SAT sentence completion practice test 05

1. To reach Simonville, the traveller needs to drive with extreme caution along the ____ curves of the mountain road that climbs ____ to the summit.

A. serpentine - steeply
B. jagged - steadily
C. gentle - precipitously
D. shady - steadily
E. hair-raising - languidly

2. The cricket match seemed ____ to our guests; they were used to watching sports in which the action is over in a couple of hours at the most.

A. unintelligible
B. inconsequential
C. interminable
D. implausible
E. evanescent

3. Our present accountant is most ____ ; unlike the previous _____ incumbent, he has never made a mistake in all the years that he has worked for the firm.

A. unorthodox - heretical
B. dependable - assiduous
C. punctilious - painstaking
D. asinine - diligent
E. meticulous - unreliable

4. The refugee's poor grasp of English is hardly an _____ problem; she can attend classes and improve within a matter of months.

A. implausible
B. insuperable
C. inconsequential
D. evocative
E. injudicious

5. We appreciated his ____ summary of the situation; he wasted no words yet delineated his position most ____ .

A. comprehensive : inadequately
B. succinct : direfully
C. cogent : persuasively
D. verbose : concisely
E. grandiloquent : eloquently

6. His musical tastes are certainly ____ ; he has recordings ranging from classical piano performances to rock concerts, jazz and even Chinese opera.

A. antediluvian
B. eclectic
C. harmonious
D. sonorous
E. dazzling

7. I cannot conclude this preface without ____ that an early and untimely death should have prevented Persius from giving a more finished appearance to his works.

A. rejoicing
B. lamenting
C. affirming
D. commenting
E. mentioning

8. Before his marriage the Duke had led an austere existence and now regarded the affectionate, somewhat ____ behavior of his young wife as simply ____ .

A. restrained - despicable
B. childish - elevating
C. playful - sublime
D. frivolous - puerile
E. unpleasant - delightful

9. Wilson ____ that human beings inherit a tendency to feel an affinity and awe for other living things, in the same way that we are ____ to be inquisitive or to protect our young at all costs.

A. argues - encouraged
B. maintains - trained
C. contends - predisposed
D. fears - taught
E. demurs - genetically programmed

10. The pond was a place of reek and corruption, of ____ smells and of oxygen-starved fish breathing through laboring gills.

A. fragrant
B. evocative
C. dolorous
D. resonant
E. fetid

11. There have been great ____ since his time, but few others have felt so strongly the ____ of human existence.

A. pessimists - futility
B. skeptics - exaltation
C. heretics - sagacity
D. optimists - tremulousness
E. cynics - joy

12. While war has never been absent from the ____ of man, there have been periods in History which appear remarkably ____.

A. archives - ambivalent
B. posterity - serene
C. mind - desultory
D. annals - pacific
E. life - belligerent