作文一直可以说是考试的重难点，也是让考生最头疼的内容，作文除了需要我们有一定的词汇积累，也需要我们不间断的练习和总结，练习多了才能熟能生巧，才能下笔成章，下面来一起练习一下这篇英语四级作文吧，希望考生能够更好地为12月份的四六级考试提前做好准备。

　　Youth

　　Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of pink cheeks, red lips and flexible knees; it is a matter of will, a quality of imagination, a vigor of the emotion, it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.

　　Youth means a dispositional control of courage over cowardice, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of 60 more than a boy of 20. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals.

　　Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.

　　Whether 60 or 16, there is in every human beings’ heart the looking forward to wonder, the endless child-like appetite of what’s next and the joy of the game of living.① In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station: so long as it is receiving messages of beauty, hope, cheer, courage and power from men and from God, you are young.②

　　When the aerials are down, and your spirit is covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you are grown old, even at 20, but as long as your aerials are up to catch waves of optimism, there is hope you may die young at 80.

　　作文点评

　　文章一开始使用了一组排比，用四个it is …句型给youth下了定义。第二段将60岁和20岁的人进行对比，从而得出结论：年轻不是单纯指年龄，而是指心态。读到这里，读者可能会提出质疑：那要如何保持心态的年轻呢?作者紧紧抓住读者的心理，在第四段中用a wireless station为例，形象地描述了保持年轻的方法。最后一段将对比the aerials are down和aerials are up进行对比，提出号召：只要乐观向上，我们就能够永远年轻。进一步深化了主题。

　　重点词汇

　　imagination n. 想象力，幻觉

　　dispositional a. 有某种性情的

　　cowardice n. 怯懦 胆小

　　appetite n. 胃口，食欲

　　enthusiasm n. 热情，积极性

　　wrinkle n. 皱纹;v. 起皱

　　aerial n. 天线

　　cynicism n. 愤世嫉俗，玩世不恭

　　pessimism n. 悲观，悲观主义

　　optimism n. 乐观，乐观主义