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Back to Classroom-tested Lesson Plans and Handouts
The
Puritan Mind
Reading 1:
Profane no Divine ordinance.
Touch no state matters.
Urge no healths.
Pick no quarrels.
Encourage no vice.
Repeat no grievances.
Reveal no secrets.
Maintain no ill opinions.
Make no comparisons.
Keep no bad company.
Make no long meals.
Lay no wagers.
The twelve good rules of Puritan
behavior
Reading 2:
In Adam's Fall
We Sinned all.
Thy Life to Mend
This Book Attend.
The Cat doth play
And after flay.
A dog will bite
A Thief at night.
The Idle Fool
Is whipt at school.
The New England Primer, 1691
Reading 3:
Surely there is in all children...a
stubbornness and stoutness of mind arising from natural pride,
which must, in the first place be broken and beaten down; that
so the foundation of their education being laid in humility
and tractableness, other virtues may, in their time, be built
thereon. For the beating and keeping down of this stubbornness
parents must provide carefully...that the children's wills and
willfulness be restrained and repressed, and that, in time;
lest sooner than they imagine, the tender springs grow to that
stiffness, that they will rather break than bow.
John Robinson
Reading 4:
God's universal law gave to
man despotic power
Over his female in due awe.
John Milton
Reading 5:
Some false principles were these:
1. That a man might sell as dear as he can, and buy as cheap
as he can.
2. If a man lose by casualty of sea in some of this commodities,
he may raise the price of the rest.
3. That he may sell as he bought, though he paid too dear and
though the commodity be fallen.
4. That, as a man may take the advantage of his own skill and
ability, so he may of another's ignorance or necessity....
John Winthrop, 1649
Reading 6:
The God that holds you over
the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome
insect over the fire, abhors you and is dreadfully provoked.
His wrath toward you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy
of nothing else but to be cast into the fire.
Jonathan Edwards, 1734
1. Identify
the basic Puritan beliefs illustrated in these quotations.
2. What do
these quotations suggest about Puritan attitudes toward women
and children?
3. In what
ways did the Puritans attempt to make religion a controlling
force in everyday life?
4. Based
on these quotations, do you consider Puritanism a repressive
and intolerant moral and religious code or as a rigorous and
realistic attempt to face up to the harsh realities of life?
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