From Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay *Self-Reliance* (1841). Select the word that fits the blank. "Else to-morrow a stranger will say with ______ good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another."
Ajuvenile
Bmasterly
Cborrowed
Dtimid
Answer & Solution
Correct answer: B. masterly
Emerson's irony rests on the contrast between the *stranger's* delivery (eloquent, authoritative) and *our own* silenced thought (which proves to have been the same all along).
For the irony to bite, the stranger's manner must be *impressive* — and the blank must reinforce that.
"Masterly" — done with the skill of a master — fits exactly. The stranger says, with masterly authority, exactly what we had been thinking but failed to voice.
- "Timid" and "juvenile" reverse the rhetorical impact.
- "Borrowed" is true of the *thought*, not the *manner of its delivery*.
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