England in the eighteenth century

After witnessing the twists and turns in the seventeenth century, England sets foots in a comparatively peaceful

and land,where Pre-romanticism Enlightenment,Sentimentalism

conspicuously spring up and a multitude of refined scholars, simultaneously,come into fore, serving as a beacon at that epoch.

Among whom, Henry Fielding, who was born on the 22nd of April 1707, is praised as the greatest novelist of the eighteenth century,and one of the greatest that England ever produced.Additionally,he is also the real founder of the genre of the bourgeois realistic novel in England and Europe.For all his life he dedicates himself to literature, leaves us quite a number of marvelous wealth,and “The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling” is quite a big hit at present.On the whole, his works are adept at unfolding a spread panorama of life in all sections of English society.He exposes the depraved aristocracy, the avaricious bourgeoisie and contrasted the life of the ruling classes to the lack of rights and misery of the people. Then,let’s appreciate this spirit in detail.

England in the eighteenth century still consists of considerable contradictions between bourgeoisie and feudalism.Previously, the overseas expansion has supplied England with substantial capital,so there is a chance of developing economy and it is England that initially finished the Industrial Revolution,casting the world a start.Meanwhile, the government is also strengthened and consolidated.Honestly speaking,the revolution does make a difference to the British society and inhabitants’s life at that time.However,as it puts it, “Each sword has two edges .”Labor gives way to machine,too, which gives rise to a high unemployment,so residents,especially those who live in the lowest class, suffer a lot. They are reduced to poverty-stricken as much as one can imagine and the society teems with class inequality,prejudices and so forth .The fact that people is devoid of freedom as well as right results in a high crime rate , and cheating becomes the order of the day.What a complicated circumstance it is. Therefore,that’s why the majority is always running after money ,as is transparently depicted in the novel.

Do you remember captain Blifil?Why did he marry Miss Bridget?For money.He appears as an avaricious one for the sake of Mr.Allworthy’s wealth and his enormous estate.As a result, he contrives to wed Mr.Allworthy’s sister,hoping get the huge treasure as a heir.The same goes for another two money worshipers. One is Hurstwood Camm，and the other is This Kriya.The former is Tom’s teacher,who is very stern and sort of savage, giving him a lot of beating in terms of his killing of a Chinese partridge which flies in Squire Western’s domain. Compared with captain Blifil, This Kriya changes from a dissenter to an opposer towards Tom, in that he also catches his eyes on squire Allworthy’s treasure,identical to Hurstwood Camm.In the following days,both of them flatter to his sister and intrigue against Tom.Moreover,it’s worth mentioning Black George, who is the guard in the hunting ground ,Tom’s best friend. As a matter of fact,it is he that shoots the partridge ,but he is afraid of taking the responsibility which will lead him to lose his position.Instead,Tom steps forward bravely to protect him,and is ready to withstand everything with heart and will, especially the stroking of his teacher and

the blame of Mr.Allworthy.Afterwards,to all the readers’ surprise,when Tom is banished from home,carrying the colossal money given by his adoptive father, Black George takes it as his unexpectedly.How pitiful our good-natured hero! Still,when realizing his poverty, the inn keeper treats him rather cruelly,Above all,that is the darkness of the eighteenth century ,where each citizen focuses their attention on shiny gold rather than sincere emotion, even at the expense of human’s nature.In a word,all of these result from the oppression of the employers,who dry up employees’ every drop of blood by remorseless exploitation for their own sufficient profits. Under that circumstance,he more farmers and craftsmen toil,the less they earn.Accordingly, the rich become more rich ,the poor become more poor.

In the contemporary England,there lies a great gap difficult to bridge between affluent and penniless. In Fielding’s work, he strongly criticizes the social relations in the situation.It’s universally acknowledged that aristocrats and men set in authority embody all the evils.For instance,Squire Western,who is rather well-off, confirmedly refuses Tom and Sophia’s marriage in that

Tom is an orphan,instead, compels his daughter to marry Blifil whom she doesn’t like. But when Tom gains fane and fortune overnight ,proving to be the real nephew of Mr.Allworthy,he couldn’t wait to consent the wedding .Besides, Blifil ,born with a silver spoon in his tongue,spares no pain to belittle Tom out of envy,who overflows with much arrogance and dishonesty,consequently gets Tom in a mess.On the contrary,Fielding’s positive characters are always people with natural, unperverted qualities.Among them Mrs.Miller can be illustrated as a convincing case.Poor as she is, she is kind enough to do Tom a favour when he gets stuck in trouble.The moment Tom’s and Sophia’s affection is exposed to risk,it’s she that runs an errand for them;the moment Mr.Allworthy feels disappointed for Tom,it’s she that does her best to redeem his good reputation. What’s more,Tom himself is a good example, in effect.Noble as he is,he is equipped with admiring valor and goodwill, always shows respect for Mr.Allworthy, and obliges those who is in need, which is acceptable to the eighteenth century.

To put it in a nutshell,Fielding,at a stroke of

pen,gives a vigorous account of the contemporary society and shows the 18th century love of satire. He hates the hypocrisy which people try to conceal and invariably puts such characters in position to tear away their mask.On the whole,just as the saying goes,“Good is rewarded with good,and evil with evil”.The author pays those virtuous a high compliment,while pours those vicious an acid sarcasm,which not only highlights the majority’s innermost emotion,but predominantly, reflects people’s best wishes as well,in terms of the happy ending between Tom and Sophia, that is, however corrupt the society is,there is still prospect of obtaining freedom and equality and moral forces will bequeath a heritage of power to England.

第二篇：英文阅读读后感4

Today I read the article“Health care site needs dozens of fixes” on China Daily.

Form the article, I know that the America hasa dysfunctional in the health care for a long time. Obama administration officials said Friday they've found dozens of website problems that need fixing and tapped a private company to take the lead. They said most of the problems will be fixed by the end of November.HealthCare.gov was supposed to be the online portal for uninsured Americans to get coverage under President Barack Obama's health care law.

What all this make me remind of our country’s health care insurance. In China, We need the money to see a doctor. In recent years, the fee of seeing a doctor is higher and higher. Many people who have no money to see a doctordied in the hospital door. And there is a big difference between city and countryside.For a city man, he has a stable job, so he has the ability to buy health insurance. Therefore he doesn’t worry about the fee of seeing the doctor. Nevertheless, the rural people have no abundant money to buy any insurance. When they are ill, they can only choose cheap drugs to treat the disease, and then waiting for death.

Now, to protect the people’s health, our government is carrying out the national health insurance, which makes the poor have a way to go to hospital. However, it seems that there are some problems about the policy.After the policy, the fee of medicine increases in the village health room. By joining the rural cooperative medical service,peasantscan get a discount on the medicine and being hospitalized. The medicine fee after discounting doesn’t reduce much. The policy just does some help to the patients who suffer from serious illness in hospitalized. In addition, some doctors report the medical people and medical expensesat random.By this way, they obtain high profits.