I believe that Hester Prynne and Dimmesdale should not be forgiven. They are supposed to be role models for everyone else and do the right thing. They did very wrong. The 2 most important people in town have done a sin that punishment could be death. They will cause a lot of ruckus for everyone in town. Hester and Dimmesdale did very wrong to themselves and everyone around them. Dimmesdale was the reason of Hester Prynne cheating on Roger Chillingworth. Not only did Hester just cheat, but she had a child with Dimmesdale, who served as a conscience for Hester. In the story, it says, “Roger Chillingworth...who for two or three years past had been settled in the town.” This quote shows that Chillingworth is not the father because Pearl is 3 years and Chillingworth had been in town for 3 years. Therefore he was not in town the 9 months before Hester gave birth to Pearl to get her pregnant. Dimmesdale has been a huge hypocrite throughout the story, telling everyone not to sin and punishing people for sinning, while he is the biggest sinner of them all. In the text, it …show more content…
People will start thinking that it is okay to sin because their role models of the town have sinned. In the text, it says, “And, even with terror in his heart, he could hardly avoid laughing, to imagine how the sanctified old patriarchal deacon would have been petrified by his minister’s impiety.” In this quote, he is laughing at everything that has happened. He thinks that it is funny that he hasn’t gotten caught but Hester has. Now that the minister and Hester have sinned, more people will start to sin, thinking that it isn’t so bad if you can be forgiven. In the text, it says, “Hester, holding little Pearl by the hand! And there was the scarlet letter on her breast!” This shows that a “leader” or very worshipped person has done wrong, when she is supposed to be a role model for everyone
This only made his guilt worsen. Dimmesdale does not feel passionate when he is trying to do job. The people are only imagining getting help because his tainted soul could not possibly redeem other souls. He feels as if he is cheating those people in their faith. Hester then tries to rebuttal by saying “Your present life is not less holy, in very truth, than it seems in people's eyes.
Dimmesdale is the biggest jerk of The Scarlet Letter. From the beginning of the book, Dimmesdale is a hypocrite. Although it is implied that he preaches against premarital sex as a Puritan pastor, Dimmesdale commits adultery with Hester. After getting Hester pregnant, he avoids visiting Hester and his daughter for seven years.
The young and beautiful Hester Prynne was once married to a man who had been missing for around three years and committed adultery with another man. Considering the time period this was no small action especially since her unnamed partner is Reverend Dimmesdale and in disguise her long lost husband is actually Roger Chillingworth. Both characters are covering up parts of their life that play a big role in who and why they are for their own individual reasons. Dimmesdale is cowardly covering up his crime in order to protect his holy name as well as himself from the shame and embarrassment that the truth will bring.
Hester and Dimmesdale have both committed adultery, but Hester accepts and embraces what has happened. Alternatively, for Dimmesdale, enduring seven long years of guilt and sin are required to get him to finally reveal the truth. Taking so many years to do so shows how
So on one note who could really blame Hester for having an affair. Until Roger came back into town she did not know is was an affair because she assumed her husband Roger Chillingworth had died. After some time Chillingworth connected the dots and he knew who the father was to Hester's young child, Pearl. When Chillingworth first came back he became Dimmesdale's Physician because he suspected it was Dimmsdale the Minister of the town.
In this book, Hawthorne details an elaborate story showing the consequences of confessing sins in contrast to concealing it. A sin weighing down on you and destroying you from the inside out is a moral consequence and, the only remedy is confessing the sin. This notion can be seen in the difference between Hester and Dimmesdale with how they handled the scarlet letter and the effects of that. Hester had worn her scarlet letter out for the public to see from the very beginning. She the subject of a lot of the town’s scrutiny.
At the beginning of the novel (specifically Ch. 3), Dimmesdale, Rev. John Wilson and Governor Bellingham try to convince her to reveal who the father of Hester’s child is, when midway through the novel, it is revealed to be that Dimmesdale is the father, showing the first piece of evidence of his concealment. The book
They had to live, “in the outskirts of town,”(4.7) without the financial or emotional support of Dimmesdale. If Dimmesdale would have taken Hester and Pearl in from the start, his punishment would have been less harsh. Dimmesdale’s cowardice limits his contact in public between himself and Hester, fearing that any interaction may lead the townsfolk to believe that there is something in between the two. Dimmesdale doesn’t even talk to Hester and Pearl after three years until they meet, due to business, in the Governor's mansion. His sin would have been less severe if he would have at the least taken Hester and Pearl in and showed compassion without revealing his
Because of this, she gets Dimmesdale involved and Chillingworth who we short after find out is Hester's husband. Everything from here begins to get even worse because of Hester and her actions. Hester never
This was the first step in releasing his own personal guilt. Dimmesdale felt terrible for the fact that he did not confess at the beginning of the book so he thought he would apologize now for all he had made them go through. This was not all that Dimmesdale had to do, it was building up to his public confession. Dimmesdale had announced that he was truly the father of Pearl and he admitted to be the other adulter. After doing so Hester had a very heavy weight taken off herself, and later on people started to appreciate her again.
By Dimmesdale's hand always on his chest, everyone makes the connection that he is the father of Pearl because of the Scarlet Letter on Hester’s
The Scarlet Letter Chapters 1-6 Response Journal Chapter one The Prison Door sets the mood of the novel. It describes how the founders of the Puritan colony knew there would be crime so they built a prison. It can be inferred that the mood is cruel because of how everything in the jail is described. “The rust on the ponderous iron-work of its oaken door looked more antique than anything else on the world” (Hawthorne, 41).
Considering the townspeople’s reactions toward Hester’s sin of adultery, it can be concluded that in the Puritan era, religion was of utmost importance, and the Puritans met sins with extremely harsh punishments. Because the majority of the Puritan town viewed Hester as a disgrace, she became “Lonely . . . and without a friend on earth” (56). This made it effortless for the inhabitants of the town to continue to insult and degrade Hester because they did not care to learn her true personality. While a few civilians had sympathy for Hester, the town mostly regarded her as shameful and
Dimmesdale sinned with Hester Prynne by committing adultery. Although this was terrible and looked down upon, his crime was self inflicting and done out of passion. After Hester was punished for the crime, Dimmesdale was overwhelmed with guilt and sadness. This showed that Dimmesdale was a good person
In Dimmesdale not confessing and facing a punishment in the eyes of the church as well as the townspeople, causing him to take to his own means, while Hester is able to face a punishment. Dimmesdale does what he believes is right for his punishment by doing acts that damaged his mind and body. Dimmesdale, in creating his own punishment, holds vigils that last all night, fasted to the point that he barely ate anything at all, beat himself, and lost the will to live. Dimmesdale's sin stays with him throughout the book, and the readers see his mind and body deteriorate through his mysterious sickness, while the readers see Hester become a closed off outcast trying to repent. The townspeople in the book see DImmesdale's sickness, and how devoted he is to his faith and begin to believe that he is holy, and an angel sent to sent to save them, while Hester has repented and become able, as well as an