Question

Read the paragraph about William Butler Yeats’ beliefs and answer the question.

According to Yeats, a belief in a universal consciousness, called "Spiritus Mundi, " connects all intelligent people through their perception of common truths.

To what event does "Spiritus Mundi" refer in the second stanza of his poem, "The Second Coming"?
A)an expectation of a certain catastrophe signaling victory over evil
B)a common fear of an approaching annihilation by nuclear force
C)the inevitable reality of mass destruction by a common enemy
D)a dismal prospect of total devastation of the natural environment

Answer 1

The correct option is option D. A dismal prospect of total devastation of the natural environment.

When the speaker talks about:

"When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi  

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert  

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,  

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,  

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it  

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. "

Is in fact referring to the birds as a symbol for Nature in its sharpest, cleanest sense. Humankind is destroying the Nature and has to face the consequences, in today's world that translates in the effects of  climate change and global warming the humans provoked, bringing deserts where once were rivers and falls.