All 12 Uses of
summon
in
The Scarlet Letter
- These old gentlemen—seated, like Matthew at the receipt of custom, but not very liable to be summoned thence, like him, for apostolic errands—were Custom-House officers.
p. 11.9summoned = called to come
- This warmer light mingles itself with the cold spirituality of the moon-beams, and communicates, as it were, a heart and sensibilities of human tenderness to the forms which fancy summons up.
p. 30.3summons = calls
- Perhaps there was a more real torture in her first unattended footsteps from the threshold of the prison than even in the procession and spectacle that have been described, where she was made the common infamy, at which all mankind was summoned to point its finger.
p. 55.2summoned = called forth
- Lifting the iron hammer that hung at the portal, Hester Prynne gave a summons, which was answered by one of the Governor's bond servants—a free-born Englishman, but now a seven years' slave.
p. 71.5summons = call
- If the same multitude which had stood as eye-witnesses while Hester Prynne sustained her punishment could now have been summoned forth, they would have discerned no face above the platform nor hardly the outline of a human shape, in the dark grey of the midnight.
p. 99.3summoned = called
- The earliest riser, coming forth in the dim twilight, would perceive a vaguely-defined figure aloft on the place of shame; and half-crazed betwixt alarm and curiosity, would go knocking from door to door, summoning all the people to behold the ghost—as he needs must think it—of some defunct transgressor.
p. 101.8 *summoning = calling to come
- He being gone, she summoned back her child.
p. 119.4summoned = called to come
- At last, while attending a sick chamber, whither the Rev. Mr. Dimmesdale had been summoned to make a prayer, she learnt that he had gone, the day before, to visit the Apostle Eliot, among his Indian converts.
p. 123.5
- Be, if thy spirit summon thee to such a mission, the teacher and apostle of the red men.
p. 133.9summon = call
- And does he now summon me to its fulfilment, by suggesting the performance of every wickedness which his most foul imagination can conceive?
p. 148.3
- Left alone, the minister summoned a servant of the house, and requested food, which, being set before him, he ate with ravenous appetite.
p. 150.9summoned = called
- It summoned him onward—inward to the festival!
p. 167.6
Definition:
to call forth
The exact meaning of summon can depend upon its context. For example:
- "summon to court" -- officially demand that someone appear in court (call them to court)
- "summon the team to a meeting" -- call upon the team members to attend a meeting
- "summon help" -- call others to come and help
- "summon her courage" -- call forth her courage from within