AP European History Practice Test 1, Section I, Part A (^) ‹ 213
Questions 7–9 relate to the following excerpt from a poem:
Take up the White Man’s burden—
Send forth the best ye breed—
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives’ need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild—
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.
...
Take up the White Man’s burden—
The savage wars of peace—
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought...
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to naught.
Rudyard Kipling, The White Man’s Burden, 1899
- Based on this poem, Kipling’s conception of the
British imperial mission could best be summed
up as which of the following?
A. A difficult but necessary task
B. A ruthless exercise of power
C. A glorious, religious responsibility
D. A hopeless task with no purpose - The poem describes which kind of attitude
toward the native peoples who were under the
rule or influence of the British Empire?
A. They are “exiled sons” of the British race.
B. While “savage,” they fight wars for the sake
of a lasting peace.
C. They are ready for conversion to Christianity.
D. They are the product of a less-civilized and
less-developed civilization. - It is generally acknowledged that Kipling fash-
ioned White Man’s Burden to address the subject
of the American colonization of the Philippines,
which the United States had recently won from
Spain in the Spanish-American War. With that
information in mind, what message can Kipling
be said to be offering the Americans in this
excerpt?
A. A reminder of the responsibility of advanced
civilizations to bring the benefits of modern
civilization to less-developed peoples
B. A warning to avoid the war and hardships of
imperialism
C. An exhortation to Christianize the heathen
peoples of the world
D. An ironic presentation of the sheer folly of
imperialism
24_Bartolini_QuesPrac1_207-230.indd 213 27/04/18 10:15 AM