atmosphere in the Puritan settlement. 'iron-clamped oaken door.¡ This is used to represent the rigorous enforcement of the laws and the inability to break free of them. The prison door itself also serves as a metaphor for the authority of the regime, which will not tolerate deviance. Hawthorne then deliberately challenges this notion by placing Ann Hutchinson¡s name in the opening page. Ann Hutchinson was a religious woman who challenged Puritanical teachings and was the imprisoned in Boston. Hawthorne then uses the symbolism of the rose bush to embody his feelings about Puritanism. 'The rose-bush, by a strange chance, has been kept alive in history; but whether it has merely survived out of the stern old wilderness.¡ This is used to imply that the Puritanical authoritarianism may be too rigid, to the point of obliterating things of beauty. That freedom in religion could be found in this settlement but it faced harsh opposition shown here as the starker backdrop of the 'old wilderness.' The Puritans had many hopes for their new settlement. They had left their homes in England in pursuit of their religious ideas. King James I of England wanted to rid England of all Puritans. When they asked him to "purify" the state Church of England of certain ceremonies and usages derived from the Roman Catholic Church his reply was severe. "I will make them conform or I will harry them out of the land." These Puritans were not dangerous revolutionists but plain citizens of England who sought out their religious Utopia in America. However, Hawthorne¡s presentation o
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