Scarlet Letter Vocabulary
Part 1:
- “Almost as seasonably(able) as they marked out the first burial ground...”
Able: ableappropriate time; right time of year
- “The rust on the ponderous iron-work of its oaken door looked more antique than anything else in the new world.”
Pond: weightmassive; having great weight
Ous: full of
- “Finding it so directly on the threshold of our narrative, which is now about to issue forth from this inauspicious portal…”
In: in/notominous; a sign of future despair
Ous: full of
- “Amongst any other population… the grim rigidity that petrified the bearded physiognomies of these good people would have argued some awful business in hand.”
Phys: nature
Gno: knowoutward appearance of facial features
- “But, in that early severity of the puritan character, an inference of this kind could not so indubitably (able) be drawn…”
In: in/notunquestionably; not able to be doubted
Able: Able
- “Meagre, indeed, and cold, was the sympathy that atransgressor might look for, from such bystanders at the scaffold”
Trans: acrossone who violates the law; to cross the line (transgression)
Gress: step
- “No sense ofimpropriety kept these women from elbowing their way to the front, even at the hanging”
Im: in or not
Pro: forwarda failure to follow society’s standard of decency; improper
- “It would be greatly for the public behoof, if we women, being of mature age and church-members in good repute, should have the handling of such malefactressesas this Hester Prynne.”
Mal: badwomen who violate the law or do evil
Fac: to do
- “A blessing on the righteous colony of the Massachusetts, whereiniquity dragged out into the open!”
In: in/nota wicked, unjust or unrighteous act; sin
- “Possibly, it was an instinctive device of her spirit, to relieve itself, by the exhibition of these phantasmagoric forms, from the cruel weight and hardness of the reality.”
Phan: appearance; showa rapid sequence of images or visions
- “Knowing your natural temper better than I, he could the better judge what arguments to use, whether of tenderness or terror, such as might prevail over your hardness and obstinacy; insomuch that you should no longer hide the name of him who tempted you to this grievous fall”
Ob: againstpersistent stubbornness; unyielding; being difficult
- “…and, I promise you, Mistress Prynne shall hereafter be more amenable to just authority than you may found her heretofore.”
A: not or withoutwilling to answer; open to suggestion
Able: able
- “Throughout them all, giving up her individuality, she would become the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point, and in which they might vivify and embody their images of a woman’s frailty and sinful passion…”
Viv: lifeto give life to; lively or active; animate
Fy: make
14.“A wise sentence!” remarked the stranger, gravely bowing his head. “Thus she will be a living sermon against sin, until the ignominious letter be engraved upon her tombstone. It irks me, nevertheless, that the partner of her iniquity should not, at least, stand on the scaffold by her side.”
Gno: knowdishonor; public contempt; humiliation
ous: full of
Part 2:
- “Again, a mystic sisterhood would contumaciously assert itself, as she met the sanctified frown of some matron, who, according to the rumor of all tongues, had kept cold snow within her bosom throughout life.”
- “It was as if a new birth, with stronger assimilations than the first, had converted the forest-land, still so uncongenial to every other pilgrim and wanderer, into Hester Prynne’s wild and dreary, but life-long home”
- “Baby-linen--for babies then wore robes of state--afforded still another possibility of toil and emolument…”
- “This outward mutability indicated, and did not more than fairly express, the various properties of her inner life”
- “She remembered—betwixt a smile and a shudder—the talk of the neighbouring townspeople; who, seeking vainly elsewhere for the child’s paternity, and observing some of her odd attributes, had given out that poor little Pearl was a demon offspring”
- “The young minister, on ceasing to speak, had withdrawn a few steps from the group, and stood with his face partially concealed in the heavy folds of the window-curtain; while the shadow of his figure, which the sunlight cast upon the floor, was tremulous with the vehemence(ment)of his appeal”
- “Two or three individuals hinted that the man of skill, during his Indian captivity, had enlarged his medical attainments by joining in theincantations of the savage priests…”
- “To sum up the matter, it grew to be a widely diffused opinion, that the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, like many other personages of especial sanctity, in all ages of the Christian world, was haunted either by Satan himself, or Satan’s emissary, in the guise of old Roger Chillingworth.”
- “Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, at noon day and entirely unawares, fell into a deep, deep slumber, sitting in his chair, with a large black-letter volume open before him on the table. It must have been a work of vast ability in the somniferous school of literature.”
- “While thus suffering under bodily disease, and gnawed and tortured by some black trouble of the soul, and given over to the machinations (machy) of his deadliest enemy, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale had achieved a brilliant popularity in his sacred office.”
- “The earliest riser... half crazed betwixt alarm and curiosity, would go... summoning all the people to behold the ghost- as he needs must think it- of some defunct transgressor.”
- “Forgive, and leave his further retribution to the Power that claims it! I said, but now, that there could be no good event for him, or thee, or me, who are here wandering together in this gloomy maze of evil, and stumbling, at every step, over the guilt wherewith we have strewn our path.”
- “All these giant trees and boulders of granite seemed intent on making a mystery of the course of this small brook; fearing, perhaps, that, with its never-ceasing loquacity, it should whisper tales out of the heart of the old forest whence it flowed, or mirror its revelations on the smooth surface of a pool.”
- “Such was the sympathy of Nature- that wild, heathen nature of the forest, never be subjugated by human law, nor illumined by higher truth-with the bliss of these two spirits!”
- “But Pearl, not a whit startled at her mother’s threats, any more mollified(fy)by her entreaties...”