Overview

Huddled on dank ships and tossed about in the waves of the Atlantic, English Puritans envisioned a new society predicated on the values of individual and communal humility. Pride, a pervasive sin, jeopardized their very survival and incited God’s wrath. The first generation of New England settlers, deeply affected by the miseries of their migration experience, crafted New England society on the dichotomy of pride and humility. Embracing demonstrative suffering as essential, Puritans embraced perpetual martyrdom, often taking great pride in the extent of their humiliation. This ideology affected self-perceptions and informed legal codes, theology, and community values. Anxieties around pride resulted in violent efforts to eradicate “proud” individuals, but also whole communities as demonstrated by the Pequot War (1636-37). The dichotomy of pride and humility permeated all aspects of New England Puritanism.

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Sandra Slater, Ph.D. (2009), University of Kentucky, is an Associate Professor of History at the College of Charleston and a scholar of the early modern Atlantic world who focuses primarily on New England. Her work has appeared in the Journal of Early American History, in Church History, and in French Colonial History.

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