works of modern a rt, the signs of ________ or landing sites of UFOs.10. Some people thought that NASA acted out the Apollo program in mov ie studios partially because the pictures transmitted from the moon d o not include ________.1. Y 根据题干中的信息词age-old desire定位到原文第一段，可知美国围家地理新闻整理了近期历史上让人印象深刻的恶作剧，这些谎言欺骗的是那些易受骗的、轻易信任他人的人，用以满足有些人想要捉弄他人的想法，故该句表述正确。