Reading Comprehension Quiz

Henry David Thoreau, “Where I Lived and What I Lived For”

Read “Where I Lived and What I Lived For” and check your comprehension by answering the following questions. Then “submit” your work.

Question Throughout the first paragraph, Thoreau uses the pronoun “it.” What is “it”?

Question Thoreau references the Westminster Catechism at the end of paragraph 1. Why does he do this?

Question Near the bottom of paragraph 2, Thoreau refers to sleepers. The footnote states that a sleeper is a railroad tie, a large piece of lumber on which the metal rails were bound. To what is Thoreau comparing these “sleepers”?

Question Thoreau rails against the incessant need for information in paragraph 3. He writes of a person who reads about “a man has had his eyes gouged out this morning on the Wachito River,” and “never dream[s] the while that he lives in the dark unfathomed mammoth cave of this world.” What is Thoreau trying to say?

Question Thoreau writes that “nothing new does ever happen in foreign parts” and that according to philosophers, “all news, as it is called, is gossip.” What is Thoreau suggesting?

Question Thoreau tells the story of the prince who was raised by a forester. The prince believed himself to be of the common people. Thoreau uses this story to make a point about his fellow New Englanders. He wants them to

Question In paragraph 7, Thoreau says that we need to “spend one day as deliberately as Nature.” What does he wish for his readers to do?

Question Which axiom is closest in meaning to Thoreau’s “Time is but the stream I go a fishing in”?

Question Thoreau writes that he “knows not the first letter of the alphabet.” This is obviously not true in the sense that he does not know how to write. What does he mean?

Question Thoreau uses the metaphor of the head as “an organ for burrowing.” What does he wish for us to compare?