Ex.1. Practice saying these words.

[L]	[W]	[Ou]
law	word	imposed
ought	refer	social
enforced	work	most
important	preserve	so
	personal
	learn

 

[w]	[D]	[N]
word	rather	belong
between	another	meaning
with	within	establishing
without	together	stealing
ways		killing
would

 

Ex.2. Use the text and give the English equivalents for:

1. различные формы поведения –

2. природное явление –

3. предписывать что-то –

4. описывать что-то –

5. ограничение скорости –

6. обычаи –

7. нарушать правила –

8. понести наказание –

9. высмеять, смеяться над кем-то –

10. поддерживать, сохранять порядок –

11. сохранять жизнь –

12. защищать собственность –

13. жить подобно хищникам –

14. ограничивать свободу –

15. необходимые ограничения –

 

Ex.3. Read the text again and answer the questions.

1. What does the English word “law” refer to?

2. What kinds of laws do you know?

3. What are descriptive laws like?

4. What do prescriptive laws do?

5. Which laws are relations between people regulated by?

6. What can these laws be like?

7. How do we learn customs?

8. What may happen if we continually break the rules?

9. What does “maintaining order” mean?

10. What was the most important function of law to Thomas Hobbes?

11. How did he describe life without law?

12. How would people live without rules?

13. What is the basic function of law?

14. What does every law restrict?

15. Why are these restrictions necessary?

Ex.4. Read the text again and correct these statements.

e.g. The English word “law” refers to limits upon various forms of thinking.
The English word “law” does not refer to limits upon various forms of thinking.
The English word “law” refers to limits upon various forms of behaviour.

1. Descriptive laws simply describe how people look.

2. Prescriptive laws prescribe how people ought to run.

3. In all societies relations between people are regulated by descriptive laws.

4. We learn customs through the Constitution.

5. The ways in which people talk, eat and work are called laws.

6. Order is poor in meaning.

7. To Thomas Hobbes, destroying life was the most important function of law.

8. Without rules people would live like “angels”.

9. Every law extends a person’s freedom.

10. These restrictions are usually useless.

 

 

Ex.5. Use the text and fill in the gaps with the proper prepositions.

1. The English word “law” refers ______ limits _______ various forms _______ behaviour.

2. We accept some rules if we belong _______ particular social institutions.

3. And some are precise laws made _____ nations and enforced ____ all citizens _____ their power.

4. The ways ____ which people talk, eat and drink, work and relax together are usually called customs.

5. Order is rich ____ meaning. Let’s start _____ “law and order”.

6. He described life _____ law as life _____ “a state ______ nature”.

7. The basic function ___ law, then, is to provide rules governing people ____ their relationships ____ others.

8. Every law restricts a person’s freedom ____ some extent.

Ex.6. Match these words with their definitions.

1. law	a) general accepted behaviour in a social group
2. limit	b) a statement explaining what someone can or cannot do in a particular system, game or situation
3. order	c) the way that people or animals act
4. rule	d) the state of things when law or authority is obeyed
5. custom	e) an official rule that controls the way things are done
6. penalty	f) the people who live in a country, their organization and their way of life
7. regulation	g) an official rule that all the citizens of the country must obey
8. behaviour	h) the group of people who are officially responsible for controlling the country
9. society	i) a punishment that someone is given for doing something which is against a law or rule
10. government	j) a point beyond which a person or thing cannot go

 

Ex.7. Fill in the gaps in the table

Verb	Noun	Adjective
1)	2)	Various
describe	3)	4)
prescribe	5)	6)
	religion	7)
educate	8)	9)
ridicule	10)	11)

 

Ex.8. Use your answers in Ex.3 and get ready to retell the text.

 

 

Read the text

The Need For Law

Mr. Jones, having murdered his wife, was burying her in the garden one night, when his neighbour, hearing the noise, asked him what he was doing.

“Just burying the cat”, said Mr. Jones

“Funny sort of time to bury a cat”, said the neighbour

“Funny sort of cat”, said Mr. Jones

Now it is obvious to everyone that, in a community such as the one which we live, some kind of law is necessary to try to prevent people like Mr. Jones from killing their wives. When the world was at a very primitive stage, there was no such law, and, if a man chose to kill his wife or if a woman succeeded in killing her husband, that was their own business and no one interfered officially.

But, for a very long time now, members of every community have made laws for themselves in self-protection. Otherwise, it would have meant that the stronger man could have done what he liked with the weaker, and bad men could have joined together and terrorized the whole neighbourhood.

If it were not for the law, you could not go out in broad daylight without the fear of being kidnapped, robbed or murdered. There are far, far more good people in the world than bad ones, but there are enough of the bad to make law necessary in the interests of everyone.

There is no difficulty in understanding this but it is just as important to understand that law is not necessary just because there are bad people in the world. If we were all as good as we ought to be, laws would still be necessary. If we never told lies, never took anything that didn't belong to us, never omitted to do anything that we ought to do and never did anything that we ought not to do, we should still require a set of rules of behaviour, in other words laws, to enable us to live in any kind of satisfactory state.

How is one good man in a motor-car to pass another good man also in a motor-car coming in the opposite direction, unless there is some rule of the road? People sometimes hover in front of one another when they are walking on the pavement before they can pass, and they may even collide. Not much harm is done, but, if two good men in motor-cars going in opposite direction hover in front of one another, not knowing which side to pass, the result will probably be that there will be two good men less in the world.

 

So you can see that there must be laws, however good we may be. Unfortunately, there are none of us always good and some of us are bad, or at any rate have our bad moments, and so the law has to provide for all kinds of possibilities. Suppose you went to a greengrocer and bought some potatoes and found on your return home that they were mouldy or even that some of them were stones, what could you do if there were no laws on the subject? In the absence of law you could only rely upon “the law of the jungle”. You could go back to the shop, demand proper potatoes and hit the shopkeeper on the nose if he refused to give them to you. You might then look round the shop to try to find some decent potatoes. While you were doing this, the shopkeeper might hit you on the back of the neck with a pound weight. Altogether not a very satisfactory morning's shopping!

Or you might pay your money to go to see a film at a cinema. You might go inside, sit down and wait. When the cinema was full, there might be flash on the screen: “You've had it, Chums”. And that might be the whole of the entertainment. If there were no law, the manager could safely remain on the premises and, as you went out, smile at you and say: “Hope you've enjoyed the show, sir”. That is to say, he could do this safely if he were bigger than you or had a well-armed bodyguard.

 

Every country tries, therefore, to provide laws which help its people to live safely and as comfortably as possible. This is not at all an easy thing to do, and no country has been successful in producing laws which are entirely satisfactory. But we are far better off with the imperfect laws which we have, than if we had none at all.

 

Ex.9. Practiсe saying these words.

[x]	[R]	[Qu]
cat	garden	now
man	far	out
bad	pass	round
kidnapped	harm	pound
absence	demand	down
back	armed
satisfactory

 

[QI]	[eI]
night	neighbour
time	stage
wife	enable
terrorized	state
lies	weight
kind	pay
rely	wait
	remain

 

Ex.10. Use the text and give English equivalents to:

1. убивать -

2. хоронить -

3. преуспевать в чем-либо -

4. вмешиваться -

5. похищать людей -

6. грабить -

7. сталкиваться -

8. в интересах кого-либо -

9. пренебрегать чем-либо; избегать что-либо -

10. полагаться, рассчитывать на что-либо -

11. в отсутствии чего-либо -

12. предотвращать что-либо, удерживать от чего-либо -

13. принадлежать кому-либо, чему-либо -

14. болтаться, вертеться, колебаться, метаться -

15. давать право, возможность –