Years ago, I lived in a building in a large city. The next building was only a few feet away from mine. There was a woman living there, and I had never met her, yet I could see she sat by her window each afternoon, sewing or reading.
After several months had gone by, I began to notice that her window was dirty. Everything was unclear through the dirty window. I would say to myself. “I wonder why that woman doesn’t wash her window. It really looks terrible.”
One bright morning I decided to clean my flat, including washing the window on the inside.
Late in the afternoon when I finished the cleaning, I sat down by the window with a cup of coffee for a rest. What a surprise! Across the way, the woman sitting by her window was clearly visible (看见). Her window was clean!
Then it dawned on me. I had been criticizing (批评) her dirty window, but all the time I was watching hers through my own dirty window.
That was quite an important lesson for me. How often had I looked at and criticized others through the dirty window of my heart, through my own shortcomings?
Since then, whenever I wanted to judge (评判) someone, I asked myself first, “Am I looking at him through my own dirty window?” I try to clean the window of my own world so that I may see the world about me more clearly.
The writer couldn’t see everything clearly through the window because _______.
A.the woman’s window was dirty |
B.the writer’s window was dirty |
C.the woman lived nearby |
D.the writer was near-sighted |
“It dawned on me” probably means “_______”.
A.I began to understand it |
B.it cheered me up |
C.I knew it grew light |
D.it began to get dark |
It’s clear that ________.
A.the writer had never met the woman before |
B.the writer often washed the window |
C.they both worked as cleaners |
D.they lived in a small town |
From the passage, we can learn _______.
A.one shouldn’t criticize others very often |
B.one should often make his windows clean |
C.one must judge himself before he judges others |
D.one must look at others through his dirty windows[ |