Scarlet Letter Response Essay

Pick one of the below passages from the Scarlet Letter. Write a well crafted essay in which you reflect on the meaning of the quote.

It must be typed, double spaced, use MLA formatting, proper grammar, punctuation, and spelling. The length should be between 2 and 4 pages.

You may explain:
-how the passage connects to your own life/world view
-how it reflects themes and concepts from the novel
-how it expresses a Romantic ideal
-any combination of the above


a. Be true! Be True! Be True! Show freely the world, if not your worst, yet some trait whereby the worst may be inferred.

b. Love, whether newly born, or aroused from a deathlike slumber, must always create sunshine, filling the heart so full of radiance, that it overflows upon the outward world.

c. It is a curious subject of observation and inquiry, whether hatred and love be not the same thing at bottom. Each, in its utmost development, supposes a high degree of intimacy and heart-knowledge; each renders one individual dependent for the food of his affections and spiritual life upon another; each leaves the passionate lover, or the no less passionate hater, forlorn and desolate by the withdrawal of his object.

d. To the untrue man, the whole universe is false,- it is impalpable,- it shrinks to nothing within his grasp.

e. No man for any considerable period can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.

f. In our nature, however, there is a provision, alike marvelous and merciful, that the sufferer should never know the intensity of what he endures by its present torture, but chiefly by the pang that rankles after it.