Everyone has judged someone else in their life, with or without it being intended, but being judgemental is different than being hypocritical. In The Scarlet Letter, Arthur Dimmesdale was a perfect example of a hypocrite because he committed the sin of adultery with Hester, yet judged her as if he had not. Along with Arthur, the townspeople also showed the hypocrisy of the Puritan society.
Hester Prynne labeled Arthur as a hypocrite, in chapter eighteen, when she said:
None; unless it avail him somewhat, that he was broken down by long and exquisite suffering; that his mind was darkened and confused by the very remorse which harrowed it; that, between fleeing as an avowed criminal, and remaining as a hypocrite, conscience might find it hard
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Arthur exploited Hester because she committed the sin of adultery, and although the reader did not know at this point in the book, Arthur was also guilty of the same sin. “...I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and fellow-sufferer!...though he were to step down from a high place...than to hide a guilty heart through life. What can thy silence do for him except it tempt him-yea, compel him, as it were-to add hypocrisy to sin?” (Hawthorne 65). Arthur told the whole congregation that he would step down from his position of a highly respected preacher if Hester would just say his name, but once again, the congregation did not know that he referred to himself when he said “...though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee on thy pedestal of shame…” (Hawthorne 65). Dimmesdale criticized Hester because she wore the letter abroad, although he could have done the same. “Happy are you, Hester, that wear the scarlet letter openly upon your bosom! Mine burns in secret!... I could daily betake myself and be known as the vilest of sinners… it is all falsehood...” (Hawthorne 188). Arthur was also hypocritical when Hester told him the truth about Roger Chillingworth. Instead of accepting Hester for telling the truth, Arthur was very upset and angered by Hester’s actions because he only saw it as her secret sin. Arthur did not accept the fact that Hester finally spoke out about Roger. After …show more content…
At the end of the book the congregation made excuses for why Arthur stood up on the scaffold with Hester and Pearl. In chapter 22, Hester and Mistress Hibbins argued after they heard and saw Hester and Pearl with Arthur. Many of the townspeople made up lies after “seeing” Arthur’s own “scarlet letter.” Some of the congregation say they saw a mark on Mr. Dimmesdale and others say they saw nothing. Those who saw no mark on his bosom said that Arthur was taking responsibility for Hester’s sins because he knew he was dying. The town referred to him as heavenly. The way the town treated Hester was very hypocritical. A woman at the beginning said this, “I’ll tell ye a piece of my mind. It would be greatly for the public behoof, if we women, being of mature age and church members in good repute, should have the handlings of such malefactresses as Hester Prynne” (Hawthorne 49). After this another woman remarked, “She hath good skill at her needle, that’s certain…” (Hawthorne 52). So in the Puritan society, Hester was not good, but, at the same time, she was. The congregation held a grudge against Hester because she committed a horrible sin, but they adored her because she was great with a needle and some
Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne attempted to expose the varying ways in which different people deal with lingering guilt from sins they have perpetrated. The contrasting characters of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale ideally exemplified the differences in thought and behavior people have for guilt. Although they were both guilty of committing the same crime, these two individuals differed in that one punished themselves with physical and mental torture and the other chose to continue on with their life, devoting it to those less fortunate than they.
Both characters had to live with the shame and guilt, but how they dealt with it during their lives was different. The two both had a physical symbol on them that they had to live with for their whole lives. Unlike Hester, Dimmesdale’s mark was branded on his chest where no one could see it. The community was clueless to what Dimmesdale had done. He concealed his transgression from the town, causing his guilt to build up inside of him. In contrast, everyone knew that Hester had committed adultery. She was forced to stand on a scaffold and be publicly humiliated in front of everyone. The scarlet letter “A” was displayed on her clothes for everyone to see. Instead of Hester being ashamed and living in guilt her whole life, like Dimmesdale did, she used her transgression as a form of strength. Even though Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale committed the same sin, the path in which they took to cope with that sin set them apart as
In The Scarlet Letter, the main characters Hester Prynne, Roger Chillingworth, and Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale are tangled in a web of deceit, which is the result of a sin as deadly as the Grimm Reaper himself: adultery. Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author of The Scarlet Letter, describes the feeling of deceit using the main characters; for each of the cast the reaction to the deceit is different, thus the reader realizes the way a person reacts to a feeling differs between each character.
...rets committing adultery with Hester. In The Scarlet Letter, Arthur Dimmesdale’s appearance, actions, and speech change from the beginning to the end of the novel, making him a dynamic character. Dimmesdale is a young clergyman in the beginning of the novel. He later turns into someone who is emaciated and full of guilt. Furthermore, he treats himself very harshly by whipping and starving himself. Dimmesdale does not trust Roger Chillingworth, but is a good friend to Hester. Even though he feels completely deceived when she tells him that Chillingworth is her husband, they have an honest relationship. He does not think that Hester and he commit the worst sin; he believes that Chillingworth does. Moreover, Chillingworth wants complete revenge on Dimmesdale. The novel ends with Arthur Dimmesdale dying on the scaffold and leaving the whole community in shock.
The Scarlet Letter is full of many psychological and moral aspects, and most of them relate very well to things that are going on right now in the world. They all go hand in hand meaning that the aspects that were explained in The Scarlet Letter, can also be explained in the same way as they can be explained now. Although times were very different in the times where The Scarlet Letter took place, they are all relevant for what people have to say about certain things in today's world. The moral aspects of the Scarlet Letter are almost the same as moral aspects of today.
In ‘The Scarlet Letter’ Nathaniel Hawthorne has created a society in which “religion and law were almost identical” (Hawthorne 57). Just as in any other society, all the members within the limits must obey the law. Disobeying these laws result in punishment. One such character is Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale. After Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale’s affair with Hester Prynne, Hester is forced into a permanent state of shame when she is forced to wear a scarlet letter “A” on her chest. Be that as it may, something isn't right about the Reverend’s retribution. Instead of being shamed publicly, Reverend Dimmesdale’s punishment is much different. Instead of living with the torments of others, Reverend
Hester’s sin is that her passions and love were of more importance to her than the Puritan moral code. This is shown when she says to Dimmesdale, "What we did had a consecration of its own. We felt it so! We said so to each other!" Hester fully acknowledged her guilt and displayed it with pride to the world. This was obvious by the way she displayed the scarlet letter. It was elaborately designed as if to show Hester was proud.
Guilt and shame haunt all three of the main characters in The Scarlet Letter, but how they each handle their sin will change their lives forever. Hester Prynne’s guilt is publicly exploited. She has to live with her shame for the rest of her life by wearing a scarlet letter on the breast of her gown. Arthur Dimmesdale, on the other hand, is just as guilty of adultery as Hester, but he allows his guilt to remain a secret. Instead of telling the people of his vile sin, the Reverend allows it to eat away at his rotting soul. The shame of what he has done slowly kills him. The last sinner in this guilty trio is Rodger Chillingworth. This evil man not only hides his true identity as Hester’s husband, but also mentally torments Arthur Dimmesdale. The vile physician offers his ‘help’ to the sickly Reverend, but he gives the exact opposite. Chillingworth inflicts daily, mental tortures upon Arthur Dimmesdale for seven long years, and he enjoys it. Hester, Dimmesdale, and Chillingworth are all connected by their sins and shame, but what they do in regards to those sins is what sets them apart from each other.
Guilt is a feeling of responsibility or remorse for some offense, crime, wrong, whether real or imagined. There are different types of guilt. Guilt can be caused by a physical thing a person did that he isn’t proud of, or wanted to hide, can be something a person imagined he did to someone or something else, or can be caused when a person did something to his God or religion. Everyone at some time in his or her life has a run in with guilt, and it has a different impact on each person. People, who are feeling guilty because of something they did or said, can influence how other people act and feel. Some people are affected worse by guilt than others, for example, Dimmesdale from The Scarlet Letter. Talked about in The Scarlet Letter, Dimmesdale, a man with the deepest guilt, was responsible for the moral well-being of his people. He went against his teachings, committed adultery, and left the woman to suffer publicly alone while he stayed like a hero in the town. On the other hand, sometimes the masses are affected by one person’s guilt. He was affected much more by guilt, because he didn’t tell anyone of what he had done. By keeping guilt internalized, a person ultimately ends up hurting himself. More than seventy percent of all things that make people feel guilty are found out later on in their life by other people. Guilt has three categories that it affects the most in people: physical, mental, and spiritual.
thou knowest that I was frank with thee. I felt no love, nor feigned any"
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Mr. Dimmesdale’s greatest fear is that the townspeople will find out about his sin of adultery with Hester Prynne. Mr. Dimmesdale fears that his soul could not take the shame of such a disclosure, as he is an important moral figure in society. However, in not confessing his sin to the public, he suffers through the guilt of his sin, a pain which is exacerbated by the tortures of Roger Chillingworth. Though he consistently chooses guilt over shame, Mr. Dimmesdale goes through a much more painful experience than Hester, who endured the public shame of the scarlet letter. Mr. Dimmesdale’s guilt is much more damaging to his soul than any shame that he might have endured.
Roger Chillingworth utilizes his deceptiveness in a number of occasions throughout the novel. For example, in chapter three, Roger Chillingworth innocently approaches Hester Prynne, acting as if he has never once seen her. Roger Chillingworth even interrogates a local townsman about Hester Prynne and her committed sins. This shows that Roger Chillingworth purposely intends to concept a deceptive knowledge of his character in order to disconcert one who may read The Scarlet Letter. Although Roger Chllingworth is the foremost antagonist of the novel, his deceptiveness empowers him to withhold an excessive amount of moral ambiguity. With this moral ambiguity, Roger Chillingworth is able to surreptitiously accomplish a various amount of things, including the death of Arthur Dimmesdale himself.
"No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude without finally becoming bewildered as to which may be true”. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, this quote applies to the two main characters of the novel. It applies to Arthur Dimmesdale in a literal way; he clearly is not the man that he appears to be, and the guilt that goes along with such deception consumes his entire life. The quote also applies to Hester Prynne, but in quite a different way because it was not her choice to wear the “face” that she was forced to wear. The mark of the scarlet letter on her bosom determined how others perceived her and, in turn, how she was expected to perceive herself. At first, Hester did not consider the sin that she committed as blasphemous and horrible as the people of Boston did, but she was forced to wear the “face” of a sinner.
Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, a main character in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter, proves to be a sinner against man, against God and most importantly against himself because he has committed adultery with Hester Prynne, resulting in an illegitimate child, Pearl. His sinning against himself, for which he ultimately paid the
In The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne’s act of adultery with Arthur Dimmesdale (Hawthorne 231) ultimately leads to negative and positive impacts on her life, including being isolated from everyone in town, being mocked and gossiped about, being more mature, and being more compassionate. One of the negative effects the loss of innocence has on Hester is that she becomes isolated from everyone in town. Hawthorne describes Hester: