In Hawthorne’s the Scarlet Letter, Chillingworth and Dimmesdale differ in their personalities, their positions in the village, and their relationship with Hester. In Hawthorne’s the Scarlet Letter, Chillingworth and Dimmesdale differ in their personalities. In the beginning of the novel, Dimmesdale is the Puritan Minister who is well educated, has a philosophical mind, but has a hard time disclosing sin from his personal life. Chillingworth has the personality of a scholar and is very well educated and when he returns, presents himself as a doctor. As the time continues and everyone is trying to figure out who the
Reverend Dimmesdale suffers a greater punishment than Hester by experiencing recurring guilt, physical harm, and Chillingworth’s torment. Dimmesdale experiences guilt after he commits adultery. As a devout Puritan minister, Dimmesdale preaches against sin. However, Dimmesdale contradicts his preaching and has an affair with Hester, a married woman. The novel begins with Hester standing on a scaffold for public shaming.
Eventually, he learns this is the man who impregnated his wife, and Chillingworth begins to seek revenge. He moves in with Dimmesdale, and claims he will care for him, but the public cannot see that his intention is to torture Dimmesdale. Hawthorne explains, “The intellect of Roger Chillingworth had now a sufficiently plain path before it. It was not, indeed, precisely that which he had laid out for himself to tread. Calm, gentle, passionless, as he appeared, there was yet, we fear, a quiet depth of malice, hitherto latent, but active now, in this unfortunate old man, which led him to imagine a more intimate revenge than any mortal had ever wreaked upon an enemy” (126).
Dimmesdale and Hester met in the woods and planned to run away together after Hester told Dimmesdale about Chillingworth being the husband. After they agreed, and they left the forest, he become even darker. Wanting to create pain and havoc wherever he went. He almost felt freer of not needing to hide his sin from everyone anymore. When their plan was finally in effect the ship to take them to England was inhabited by Old Roger Chillingworth who looked terrible now.
Was atropine poisoning the cause of Arthur Dimmesdale’s death? In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter one of the three main characters’, Arthur Dimmesdale dies suddenly, although it is not explained in the book exactly how he died, many have theories. In an Article written by Dr. Jemshed A. Khan in the New England Journal of Medicine, he claims that Chillingworth purposely gave doses of atropine to Dimmesdale. Of course Chillingworth was "a man of skill in all Christian modes of physical science” (Hawthorne 65) he was also quite the brainer when it came to “medicinal roots and herbs” (Hawthorne 65), he was a physician, right? He definitely could have been aware of how to poison someone with atropine.
The reader is especially made aware of Dimmesdale's mental state in the eleventh chapter, “His inward trouble drove him to practices more in accordance with the old, corrupted faith of Rome, than with the better light of the church in which he had been born and bred” [150]. This suggests that he is racked with immense guilt and shame at the falsehood he is living and suggests that he is physically abusing himself as a result of this guilt. This directly contradicts Chillingworth's mental state of fury and vengeance that he falls deeper into as the story progresses. These two characters also hold striking incongruities as to what drives them onward as the account
Arthur Dimmesdale was a character with plenteous authority and a vast following from the puritan people which admired him, but he lost all of the power. The sin he committed mentally and physically exhausted himself which consequently lead him body to death. Dimmesdale receives brutal punishment because Nathaniel Hawthorne wanted to use him to teach a moral lesson that sin doesn’t have to be the event that defines how to live a life. Although Dimmesdale fails to move past his sin, Hawthorne presents the reader with an offering that would have free Dimmesdale of his crime to show redemption was still possible. Dimmesdale could not move past the emotional chain of events that were a result of sin, and therefore, he could not live a life of happiness as he did before his crime.
Her husband, Roger Chillingworth, who she believed dead, sought out revenge against the unknown father of Hester’s child. It is later revealed in the novel that the father of Hester’s child is the revered Reverend Dimmesdale. These characters each possess a fatal flaw that ultimately leads to their own distinctive downfall. Hester Prynne’s persistent attempt to make reparations for her sin leads to her losing her unique personality, Dimmesdale’s incapability to forgive his own guilt causes his mentality and health to crumble, and Roger Chillingworth’s desire for revenge overcomes his soul. Hester Prynne spends the length of the novel attempting to atone for her sin and shame, a feat that in turn subdues her vibrant personality.
She has by far done the most sinful things and exceeded both Dimmesdale and Chillingworth. She had a baby with another man while she was married and never told the man she had the baby with about it. She never even wanted to be in a relationship with Chillingworth, but married him anyway and said it was her worst mistake. She kept the secret of who the real father was from Dimmesdale thinking it was the best decision to make, but it wasn't, Dimmesdale ended up dying from all of the hateful sin building up in his chest. So there is no reason to believe Dimmesdale or Chillingworth is the worst sinner because Hester clearly
Dimmesdale had recently committed adultery with Chillingworth’s wife and he was looking for revenge. He achieves this “revenge” by pretending to care for the priest but in reality he is clandestinely torturing Dimmesdale and watching him suffer. Evil can be seen in Chillingworth when he obviously makes his revenge on Dimmesdale a life goal. Chillingworth insists that he must stay with him to ensure that Dimmesdale gets better, and Chillingworth staying with the priest would guarantee the relentless torment of Dimmesdale to be nonstop. It is also believed, but not specifically explained,