“He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy,” (KJV 28:13). The message of this short proverb is simple: confess. Despite this, there are millions refusing to reveal their hidden atrocities to the oblivious public. But you don’t need public ridicule for a sin to destroy you, in fact, it would be better if you did confess. This is the ideology of Nathaniel Hawthorne author of The Scarlet Letter. 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. However, after many years of performing good deeds for the community the scarlet letter, and by extension Hester, was met with less hostility. Her influence is so great that many citizens start to believe the scarlet letter “...[now] meant Able…”(Hawthorne
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As such the weight and burden of his sin only grew stronger. Dimmesdale desperately tried to relieve his guilt by “...inflicting a hideous torture on himself,” (Hawthorne 234) but to no avail. The only way Dimmesdale could have helped himself was by confessing his sin to the public, and that is what he did. However, when he did confess, the weight and guilt that built up inside were so immense that his confession was Dimmesdale’s “...[the] final words [that] came forth…” (Hawthorne 233). Dimmesdale had paid the ultimate price and died due to letting the problem grow to an immense proportion rather than directly handing it by confessing from the