Scarlet Letter By Arthur Dimmesdale

Arthur Dimmesdale was the town minister in The Scarlet Letter, a story of a young woman who committed adultery and faced the consequences, such as wearing a scarlet “A” on her chest. Dimmesdale was a very interesting character because he was very religious but also committed a sin that haunted him everyday. He also happened to be the man who was involved in the young woman’s adultery. He was never convicted, however he still faced the consequences everyday. Dimmesdale was a man of God. He was the town’s minister and all the citizens of the town looked to him for their source of spiritual guidance. “They deemed the young clergyman a miracle of holiness. They fancied him the mouthpiece of Heaven’s message of wisdom, and rebuke, and love.” (132). This shows how the town’s people viewed

He longed to tell the people who believed he was pure and faithful that he was a sinner. “He had told his hearers that he was altogether vile, a viler companion of the vilest, the worst of sinners, an abomination, a thing of unimaginable iniquity; and that the only wonder was, that they did not see his wretched body shrivelled up before their eyes, by the burning wrath of the Almighty! (133)” He wanted them to know that he was not perfect and he was not worthy of the love and adoration that they gave him. However, they didn’t understand and it made them adore him even more (133). He ended up torturing himself because he couldn’t stand to be adored by his followers even though he had committed a sin and never been punished. “It was his custom, too, as it has been that of many other pious Puritans, to fast, - not, however, like them, in order to purify the body and render it the fitter medium of celestial illuminations, but rigorously, and until his knees trembled beneath him, as an act of penance.” (134). He would punish himself because nobody else would even if it brought him close to