To err is human. To blame（责备） the other guy is even more human.
Common sense is not all that common.
Why tell the truth when you can come up with a good excuse?
These three popular misquotes（戏谑的引语）are meant to be jokes, and yet they tell us a lot about human nature. To err, or to make mistakes, is indeed a part of being human, but it seems that most people don’t want to accept the responsibility for the problem. Perhaps it is the natural thing to do. The original quote about human nature went like this: “To err is human, to forgive, divine（神圣的）.” This saying mirrors an ideal: People should be forgiving of others’ mistakes. Instead, we tend to do the opposite – find someone else to pass the blame on to. However, taking responsibility for something that went wrong is a mark of great maturity（成熟）.
Common sense is what we call clear thought. Having common sense means having a good general plan that will make things work well, and it also means staying with the plan. Common sense tells you that you take an umbrella out into a rainstorm, but you leave the umbrella home when you hear a weather forecast for sunshine. Common sense does not seem to be common for large companies, because there are so many things going on that one person cannot be in charge of everything. People say that in a large company, “the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing.”
And what is wrong with a society that thinks that making up a good excuse is like creating a work of art? One of the common problems with making excuses is that people, especially young people, get the idea that it’s okay not to be totally honest all the time. There is a corollary（直接推论）to that: if a good excuse is “good” even if it isn’t honest, then where is the place of the truth?
小题1:Which of the following is NOT based on common sense?
A．A secretary works to a timetable.
B．A company’s next move follows a good plan.
C．A girl goes out with an umbrella in stormy weather.
D．A man tries to manage everything in a large company.小题2:What can we infer from the last paragraph according to the writer?
A．A good excuse is the same as honesty.
B．Inventing a good excuse needs creative ideas.
C．Unpleasant truth is better than a good excuse.
D．Making a good excuse is sometimes a better idea.小题3:What would be the best title for this passage?
A．A Mirror of Human Nature
B．To Blame or to Forgive
C．A Mark of Maturity
D．Truth or Excuse
