2. 外语
  3. On November 5th 1605, a band of English Catholic hotheads planned to detonate 36 barrels of gunpowder under the House of Lords.

On November 5th 1605, a band of English Catholic hotheads planned to detonate 36 barrels of gunpowder under the House of Lords.

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问题     On November 5th 1605, a band of English Catholic hotheads planned to detonate 36 barrels of gunpowder under the House of Lords. The scheme would have destroyed the nation by wiping out MPs, lords, bishops and the king. For sheer terrorist ambition, the plot remains unmatched. So why has this plan, and the capture, torture and public execution of the leading conspirators, been celebrated in Britain for the past four centuries?
    "God’s Secret Agents" suggests one reason why: anti-Catholic paranoia. The plot was the "popish" outrage that Protestants had expected and warned about for half a century. Such fears had resulted in fines, strict laws and show trials of Jesuit missionaries. It is as though Anglicanism—a vague and ambiguous creed, even in its early days—required an enemy against which to test itself.
    Before 1605, the threat from Catholicism was mostly imaginary. Attempts to re-establish the old religion in England were doomed to failure. Missionaries concentrated on the nobility, reckoning they would in turn convert the rest of the population, but this was to misunderstand English society. Worst, the missionaries received little support from Rome or Spain. The Gunpowder Plot was a desperate last heave by men who had already failed.
    It was also a gift to the authorities. The plot had been so wide-ranging that every pillar of the state—monarchy, church, nobility and Parliament—could interpret its survival as an act of divine providence. All had an interest in keeping the memory of Catholic perfidy alive. As one preacher put it in 1636, the day was "never to be cancelled out of the calendar, but to be written in every man’s heart for ever. "
    But then, something rather odd happened. What began as a celebration of the status quo became the opposite. By the 18th century, Bonfire Night had become an excuse for violence and barely disguised extortion. Respectable citizens who tried to suppress it were burned in effigy for their pains, alongside the pope—a tradition that survives in the Sussex town of Lewes.
    This peculiar transformation is the subject of Gunpowder Plots, a book of essays. It is a mixed bag, but two stand out: an elegant account of the evolution of Bonfire Night by David Cressy, a historian, and a nerdy and fascinating treatise on gunpowder and fireworks by Brenda Buchanan. The latter contains an intriguing detail. A receipt dated November 1605 from the Board of Ordnance mentions that the gunpowder recovered from Parliament was "decaied"—i. e. moist. Perhaps the plot that Britons have celebrated all this time would have been rather a damp firework.
The celebration of the Gunpowder Plot actually
选项 A、prompted the state to suppress the Catholics.
B、caused the deaths of respectable citizens.
C、was intended to commemorate the victims.
D、served as an excuse for violence.
答案D
解析 细节题。题目问的是“火药阴谋的庆祝活动实际上________。”根据第五段的“What began as a celebration of the status quo became the opposite. By the 18th century，Bonfire Night had become an excuse for violence and barely disguised extortion. ”可知，这个日子变成了现在的庆祝日而不是相反的情况。到了18世纪，篝火之夜已经成为暴力和变相勒索的借口。故选D。
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