Passage (Thomas Babington Macaulay, "Milton," *Edinburgh Review*, August 1825): "We think that, as civilisation advances, poetry almost necessarily declines. Therefore, though we fervently admire those great works of imagination which have appeared in dark ages, we do not admire them the more because they have appeared in dark ages. On the contrary, we hold that the most wonderful and splendid proof of genius is a great poem produced in a civilised age. We cannot understand why those who believe in that most orthodox article of literary faith, that the earliest poets are generally the best, should wonder at the rule as if it were the exception. Surely the uniformity of the phaenomenon indicates a corresponding uniformity in the cause. The fact is, that common observers reason from the progress of the experimental sciences to that of imitative arts. The improvement of the former is gradual and slow. Ages are spent in collecting materials, ages more in separating and combining them. Even when a system has been formed, there is still something to add, to alter, or to reject. Every generation enjoys the use of a vast hoard bequeathed to it by antiquity, and transmits that hoard, augmented by fresh acquisitions, to future ages. In these pursuits, therefore, the first speculators lie under great disadvantages, and, even when they fail, are entitled to praise. Their pupils, with far inferior intellectual powers, speedily surpass them in actual attainments. Any intelligent man may now, by resolutely applying himself for a few years to mathematics, learn more than the great Newton knew after half a century of study and meditation." Which of the following best captures Macaulay's main claim in the passage?
AGreat poetry can appear only in dark ages, never in civilised ones.
BProgress in the experimental sciences explains the cumulative refinement of poetry.
CPoetry tends to decline as civilisation advances; therefore the appearance of great poetry in a civilised age is an exceptional feat.
DCritics overstate the achievements of early poets and undervalue the polished work of later ages.
Answer & Solution
Correct answer: C. Poetry tends to decline as civilisation advances; therefore the appearance of great poetry in a civilised age is an exceptional feat.
The passage opens with the thesis — "as civilisation advances, poetry almost necessarily declines" — and immediately draws its consequence: a great poem in a civilised age is "the most wonderful and splendid proof of genius." Both halves together yield the claim in **C**.
- **A** overstates: Macaulay says poetry *tends* to decline, not that great poetry is impossible in civilised ages; the passage's whole point is the opposite — Milton's achievement in a civilised age is the most impressive kind.
- **B** inverts Macaulay's argument — he holds that scientific progress is *not* a model for the imitative arts.
- **D** misattributes a position to Macaulay; it is closer to the view he sets out to refute.
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