Question

Like the bright and beautiful leaf, man is ____________
A) Pale and dull in his old age.
B) Pale and happy in his youth.
C) Fine and gay in his youth.
D) Gay and ill in his old age.

Answer 1

Hint:In order to fill in the blank it is important to understand the meaning of these lines and in which context they are written.

Complete answer:
These lines are from a poem
“What’s the life of a man any more than a leaf
A man has his seasons so why should he grieve
For although through this life we appear fine and gay.”

Now let us discuss all the given options one by one to find out the correct answer.
Option A) Pale and dull in his old age
This option is incorrect because the comparison is made between a young leaf and a young man. But this option describes a man in his old age. Hence it does not apply to the given sentence.
Option B) pale and happy in his youth
This option is incorrect as the words pale and happy contradict one another. Pale refers to old age and happy refers to young age.
Option C) fine and gay in his youth
This option is correct because it is given in the poem that a person has to go through different seasons.
Option D) gay and ill in his old age
This option is incorrect because gay and ill contradict one another. Gay here refers to youth and ill refers to old age.

Hence option ‘C’ is the correct option.

Note: In order to answer such questions it is important to understand the context in which the sentence is written.