2012-02-17 09:00:40

The ______ effects of the concoction were exaggerated; in fact, the peddler could not really guarantee that the so-called “cure all” he was selling had any ______ effects at all.

A) deleterious…innocuous
B) tonic…enervating
C) salubrious…medicinal
D) imaginative…dire
E) beneficial…cataclysmic

The correct answer is C

To find the correct answer, use key words in the sentence. The most important phrase in this particular sentence is the phrase “in fact.” This phrase links the two clauses and suggests that the second clause of this sentence elaborates on the first clause. This means that the two clauses must more or less state the same information. As both missing words describe the “effects” of the “concoction” or “cure all,” the two missing words must mean the same thing. Additionally, since the prompt implies that the concoction was “exaggerated” as a “cure all,” the type of “effects” described must have been healthful ones, meaning the two missing words must both mean “healthful.” Because salubrious means healthful or promoting good health and medicinal means curative or working like a medicine, choice C is correct.

None of the other choices work, either:

Deleterious: harmful and innocuous: harmless (thus, the two words have opposite meanings, not similar meanings)

Tonic: invigorating or restorative of health and enervating: weakening (thus, the two words have opposite meanings, not similar meanings)

Imaginative: fanciful or showing great creativity and dire: terrible or dreadful (neither word relates to a “cure all,” and the two words have no clear relationship)

Beneficial: advantageous or helpful and cataclysmic: relating to a violent upheaval (only the first word could work in context and the two words do not have similar meanings)