Directions: Select the option that fills in the blanks most suitably (in the same order).

The impact of recently published collection of essays, written during and about the last presidential campaign is lessened by its timing, it comes too late to affect us with its _______ and too soon for us to read it out of historical ________.

The first part of the sentence implies that the impact of the publication of the essays about the presidential campaigns is less than what it might have been, had it been published either earlier or much later than at present. If it had been published earlier, it would had the merit of topicality. If it had been published much later, it would have had historical value. The pair of words which gives this meaningful sense to the sentence is in (4), which is the answer. (you could also have approached the question with the argument that the phrases 'historical anxiety', 'historical consistency', 'historical skepticism' and 'historical respect' do not make sense and that 'historical curiosity' is the only possible choice for the second missing word).