1.How to grow old
How to grow old(如何安度晚年)壹文出自英國哲學家和數學家伯特蘭·羅素的同名演講，新概念4的課本只節選了其中的壹部分，完整版演講可參見：/Rjj5twB
羅素的人生經歷相當精彩，他出生於英國貴族家庭，早年進入的劍橋大學三壹學院，後來當選為英國皇家學會院士。羅素於1950年獲得諾貝爾文學獎，以表彰其“西歐思想，*最勇敢的君子，卓越的活力，勇氣，智慧與感受性，代表了諾貝爾獎的原意和精神”。除了在數學和哲學上的貢獻之外，他還是壹名和平主義者，在80多歲的高齡還積極參加反戰與核裁軍運動。How to grow old這篇演講也是其人生信條的體現。
害怕死亡是人類的人性，而羅素認為，對於壹個經歷了生命中各種起起落落的人來說，害怕死亡並不是壹件高尚的事情。怎樣更好地面對生老病死呢?羅素給出了答案：
The best way to overcome it—so at least it seems to me – is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal, until bit by bit the walls of the ego recede, and your life becomes increasingly merged in the universal life. An individual human existence should be like a river – small at first, narrowly contained within its banks, and rushing passionately past boulders and over waterfalls. Gradually the river grows wider, the banks recede, the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their individual being.
羅素認為，克服死亡恐懼的方式是逐漸使自己的興趣更加廣泛，逐漸擺脫個人狹小的圈子，直到自我的圍墻壹點壹點倒塌下來，讓自己的生命與整個宇宙的生活融為壹體。作者在這裏用了壹個很精彩的比喻：生命就像壹條河流，最初窄小，限於兩岸。青春時激情澎湃，沖過巖石，投入飛瀑。漸漸地河流變寬，河岸退遠，水流轉趨平靜，最終融入大海，毫無痛苦地失去了自我的存在。從語言角度來分析，上面的句子沒有壹個大詞，但讀起來非常舒服，這種寫作風格是非常值得我們借鑒的。
此外，這篇文章中還使用了委婉語(euphemism)的修飾方式：
And if, with the decay of vitality, weariness increases, the thought of rest will be not unwelcome.
rest 在這裏並不是指“休息”，而是death的委婉說法，因此the thought of rest應該理解為“有長眠的想法”。will be not unwelcome是雙重否定，用來表達出肯定含義，但它的語氣比will be welcome弱，可以理解為“未嘗不是好事”。
2.Beauty
Beauty壹文節選自英國哲學家C. E. M. Joad的書籍Pieces of Mind，C. E. M. Joad在早期信奉不可知論(agnosticism)，認為第壹原則的確定性或絕對真理無法達到，只有可感覺的現象才是真正意識的對象，這篇文章也體現了他的不可知論思想。
在新4中Beauty屬於比較難的壹篇文章，它不僅在語言上比較難懂，表達的思想也比較抽象。例如：
But, if this world is not merely a bad joke, life a vulgar flare amid the cool radiance of the stars, and existence an empty laugh braying across the mysteries; if these intimations of a something behind and beyond are not evil humor born of indigestion, or whimsies sent by the devil to mock and madden us, if, in a word, beauty means something, yet we must not seek to interpret the meaning.
這句話開始讀不太好理解，因為這是壹個被省略了的排比結構，還原後是 if this world is not merely a bad joke, (if) life (is not merely) a vulgar flare amid the cool radiance of the stars, and (if) existence (is not merely) an empty laugh… 這種省略現象有時候會在文學作品中出現。a something behind and beyond中something作為名詞，所以前面用不定冠詞，behind and beyond 在這裏是指“玄妙的”。
句子的用詞很有畫面感，比如an empty laugh braying across the mysteries 其中bray壹詞專門指人“刺耳大笑”(if someone brays, they laugh or talk in a loud, slightly annoying way)，life a vulgar flare amid the cool radiance of the stars則將人生比作群星寒光中平凡的壹次閃爍。
句子最後部分 if, in a word, beauty means something, yet we must not seek to interpret the meaning(壹句話，如果美有某種意義的話，我們千萬不要去闡明它的意義)，這裏作者之所以這麽說是因為他認為美是不可知的，用語言來闡明美的行為是徒勞無功的。如果想進壹步了解作者的思想可以閱讀他的圖書Pieces of Mind
3.Galileo reborn
Galileo reborn(伽利略重生)是新4中思辨性比較強的壹篇文章。伽利略是意大利物理學家、數學家以及天文學家，是16和17世紀科學革命的重要人物。他因為支持哥白尼的日心說以及宣揚科學理論而遭到宗教法庭的*。在人們的傳統認知中，這些在當時反對伽利略的人是在反對科學和進步，應該遭到嚴厲譴責。但作者在此提出了不同的觀點：在伽利略的那個年代觀測儀器並不夠精確，人們完全有理由懷疑望遠鏡裏面看到的是幻影，而不是事實。因此，壹味譴責當時的反對派並不合理。要正確評價人物需要結合歷史背景。
在這篇文章中出現了不少好句子，例如：
He was, above all, a man who experimented: who despised the prejudices and book learning of the Aristotelians, who put his questions to nature instead of to the ancients, and who drew his conclusions fearlessly.
這個句子連用了四個由who引導的修飾a man的定語從句，這四個句子構成了排比結構，能夠極大增強句子的語氣。如果去掉這個排比結構，將句子寫成：
He was, above all, a man who experimented, and he despised the prejudices and book learning of the Aristotelians. He also put his questions to nature instead of to the ancients and drew his conclusions fearlessly.
整個句子讀起來明顯沒有原句那麽有力。
又比如全文最後壹句：
We can perhaps forgive those who said the moons of Jupiter were produced by Galileo’s spyglass if we recall that in his day, as for centuries before, curved glass was the popular contrivance for producing not truth but illusion, untruth; and if a single curved glass would distort nature, how much more would a pair of them?
最後壹句話補全後是：…and if a single curved glass would distort nature, how much more would a pair of them (distort nature)? 這裏結尾的反問讓人印象深刻：既然在當時壹片曲面鏡就可以歪曲自然，那麽伽利略的兩片曲面鏡對自然的歪曲又該多大呢?由此引發讀者思考應該如何正確評價歷史人物。同樣，如果把上面的反問句改為陳述句：
…and if a single curved glass would distort nature, a pair of them would certainly do more to distort it.
句子的表達效果就會大打擇扣。