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How Does John Winthrop Use The Metaphor Of A City On A Hill

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John Winthrop uses the metaphor of “a city on a hill” in order to provide a goal to which the Puritans should aspire in his sermon. The metaphor is used as a image to provide the way that John Winthrop viewed how a Christian should act like. He said that in order to provide for posterity, one must follow “the counsel of Michah to doe justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God…must be knit together..as one man.” () John Winthrop has three reasons why he believed that God wanted everyone to appreciate one another as if they shared the same soul but have different positions in life. These reasons were to hold conformity with the everything in the natural world, to act kind and have a spirit of obedience to manifest the spirit of the ideal
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1331 Words | 6 Pages

He didn’t have the smallest connection with the Church of England. Williams rejected its teachings entirely and demanded complete dissociation between the Church of England and anyone who claimed to be living under God’s command. Winthrop responded by claiming that the people of England were just misled Christians that needed to be guided back into morality and for this reason, there was no need to completely detach from them. Winthrop’s response showed that even when dealing with opposers he displayed the characteristics of a good leader (Morgan 110-114). Instead of immediately shutting down Williams or ignoring his beliefs, Winthrop exhorted to “meet them with arguments and not merely authority (Morgan 110).

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John winthrop soon became the governor and called the puritan built city the “City upon a hill” The new England colonies were more well rounded with agriculture, lumber, and fishing.

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The puritans brought an upper level of idealism to the first colony they settled in. Their leader John Winthrop used the words “A city upon a hill” to describe it. They found six towns that were setting up churches using the congregationalist structure. The churches taxed the community in order to help pay for certain operations.

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To understand why and how these issues arose in Salem, first look to the history of the Puritans. The Puritans believed that the Anglican Church needed to be purified of the Catholic ideologies. With monarchs of their time disinterested in the idea of reform, many Puritans became discouraged and thought the colonies would give them a better chance to reform the church. John Winthrop along with a few other Puritans in the New World decided to create City on a Hill to set an example of good behavior and religious purity. The Puritans believed that God had made a special covenant with them so they could live according to scripture, reforming the Anglican Church, and set a good example for those who were still living in England.

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The Massachusetts Bay colonists were Puritans seeking religious freedom and purity. After being persecuted for their beliefs in England, they moved to Holland. Before long, parents felt their children were being influenced by the more liberal beliefs of Holland. The next option was to move to the New World where they could raise their children in a private community surrounded by like-minded families. As Puritan lawyer John Winthrop envisioned the new colony he said, “Wee shall be as a Citty upon a Hill, the eies of all people are uppon us.”

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Religion was an essential part of everyday life and it provided individuals with a purpose in life. John Winthrop’s goal was to expand the Protestant community (Puritans) and his main focus was to have a better relationship with God. Winthrop especially desired for all the settlers of New England

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he term "city on a hill" was initially invoked by English-born Puritan leader John Winthrop. The concept became central to the United States' conception of itself as an exceptional and exemplary nation. In 1630, aboard the Arbella before the ship's departure for the New World, Winthrop recited a sermon to his fellow travelers. Drawing upon Matthew 5:14–15, Winthrop articulated his vision of the prospective Puritan colony in New England as "a city upon a hill": an example to England and the world of a truly godly society. According to historian Perry Miller, Winthrop believed that this religious utopia would be acclaimed and imitated across the Old World, precipitating the Puritans' glorious return to England.

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The puritan rhetoric and conception of love does not in any way match with the normal human way of perceiving love. John Winthrop explains it as it is written in the holy Bible, and also expounds it by the use of his knowledge. His explanation out of the Bible are not however as complicated as those of ordinary people, who believe that love is expensive and one has to buy it from a friend. Winthrop convinces the Christians on the simplicity of love, and later brings them to understand that loving one another is the greatest commandment which has a reward at the end. Unlike the rest of the people who are non believers, Winthrop touches on the aspects of love by quoting different verses from the bible.

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The New Englanders took religion seriously, making unitary laws according to Puritan standards. John Winthrop, later chosen as the first Massachusetts Bay Colony governor, was seeking religious freedom. Wishing to inspire the colonists to dwell in brotherly unity, he summoned them together to remind them “that if we [colonists] shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.” On the other hand, those in the Chesapeake region came for the wealth that America promised. They were there to become prosperous or die trying.

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What is literature if not an author’s imaginative response to what occurs around them? John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men is a prime example of just that. His experiences living during the Great Depression in America is reflected through the geography in his book and the meanings behind it. The perceived geography of the novel; the river, the barn, and Crooks’s room; is so simplistic to allow the reader to see the effect of more discrete aspects of the setting. As Thomas Foster says in How to Read Literature like a Professor, “Geography is setting, but it’s also (or can be) psychology, attitudes, finance, industry- anything that place can forge in the people who live there.”

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The values that early American writers considered most important were piety, courage, and industry. They were highly honored by the large Puritan population, and these values helped them survive the beginning of the colonies. Overtime, however, different values were stressed more than others. For example, in “Of Plymouth Plantation,” written around 1620, Bradford chooses to write about the piety, courage, and industry of all the settlers in his settlement. In 1630, Winthrop gave his sermon “A Model of Christian Charity,” and in it he motivates his audience using piety and industry as reasons to succeed.

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The Puritan’s goal of coming to the New World was not to create a new life, but to create the ideal model of living for the “corrupt” inhabitants of England. This was coined “The Errand”, the Puritans desire to establish a City Upon a Hill that others could look up to and imitate in order to receive God’s grace. The Puritans failed at building their City Upon a Hill (creating a perfect religious, economic, and political community), however the long-term effects of their efforts have influenced American moral politics throughout its history. The Puritans forever had the attitude of a community that had successfully established a City Upon a Hill. The Puritan lifestyle was heavily influenced not only by religion, but also inside of that, morality.

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The ideas constructed by the Puritans were not simply a principal starting point for American culture because they were the first in the country, but because they offered distinct ways of thinking that are still deep-seated in our culture today. Although many of the ideas of Puritans have evolved or vanished over time, it is important to give credit to the Puritan writers and thinkers such as John Winthrop and John Cotton who offered ideas that were new at the time and that stayed with the American consciousness—culturally, socially, and politically. “John Winthrop's legacy can be seen primarily in the fields of government, commerce, and religion. It was religion that would most impact John's life; his religion would ultimately impact the

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Purpose: Winthrop’s purpose for creating this sermon was to coax the colonist into creating a “utopia” in the New World; essentially a moral boost. The author used nationalism, imagery, and God to express his sermon towards the Puritans. By evoking God, he’s trying to create fear among the Puritans.

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877 Words | 4 Pages

John Winthrop, a non-separating Puritan, was a leading figure in the founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony that described the goal of this colony in his City Upon a Hill speech in which he says, “We must consider that we shall be as a city

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