英语专业四级听力50篇 26-50

Passage 26 Travel for Work
You can see them in every airport in the world. They are businessmen and
women who have to travel for their work.
When they first applied for the job, they may have thought of good food
and hotels, huge expense accounts and fashionable cities. Now they have
to sit in airport lounges, tired and uncomfortable in their smart clothes,
listening to the loudspeaker announce “The flight to Tokyo, or Berlin,
or New York is delayed for another two hours”. Some people say to me,
“How lucky you are to be able to travel abroad in your work! You can go
sightseeing without paying any money by yourself!” They think that my
job is like a continual holiday. It is not.
There are advantages, of course, and I do think I am lucky, but only because
I can go to places I would never visit if I was a tourist. (149 words)
Passage 27 Intelligence
Are some people born clever, and others born stupid? Or is intelligence
developed by our environment and our experience?
Strangely enough, the answer to these questions is yes. To some extent
our intelligence is given us at birth, and no amount of special education
can make a genius out of a child born with low intelligence. On the other
hand, a child who lives in a boring environment will develop his
intelligence less than one who lives in rich and varied surroundings. Thus,
the limits of a person’s intelligence are fixed at birth, whether or not
he reaches those limits will depend on his environment. This view, held
by most experts now, can be supported in a number of ways. As is easy to
show that intelligence is to some extent something we are born with. The
closer the blood relationship between two people is, the closer they are
likely to be in intelligence. (154 words)
Passage 28 A Free Dress Every Week
The temptation to steal is greater than ever before especially in large
shops and people are not so honest as they once were.
A detective recently watched a well-dressed woman who always went into
a large store on Monday mornings. One Monday, there were fewer people in
the shop than usual when the woman came in, so it was easier for the
detective to watch her. The woman first bought a few small articles. After
a little time, she chose one of the most expensive dresses in the shop
and handed it to an assistant who wrapped it for her as quickly as possible.

The woman simply took the parcel and walked out of the shop without paying.
When she was arrested, the detective found out that the shop assistant
was her daughter.. Believe it or not, the girl “gave” her mother a free
dress every week. (148 words)
Passage 29 Time
Time is tangible. One can gain time, spend time, waste time, save time,
or even kill time. Common questions in American English reveal this
concrete quality as though time were a possession. “Do you have any
time?”, “Can you get some time for this?”, “How much free time do you
have?” The treatment of time as a possession influences the way that time
is carefully divided.
Generally, Americans are taught to do one thing at a time and may be
uncomfortable when an activity is interrupted. In businesses, the careful
scheduling of time and the separation of activities are common practices.
Appointment calendars are printed with 15-, 30-, and 60-minute time slots.
The idea that “there is a time and place for everything” extends to
American social life. Visitors who drop by without prior notice may
interrupt their host’s personal time. Thus, calling friends on the
telephone before visiting them is generally preferred to visitors’
dropping by. (157 words)
Passage 30 Cartoonist
In a good cartoon, the artist can tell in a few lines as much as a writer
can tell in half a dozen paragraphs. The cartoonist not only tells a story
but he also tries to persuade the reader to his way of thinking. He has
great influence on public opinion. In a political campaign, he plays an
important part. Controversial issues in Congress or at meetings of the
United Nations may keep the cartoonist well-supplies with current
materials.
A clever cartoonist may cause laughter because he often uses humour in
his drawings. If he is sketching a famous person, he takes a prominent
feature and exaggerates it. Cartoonists, for instance, like to lengthen
an already long nose and to widen an already broad grin. This exaggeration
of a person’s characteristics is called caricature. The artist uses such
exaggeration to put his message across. (144 words)
Passage 31 Water Pollution

Water is very important to us. Factories and plants need water for
industrial uses and large pieces of farmland need it for irrigation.
Without water to drink, people die in a short time.
Today most water sources are so dirty that people must purify water before
drinking. Water becomes dirty in many ways: industrial pollution is one
of them. With the development of industry, plants and factories pour tons
of industrial wastes into rivers every day. The rivers have become
seriously polluted, and the water is becoming unfit for drinking or
irrigation. The same thing has also happened to our seas and oceans. So,
the problem of water pollution is almost worldwide.
Scientists of many countries have done a lot of work to stop pollution.
The polluted water in some places has become clean and drinkable again.
Perhaps one day the people in all towns and cities will be drinking clean
water. That day, we believe, is not very far off. (161 words)
Passage 32 Making a Complaint
Complaining about faulty goods or bad services is never easy. But if
something you have bought is faulty or does not do what was claimed for
it, you are not asking for a favour to get it put right.
Complaints should be made to a responsible person. Go back to the shop
where you bought the goods, taking with you any receipt you may have. In
a small store the assistant may also be the owner so you can complain direct.
In a chain store, ask the manager. If you telephone, ask the name of the
person who handles your enquiry, otherwise you may never find out who dealt
with the complaint later. If you do not want to do it in person, write
a letter. Stick to the facts and keep a copy of what you write. At this
stage you should give any receipt number, but you should not need to give
receipt or other papers to prove you bought the article. (164 words)
Passage 33 Where Do the British Live
Nearly everyone in Britain would like to own their own home and, whether
they do or not, they are prepared to put time and money into decorating
and furnishing it or even making structural alterations to it. Because
of the climate and because of the expense involved in going out for the
evening, the British spend a lot of time at home and a large part of their
social life takes place there.
Young people tend to stay with their families longer these days as
accommodation is expensive but, when they move away to a job or college,
there are various options open to them. They can get lodgings with a

landlady. This means that they rent a room in someone’s house and have
breakfast with the family. They can also get a bed-sitting room, that is
to say one self- contained room in which they can cook, live and sleep.
Alternatively, they can share a rented flat or house with a group of young
people, perhaps the most popular option of all. (172 words)
Passage 34 Will Computer Replace Human Beings?
We are in the computer age today. The computers are working all kinds of
wonders now. They are very useful in automatic control and data processing.
At the same time, computers are finding their way into the home. They seem
to be so clever and can solve such complicated problems that some people
think sooner or later they will replace us.
But I do not think that there is such a possibility. My reason is very
simple: Computers are machines, not humans. And our tasks are far too
various and complicated for any one single kind of machine to perform.
Probably the greatest difference between man and computer is that the
former can do things of his own while the latter can do nothing without
being programmed. In my opinion, computers will remain nothing but an
extension of our human brains, no matter how clever and complicated they
may become. (150 words)
Passage 35 Soccer
Soccer has had a slow start in America. In fact, the majority of schools
still have no official soccer teams or coaches. But the blossoming
popularity of the game cannot be denied. Thanks to the efforts of some
world-famous soccer stars, soccer is soon to have its place in American
culture.
Although soccer has enjoyed decades of popularity elsewhere, it was
literally ignored in America. Instead, a variation of the game called
“football” was most popular in the U.S. and still is to this day. But
the obvious advantages of playing soccer instead will soon win even most
avid football enthusiasts.
For one thing, soccer is a much safer game to play than football. No one
deliberately tries to knock an opponent down in soccer. In fact, the
players are discouraged from even touching each other.
Soccer is a game that requires skill and dexterity in controlling the ball.
Since no one may use hand to do this, soccer players soon acquire
incredible control of their heads, knees, and feet. (171 words.)

Passage 36 Artists
Every artist knows in his heart that he is saying something to the public.
Not only does he want to say it well, but he wants it to be something which
has not been said before.
What visual artists, like painters, want to say is easy to make out but
difficult to explain, because painters translate their experiences into
shapes and colors, not words. They seem to feel that a certain selection
of shapes and colors, out of the countless billions possible, is
exceptionally interesting for them and worth showing to us.
Most artists take their shapes and colors from the world of nature and
from human bodies in motion and response; their choices indicate that
these aspects of the world are worth looking at, that they contain
beautiful sights. Contemporary artists might say that they merely choose
subjects that provide an interesting pattern, that there is nothing more
in it. Yet even they do not choose entirely without reference to the
character of their subjects. (166 words)
Passage 37 Professional Sports in the U.S.
Professional sports are not only very popular in the United States, but
also a big business. The most popular sports are baseball, football and
basketball. Each sport has its own season and individual teams have
millions of supporters. Professional teams are named for the cities where
they are located. For example, the Lakers are in Los Angeles. The strongest
supporters of the Lakers are residents of Los Angeles and Southern
California. When the Lakers play, many people in Los Angles
enthusiastically follow the game. When we mention “NBA”, almost every
one knows it has some relationship with U.S. professional basketball.
However, what does it really stand for? N.B.A. is short for the National
Basketball Association. The NBA is gaining new fans and supporters around
the world. Basketball is another popular American sport. In the U.S.,
basketball has been called the “national pastime”. However, football
is the most popular professional sport in the U.S.. American football is
different from international football, which Americans call “soccer”.
Both games require strength and specialized skills. (171 words)
Passage 38 “How to” Books
Books which give instructions on how to do things are popular in the United
States today. Thousands of these “how to” books are available. In fact,
there are about four thousand books with titles that begin with words “how
to”.

Many “how to” books give advice on careers. They tell you how to choose
a career and how to succeed in it. Many of these books help people to use
their free time better. Some people want books which will give them useful
information about sports, hobbies, and travel. Other people use their free
time to make repairs and improvements on their homes. They prefer books
which give step-by- step instructions on how to repair things like plumbing
and electrical wiring or on how to redecorate or enlarge a house.
Why have “how to” books become so popular? Probably because life has
become more complex. Today people have far more free time to use, more
choices to make, and more problems to solve, “how to” books help people
to deal with modern life. (173 words)
Passage 39 Don’t Give Up
If we would ever accomplish anything in life, let us not forget that we
must persevere. If we would learn our lessons in school, we must be
diligent and not give up when ever we come to anything difficult. We shall
find many of our lessons very hard, but let us consider that the harder
they are the better they will do to us if we will persevere and learn them
thoroughly.
But there are some among us who are ready to give up when they come to
a hard example in mathematics, and say, “I can’t do this.” They never
will if they feel so. “I can’t” never does anything worthwhile; but
“I’ll try” accomplishes wonders.
Let us remember that we shall meet with difficulties all through life.
They are in the pathway of everyone. If we will only try and keep trying,
we shall be sure to conquer and overcome every difficulty we meet. (155
words)
Passage 40 How High Can You Jump?
Flea trainers have observed a strange habit of fleas while training them.
Fleas are trained by putting them in a cardboard box with a top on it.
The fleas will jump up and hit the top of the cardboard box over and over
and over again. As you watch them jump and hit the lid, something very
interesting becomes obvious. The fleas continue to jump, but they are no
longer jumping high enough to hit the top.
When you take off the lid, the fleas continue to jump, but they will not
jump out of the box. They will not jump out because they cannot jump out.
Why? The reason is simple. They have conditioned themselves to jump just

so high. Once they have conditioned themselves to jump just so high, that
is all they can do.
Many times, people do the same thing. They restrict themselves and never
reach their potential. Just like the fleas, they fail to jump higher,
thinking they are doing all they can do.
Passage 41 Apology Helps
It is never easy to admit you are in the wrong. Being human, we all need
to know the art of apologizing. Look back with honesty and think how often
you have judged roughly, you said unkind things, and pushed yourself ahead
at the expense of a friend. Then count the occasions when you indicated
clearly and truly that you were sorry. A bit frightening, isn’t it? It
is frightening because some deep wisdom in us knows that when even a small
wrong has been committed, some mysterious moral feeling is disturbed; and
it stays out of balance until fault is acknowledged and regret expressed.
A heartfelt apology can not only heal a damaged relationship but also make
it stronger. If you can think of someone who deserves an apology from you,
someone you have wronged, or judged too roughly, or just neglected, do
something about right now. (148 words)
Passage 42 Sleep
Why is it so difficult to fall asleep when you are overtired? There is
no one answer that applied to every individual. It is possible to feel
“tired” physically and still be unable to fall asleep, because while
your body may be exhausted, you do not feel sleepy. It is not so easy to
simply “turn off”.
Lack of sleep complicates matters even more. Experts say adults need at
least seven to eight hours of sleep a night to function properly. When
you get less sleep than that on consecutive three nights, you begin to
accrue for “sleep debt”. As sleep debt increases your body experiences
a stress response. Now a vicious cycle has been created: You experience
the feeling of being more and more tired, but your body is increasingly
stimulated. “Power sleeping” for more hours on weekends is only a
temporary solution. There is no substitute for getting a good night’s
sleep on a regular basis. (158 words)
Passage 43 Our Concern
The history of life on earth has been a history of interaction between
living things and their surroundings. To a large extent, the physical form

and the habits of the earth’s vegetation and its animal life have been
molded by the environment. Only in the present century has one species
of man acquired significant power to alter the nature of his world.
The rapidity of change follows the pace of man rather than the pace of
nature. Radiation is now the unnatural creation of man’s tampering with
the atom. The chemicals are creations of man’s inventive mind, having
no counterparts in nature.
We have put poisonous and biological potent chemicals into hands of
persons largely ignorant of their potentials for harm. We have subjected
enormous numbers of people to contact with these poisons, without their
consent and often without their knowledge. We have allowed these chemicals
to be used with little or no advance investigation of their effect. Future
generations are unlikely to forgive our lack of concern. (170 words)
Passage 44 Gardening in America
Believe or not, 43,000,000 Americans are gardening. That is about one in
six. Gardeners, of course, come in many varieties. Not surprisingly, most
of them are people who live in the suburbs, and enjoy planting flowers,
or maybe a small vegetable garden.
The average age of gardeners in America is about 45 years old; they usually
fall somewhere in the middle class. But the fastest growing groups are
city dwellers. Urban residents are finding ways of gardening even in their
crowded areas. Many go to large public gardeners, as a place designed by
the city for garden, and you can actually ranch your own plot.
Still other people use their balconies or roof tops, wherever they can
find the space to plant small patches of green. (126 words)
Passage 45 The Influence of Life
In the early times when human beings hunted and gathered food, they were
not in control of their environment. They could only interact with their
surroundings as the other lower animals did.
When they learned to make fire, however, they became capable of altering
their environment. To provide themselves with fuel, they cut down trees.
They also burned clearings in forests to increase the growth of grass and
to provide a greater grazing area for wild animals that human beings fed
upon. This development led to farming and domestication of animals. Fire
provided the means for cooking plants which had previously been inedible.
Only when the process of meeting the basic need for food reached a certain

level was it possible for humans to follow other pursuits such as setting
up families, forming societies and founding cities. (139 words)
Passage 46 Automobiles
It is impossible to say that any one man invented the automobile. Many
individuals living and working in different countries and at different
times contributed to its development. Many of the discoveries that went
into the creation of the automobile were small in themselves. But together
they were important. Here are two examples.
“Carriage is running at a speed of 8 to 9 miles an hour.” It was almost
unheard of in those days. According to automobile historians, this was
the first practical use of mechanical power to move a vehicle. After its
first run, the machine reportedly burned up while the inventor and his
friends were celebrating its success at a pub.
Henry Ford is considered the father of modern automobile mass production.
His famous Model-T car, because of its low price, made it possible to
produce cars on a large scale and his efforts made it accessible to
ordinary people. (152 words)

Passage 47 House and Home
“House” and “home” are two words that have similar meanings.
“House” and “home” both refer to places where people live. However,
there is a difference between them. “Home” is often referred to as the
place that we live in with our families. Sadly, in our society, people
can hardly distinguish a home from a house because they often see no
difference between them. This confusion can be traced back to the
indifference the family members. Therefore, we can say that love is an
important factor in a home. A home is a shelter, not only for our bodies
but also for our minds. Whenever we are depressed, we can go home for
comfort. Everyone in the family will do his best to take care of each other
and share their happiness as well as sorrow. Without love, a home is merely
a house where loneliness is all that can be found. And a house can never
be a home unless there is love. (163 words)
Passage 48 Population Growth

It is well-known that there has been a drastic increase in world population.
But it is probably less well-known that the extinction rate of wildlife
species is experiencing a parallel trend.
Take the United States for instance. In 1990, U.S. population reached an
unprecedented level of 250 million, which is approximately 250 times of
that of 1800. On the other hand, wildlife species are disappearing from
the country at an alarming rate. By 1900, about 70 wildlife species would
never be seen in U.S.. We are fully justified in declaring that the
explosive population growth has had an adverse effect on the survival of
wildlife species and will be a constant threat to the wildlife resources
if no immediate actions are taken.
Nothing has ever equaled the magnitude and speed with which the human
species is altering the physical and chemical world. It has been
demolishing the environment we are living in. (152 words)
Passage 49 Natural Resources
Through the changes in the ways of making living in a family over several
generations, the cartoon aims at sounding a warning against man’s
wasteful use of natural resources and emphasizing the urgent need to
preserve these resources.
Ever since man appeared on the earth, man’s survival has been heavily
dependent on nature. Almost everything we use in our everyday life comes
from nature, ranging from the food we eat, the water we drink, to the wood
which is turned into furniture. With the development of technology and
population growth, the amount and range of materials used has increased
at an alarming rate.
However, natural resources are not inexhaustible. Some reserves are
already on the brink of exhaustion and there is no hope of replacing them.
The widespread water shortage is an example in point. If man continued
to squander natural resources with no thought for the future, the whole
world would be in a mess. (157 words)
Passage 50 Reading
Nowadays few of us read books after we leave school.
This is rather disturbing, for one should know that books are no less
necessary to one’s mental life than fresh air is to one’s physical life.
From good reading we can derive companionship, experience and instruction.
A good book is our faithful friend. It can increase our contentment when

we are cheerful and happy, and lessen our pain when we are sad or lonely.
Books can also offer us a wide range of experience. Few of us can travel
far from home or live long over 100, but all of us can live many lives
through the pages of books. What’s more, reading books can increase our
intellectual ability, broaden our minds and make us wise.
With the coming of TV, books are no longer read as widely as they once
were. However, nothing can replace the role that books play in our lives.
(154 words)