Class 12 English specfic purpose :
By Mysite
PASSAGE ~
In my general reading history, biography and travel occupy a prominent place; and since I have spent a considerable proportion of my life in the East there are a good number of volumes on India and the Middle East. There is plenty of poetry on my shelves and a good deal of it is in my head. Poetry should dance in the mind, and blow one a kiss; or gallop to adventure with a cheer; or whisper gently of things€ past; not shuffle or slouch past with dark incomprehensible mutterings. Perhaps I am getting old, anyway I prefer the old poets. Lastly comes what is sometimes called escapist literature, the books we read with no other aim, than to rest or amuse the mind; to forget the day's chores and tomorrow's anxieties. This is perhaps the most pleasant form of reading for most, and I suspect the only form of reading for many. The volume chosen may either be a thriller or soother, a thriller to bring sense of adventure into the dull daily routine or a soother to rest tired nerves.
Our grandfathers in their leisurely days were content with the stately, comfortable three volume novel, but that had passed before the beginning of this century. You will choose your books as you choose your friends, with taste and discrimination; I hope; because they can tell you something of your profession and interests,because they are wise and helpful, because they can stir your blood with tales of adventure or because they are gay and witty. I can only wish you will get as much pleasure from them as I get from my books. ( 240 words )
PASSAGE ~
In our country begging has becotue a profession and the beggars continue to increase in numbers. So, vast indeed is the fraternity of these beggars that foreigners visiting India, especially, cities like Varanasi. Our cities of pilgfimage have been led to call the cities of beggars and dust. There are no statistics available for estimating their number, but that is not needed for our present putvose. Of course, any practical reform in this matter does not require a close investigation into the causes and conditions of the existence of beggars, but we are here concemed with the question of seeing how these beggars live and what, in particular, is the effect of their existence on our society.
The vastness of the number of the Indian beggars is evident to any visitor fronn a foreign country. The causes of the increase in the nunlber of beggars are many, but of these we may just consider only a few. For good or evil, Indians have been very religious in their outlook on life, and also very generous and hospitable towards those who go to them for begging. Our Puranas and Shastras point out that giving charity to beggars ensures Moksha in the next world.
The social conscience developed from such an article of faith has been the main cause of the increase in the number of beggars. They are always sure of finding people anxious to go to heaven by offering doles and donations to the needy and so they are thriving. ( 200 word )
PASSAGE~
The teacher, like the artist, the philosopher and the man of letters, can only perform his work adequately if he feels himself to be an individual directed by an inner creative impulse, not dominated and fettered by an outside authority. It is very difficult in this modern world to find a place for the individual. He can subsist at the top as a dictator in a totalitarian state or a plutocratic magnate in a country of large industrial enterprises, but in the realm of the mind it is becomtng more and more difficult to preserve independence Of the great organised forces that control the livelihood Of men and women. If the world is not to lose the benefit to be derived from its best minds, it will have to find some method of allowing them scope and liberty in spite of organisation. This involves a deliberate restraint on the part of those who have power and a conscious realisation that there are men to whom free scope must be afforded. Renaissance Popes could feel in this way towards. Renaissance artists, but the powerful men of our day seem to have more difficulty in feeling respect for exceptional genius. The turbulence of our times is inimical to the flowering of culture.
