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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What word from "Down at the Cross" means impossible to stop or prevent?
(a) Inexcusable.
(b) Plausible.
(c) Deplorable.
(d) Inexorable.

2. What does the author claim to be the seeming "sum of our achievement" as humans, in "Down at the Cross"?
(a) The power to enslave one another.
(b) The power to oppress one another.
(c) The power to exterminate ourselves.
(d) The power to kill nature.

3. What word from "Down at the Cross" refers to people who engage in dishonest and fraudulent business dealings?
(a) Diffidents.
(b) Hucksters.
(c) Sheisters.
(d) Racketeers.

4. In what periodical was "Down at the Cross" first published?
(a) Publisher's Weekly.
(b) Reader's Digest.
(c) The New Yorker.
(d) Time.

5. What does the word "bulwark" mean in "Down at the Cross"?
(a) A defensive wall.
(b) A rope attached to a roof.
(c) A chain.
(d) A fencing sword.

6. Where did Rudyard Kipling live?
(a) England.
(b) Ireland.
(c) France.
(d) Canada.

7. As the author describes growing up in Harlem in "Down at the Cross," he says, "In the same way that the girls were destined to gain as much weight as their mothers, the boys, it was clear, would" what?
(a) "Become even lower than their fathers."
(b) "Leave home and never return."
(c) "Rise no higher than their fathers."
(d) "Fall even further from grace."

8. What word from "Down at the Cross" refers to a large area of unforested grassland in southeastern Europe or Siberia?
(a) Gully.
(b) Ravine.
(c) Corral.
(d) Steppe.

9. How late was the author when he arrived for dinner at Elijah Muhammad's home?
(a) 15 minutes late.
(b) 30 minutes late.
(c) 1 hour late.
(d) 45 minute late.

10. What color clothing does the author describe the women wearing at Elijah Muhammad's home in "Down at the Cross"?
(a) White.
(b) Red.
(c) Yellow.
(d) Green.

11. How does the author describe his feelings about "a separate black economy in America"?
(a) "A true possibility if there were enough cooperation."
(b) "A cautionary warning."
(c) "Willfull, and even mischievous nonsense."
(d) "An ideal to attain."

12. How old was the author when he describes an encounter where a policeman made a racial slur as he passed in Manhattan in "Down at the Cross"?
(a) 16.
(b) 10.
(c) 13.
(d) 19.

13. What word from "Down at the Cross" means something continuing without pause or interruption?
(a) Exuberant.
(b) Incessant.
(c) Explicit.
(d) Petulant.

14. Of the girls in Harlem going through adolescence, the author says in "Down at the Cross," "They understood that they must act as God's" what?
(a) "Angels."
(b) "Decoys."
(c) "Watchmen."
(d) "Love."

15. The author writes in "Down at the Cross," "From my own point of view, the fact of the Third Reich alone makes obsolete forever any question of" what?
(a) "Christian superiority."
(b) "Love."
(c) "Black superiority."
(d) "White superiority."

Short Answer Questions

1. The author writes in "Down at the Cross," "It was absolutely clear that the police would whip you and take you in as long as" what?

2. What kind of athletic career does the author describe pursuing but not succeeding at in "Down at the Cross"?

3. What word used by the author in "Down at the Cross" means relentless or unstoppable?

4. The author states in "Down at the Cross," "White people hold the power, which means that they are" what?

5. The author states in "Down at the Cross," "I certainly could not discover any principled reason for not becoming a criminal, and it is not my poor, God-fearing parents who are to be indicted for the lack but" what?

(see the answer keys)

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