Similarities Between The Tell Tale Heart And The Minister's Black Veil

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The Sins Within
“The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allen Poe and
“The Minister’s Black Veil” by Nathanial Hawthorne “Sin will take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, cost you more than you want to pay,” by unknown. The life of sins are revealed in both “The Tell- Tale Heart” by Edgar Allen Poe and in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Minister’s Black Veil”. Beginning with “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Poe there is this man watching over an old man that he loves dearly, but cannot seem to do right by. Everyday he would stare into this old man’s pale blue eye with the thought that he was haunting him. When the man would go to sleep at night he would sneak into his room just to check if the eye was still watching it, but …show more content…

In “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Poe the narrator feels the need to justify his reasoning for being bothered by the old man’s eye. He knows this is wrong, but in his mind if he justifies it and actually makes sense then it is okay. “Whenever it fell upon on me, my blood ran cold, and so by degrees, very gradually, I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and this rid myself of the eye forever.” Poe. This sounds very devious and selfish right? The man knows this and feels bad for not liking the man’s eye, but believes his reason makes it okay. “It was the beating of the old man’s heart. It increased my fury, as the beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage.” Poe. The beating of the heart began to make him angry. It added to the fuel because he could he the fear. He knew the man was awake and looking around in the dark hoping to catch him standing in his doorway. The thought of the eye being open completely bothered him and he just snapped. Before he snapped he needed to justify his reasoning within himself. He needed something to blame it on; therefore he blamed it on the beating of the old man’s heartbeat. The narrator shows the most guilt toward the end of the story though. “But anything was better than this agony.” Poe. After he killed the old man his conscience ate away at him so bad that he could not take it anymore. He could not hold the pain of guilt. He felt like he was being punished. “Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer! Even though the police officers were having regular conversation he felt as though they knew what he had done. He felt like they were plotting against him and using their smiles to make him think otherwise. Police officers often use tactics that would make their suspect think that they are their friend he believed they were pretending.“ Almighty God! –No,