Section Ⅱ Reading Comprehension Part A Directions: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A,B, C or D. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1. (40 points) Text 1 In sixteenth-century Italy and eighteenth-century France, waning prosperity and increasing social unrest led the ruling families to try to preserve their superiority by withdrawing from the lower and middle classes behind barriers of etiquette. In a prosperous community, on the other hand, polite society soon absorbs the newly rich, and in England there has never been any shortage of books on etiquette for teaching them the manners appropriate to their new way of life. Every code of etiquette has contained three elements= basic moral duties; practical rules which promote efficiency; and artificial, optional graces such as formal compliments to, say, women on their beauty or superiors on their generosity and importance. In the first category are consideration for weak and respect for age. Among the ancient Egyptians the young always stood in the presence of older people. Among the Mponguwe of Tanzania, the young men bow as they pass the huts of the elders. In England, until about a century ago, young children did not sit in their parents’ presence without asking permission. Practical rules are helpful in such ordinary occurrences of social life as making proper introductions at parties of other functions so that people can be brought to know each other. Before the invention of the fork, etiquette directed that the fingers should be kept as clean as possible, before the handkerchief came into common use, etiquette suggested that after spitting, a person should rub the spit inconspicuously underfoot. Extremely refined behavior, however, cultivated as an art of gracious living, has been characteristic only of societies with wealth and leisure, which admitted women as the social equals of men. After the fall of Rome, the first European society to regulate behavior in private lift in accordance with a complicated code of etiquette was twelfth-century Provence, in France. Provence had become wealthy. The loads had returned to their castles from the crusades, and there the ideals of chivalry grew up, which emphasized the virtue and gentleness of women and demanded that a knight should profess a pure and dedicated love to a lady who would be his valiant deeds, though he would never come physically close to her. This was the introduction of the concept of romantic love, which was to influence literature for many hundreds of years and which still lives on in a debased form in simple popular songs and cheap novels today. The ideals of chivalry demanded that（）

A. a knight should never have physical relationship with women.
B. a knight should inspire his lady to valiant deeds.
C. a knight should dedicate his valiant deeds to a woman.
D. romantic people should influence literature.