Issue 221 新手习作 求拍（欢迎互改）

manfred_huiUID: 2689901

TOPIC: ISSUE221 - "The chief benefit of the study of history is to break down the illusion that people in one period of time are significantly different from people who lived at any other time in history."
WORDS: 481
TIME: 00:45:00
DATE: 2009-8-28 10:07:08

这个版本是自己改过一遍后的，也参考了一些网友的习作，希望大家猛拍，谢谢

Throughout the course of development of the human society, many traditions and ideas we hold nowadays are inherited from the ancestors. Thus, I agree with the speaker insofar as people at different times may share some nature and values in common, which are essence beneath the distinct differences in every period, and aside from the benefit to realize the similarities of people, other merits, potentially more significant, in the study of history should not be overlooked.

Admittedly, the living style of people in different period of time is of huge disparity. Our ancestor lives in the cave and hunts the games for sustenance. No one can deny that we who are living in the concrete formed buildings and eat cooked food now live a totally different live. The advancement of science and technology has brought great change to our substance world. Cities are established in the place which is forest originally. Great bridges are built across those wide rivers which are impossible to go across with small boat in the past. Long tunnels lie under the bottom of the mountains which can not be conquered by climbing with our rare hands. Science and technology facilitates our lives.

However, our mental world and those momentum behind the development of society, unlike our physical world, experience little change. Most human nature such as dignity and chicanery, altruism and selfishness, kindness and meanness and etc. won't be changed by the vicissitude of our society. We can reshape the outside world however have no power to change our nature. So every society has the problem of crime and meanwhile so many warm-hearted persons who are willing to help those strangers and poor people. Similarly, our human's curiosity to the unknown world remains constant and is one of the concealed momentums which propel our science and technology to advance. From history, we can learn this fact and better understand ourselves. Thus, our human will make further progress under the guide of history if we realize the common nature of people in different period of time.

Further more, the chief function of history is more than recognizing these similarities. History can provide us with invaluable lessons. From those mistakes we have made, similar tragedy can be avoided. As mentioned above, we can build cities upon forests. However, we can never turn the cities back to forests and enjoy the fresh air and blue sky like our ancestor does. As a result, history informs us that we can not exploit the earth without any constrains. From the formidable flood, earth quack and climate change caused by human activity, we gradually recognize that we need to protect the natural environment in the process of urbanization. We can earn great benefit if we learn the lessons from history.

Besides the lessons and experience, history conceals the culture identity of a nation. We will learn our custom, culture and sprits, which are essential to every ethnic. History will reflect the wisdom and value system of one nation. That's why so many historian, thinkers and poets study history. They analyze history and merge the essence to their works which enlighten more people. Without culture identity, a nation can not be consolidated and the ability of every person can't be aggregated to push the advancement of the whole society.

To sum up, though our living style has been changed greatly in the long history, human nature and momentum to advance concealed behind the appearance remains constant. Moreover, history is a great textbook which will enable us to avoid the similar mistakes and the root of every nation.