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Hope In An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge

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Hope: The Battery for the Soul Christianity has three theological virtues that are more important than all others: faith, love and hope. While the Bible says, "love never ends," hope is a virtue that is specifically meant for life on Earth. Faith and love are mindsets for the present, whereas hope looks towards the future. (Encyclopedia Britannica) Although the greatest of the theological virtues is love, which is one's mindset towards others, and faith is one's own internal mindset, hope is a virtue that it both internal and external. A Christian, or really, any person at all, needs to have a hopeful viewpoint in life in order to thrive. If a man has hope, then he will also feel the inclination to share hope with others. As a theme, hope …show more content…

The story focuses on the execution of Peyton Farquhar, a Confederate sympathizer captured by the Union. Right as Farquhar is about to be hanged, though, he imagines himself escaping. The rest of the story takes place inside his fantasy, within a few seconds before his death. Within the fantasy, Farquhar makes it all the way back to his home, but snaps out of his dream right before reuniting with his wife and children. (Bovey) Despite being faced with impending demise, Farquhar refused to simply give up without a fight. This demonstrates how hope can be synonymous with determination. Farquhar's fantasy eventually ends, though, and with it, his life. However, what Farquhar's example teaches is that hope will fight until the very end, never quitting even when defeat is clearly inevitable. An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge shows that even in the most impossible situation, when one is mere seconds before death that hope can still remain. (Graves) Although the story will horrify its viewer with its grim ending, it possesses the underlying lesson that hope will fight to the very end. The power of hope within one's own mind can even transcend the boundaries of space and time, as seen through the main character's pre-death hallucination. However, what one would consider to be hope may not actually be as powerful, if it is not genuine. Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations demonstrates this, by comparing the hopes of its two main characters, Magwitch and Pip. Magwitch, a man who has been exiled from his homeland for a crime he did not commit, uses hope as his anchor in order bear his unjust punishment. In many ways, his hope for a better tomorrow is all that

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