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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does the author say concerns the young man?
(a) Either/Or.
(b) Nothing.
(c) Serious questions of philosophy.
(d) His parents.

2. What phrase does the young man fling about according to the author?
(a) "It is not the given that is great, but the acquired."
(b) "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush."
(c) "It takes one to know one."
(d) "Too many cooks spoil the broth."

3. What does the author say art and poetry do for us?
(a) Art and poetry torture us with their beauty.
(b) Art and poetry delight us in the moment of consummation.
(c) Art and poetry bore most of us to tears.
(d) Art and poetry amaze us with the complexity of their construction.

4. What "humble view" does the author say he presents to the young man?
(a) What it is to prepare and debate.
(b) What it is to study and perform.
(c) What it is to choose and repent.
(d) What it is to hate and destroy.

5. What does Either/Or represent?
(a) An album of music.
(b) Marital fidelity.
(c) Choice in human life.
(d) The capital of Denmark.

6. What does the author say the young man's attitude toward ethics is?
(a) The author says the young man finds ethics fascinating.
(b) The author says the young man is not ordinarily disdainful of ethics.
(c) The author says the young man despises ethics.
(d) The author says the young man finds ethics amusing.

7. What does the author claim the aesthetic is?
(a) The aesthetic is a mystery that is fundamentally unknowable.
(b) The aesthetic is that by which a person becomes what he becomes.
(c) The aesthetic is that by which a person spontaneously arouses the essence of someone else.
(d) The aesthetic is that by which a person spontaneously is what he is.

8. What does the author write is on the other side of the aesthetic?
(a) The indifferent.
(b) The joyous.
(c) The romantic.
(d) The hateful.

9. What does the author assert is more important than cultivating one's mind?
(a) Developing one's personality.
(b) Gathering wealth.
(c) Traveling widely.
(d) Cultivating one's garden.

10. The author claims there is the deepest relationship between what two things?
(a) A man and woman who have gotten divorced.
(b) A choice and the one who is choosing.
(c) A choice and the people surrounding the person choosing.
(d) Denmark and Norway.

11. The author asserts that making a good choice does not depend so much on deliberation as on what?
(a) Just doing what one feels.
(b) A baptism of the will.
(c) A learning of correctness.
(d) What others wish for one to do.

12. What kind of energy does the author say a dying person has?
(a) Not very much energy at all.
(b) Supranatural energy.
(c) Light energy.
(d) Atomic energy.

13. Why do the author's two Englishmen travel to Arabia?
(a) To purchase horses.
(b) To discuss philosophy.
(c) To visit Mecca.
(d) To smoke tobacco.

14. What does the author find sad in the contemplating of human life?
(a) That most people live out their lives in a quiet lostness.
(b) That most people never learn the joy of a beautiful marriage.
(c) That most people never learn the value of a dollar.
(d) That most people go on about their lives as it they will never die.

15. What does the author say is another way to articulate the importance of living aesthetically?
(a) One must enjoy life.
(b) One must find the truth.
(c) One must destroy life.
(d) One must marry well.

Short Answer Questions

1. What history does the author say proves to be incommensurable for poetry?

2. What concept does the author of the letter introduce at the beginning of this section?

3. Why does the author say it seems superfluous to tell the young man what is aesthetic?

4. What natural need does every human being have according to the author?

5. What kind of person does the author say the young man is like?

(see the answer keys)

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