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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What examples does Burke use to argue that some sights are pleasurable to all people?
(a) Objects or ideas that he argues are morally repugnant.
(b) Objects he opines are among the ugliest animal species.
(c) Objects he says can only be found in country estates.
(d) Objects he and others he knows think are beautiful.

2. Why, according to Burke, do we delight in the tragedies of others?
(a) There is little else in the world in which to delight.
(b) We are happy we are not the victims.
(c) All humans have a sadistic streak.
(d) This is a function of sympathy instilled in us by our Creator.

3. Which passion belongs under the heading of "self-preservation?"
(a) Pain.
(b) Sadness.
(c) Anger.
(d) Desire.

4. Which two ideas does Burke often find confused with one another?
(a) Picturesque and picaresque.
(b) Fear and terror.
(c) Liberty and patriotism.
(d) Sublime and beauty.

5. How does Burke define sympathy?
(a) As a desirable state of mind reached by looking inward towards one's own soul.
(b) As an unnecessary show of weakness that will cause pain.
(c) As a painful realization, and reasoned acceptance, of one's humanity .
(d) As a sort of emotional substitution between people or through art.

6. What is Burke's argument that infinity exists in pleasing objects?
(a) Pleasantness is a feeling that goes on forever within our minds.
(b) The only truly pleasing object is the night sky, which is truly infinite.
(c) Infinity itself is a pleasant concept, so an infinite object must be pleasant.
(d) Humans are pleased by the unlimited potential of these objects.

7. What large part of text has Burke added between the First and Second editions?
(a) An Introduction on Taste.
(b) An Autobiographical Epilogue.
(c) A Publisher's Foreword.
(d) An Afterword on Terror.

8. What term does Burke use to reflect uncertainty relative to the sublime?
(a) "Random."
(b) "Harsh."
(c) "Steady."
(d) "Intermitting."

9. What literary example does Burke give as representative of magnificence?
(a) A passage from Shakespeare's _Henry IV_.
(b) An excerpt from Milton's _Paradise Lost_.
(c) A folk ballad from Scotland.
(d) One of Donne's Holy Sonnets.

10. What natural powers in man does Burke say relate to external objects?
(a) The senses, imagination, and judgment.
(b) The senses, passions, and the will.
(c) The judgment, emotions, and the will.
(d) The imagination, passions, and the senses.

11. What does Burke note about youth, as related to taste?
(a) That innocence does not equal ignorance.
(b) That youth is the province of true wisdom.
(c) That sensory pleasure is great while judgment is inaccurate.
(d) That although judgments may not be sound, taste is excellent.

12. To which other passions is the idea of power closely related, according to Burke?
(a) Joy and delight.
(b) Curiosity and novelty.
(c) Fear and terror.
(d) Love and desire.

13. Burke opines that buildings that are great only in dimension are:
(a) Paragons of human imagination.
(b) The epitome of sublimity in architecture.
(c) Too simple and common to be sublime.
(d) Only deceptively large.

14. In what year was "A Philosophical Enquiry Into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful" first published?
(a) 1801.
(b) 1794.
(c) 1757.
(d) 1773.

15. What example does Burke give for a sublime sound?
(a) Artillery booming.
(b) Childish laughter.
(c) Running water.
(d) Lapping waves.

Short Answer Questions

1. How do smells and tastes become sublime most effectively?

2. What does Burke assert is necessary for the success of "A Philosophical Enquiry Into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful"?

3. What does Burke use as a common, but bad, example of infinity?

4. What does Burke term the "creative power" of the mind?

5. Which of the following is one of the general privations Burke lists?

(see the answer keys)

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