Analyze Puritanism’s connection to the religious tenets of Calvinism by examining the Puritan texts we read this semester. How do texts such as Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation, Winthrop’s “A Model of Christian Charity,” and Mary Rowlandson’s captivity narrative reflect Puritanism as a culture, religion, and political belief system? This prompt would perhaps, via the texts we’ve read, focus on explaining such things as the affect such ideas as total depravity, predestination, and limited atonement had on Puritan culture.

Choose one of the following writing prompts below and write a 5-6 double-spaced page essay (1250-1500 words) that fully answers the prompt using literary analysis (argumentation via textual citation).

Prompts:
* Analyze Puritanism’s connection to the religious tenets of Calvinism by examining the Puritan texts we read this semester. How do texts such as Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation, Winthrop’s “A Model of Christian Charity,” and Mary Rowlandson’s captivity narrative reflect Puritanism as a culture, religion, and political belief system? This prompt would perhaps, via the texts we’ve read, focus on explaining such things as the affect such ideas as total depravity, predestination, and limited atonement had on Puritan culture.
* Analyze Hawthorne’s fictionalization of Puritan culture in either (or both) “The May-Pole of Merry Mount” and “The Young Goodman Brown.” What critical arguments does Hawthorne’s short stories make about the historical legacy of Puritanism on American culture? What moral arguments does his stories make about Puritanism as a worldview and belief system?
*Analyze the Enlightenment as a worldview and philosophy by examining the texts that we’ve read from that period. This prompt might focus on the ideas of individualism, rationality, historical progress, self-making, social mobility, government, etc., as the focus of your answer. What are some of the positive and negative aspects that Enlightenment thought contributed to American society? How, for instance, did writers such as Equaino, Wheatley, and Murray criticize certain aspects of Enlightenment culture?
* Analyze Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography as an ethical system. As many scholars have suggested, Franklin’s reason for writing his memoirs was not just to leave behind his life story but also to promote a new system of ethics for the modern world, based on individualism and secularism. This prompt would focus on arguing how Franklin promotes such an ethical system in his autobiography, and would also explain what new values his ethical system promotes. Comparing and contrasting his views in comparison to Puritan texts or other Enlightenment era texts would be appropriate here.
* Analyze the significant differences between Winthrop’s and Madison’s understanding of political order by examining “A Model of Christian Charity” and “Federalist Paper No.10.” What ethical, philosophical, and political differences exist between the two texts? This essay might focus on how differences of religious belief, notions of human nature, or differing political goals factor in the relationship between the two texts.