Puritan In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

Nearly every reference to the word “Puritan” in the Scarlet Letter conveys Puritan society as miserable, isolating and rigid (Hawthorne, 119-21, 127, 148, etc.). In fact, Schwartz points out that “[Hawthorne’s coverage of the whole range of Puritan life is very complete - all the way from the minister to the children of the Puritan community,” (201), and that Hawthorne’s portrayal of such figures, “created a social system… that trammelled itself as it did the people who lived under it” (207). Hawthorne’s Puritan leaders display a lack of compassion (Harper, 55), causing ‘sinners’ like Hester to feel isolated and scorned. Yet, Harper also claims that to view “Hawthorne as a Puritan basher does not proceed from a complete understanding” as Hawthorne was “proud of his Puritan ancestry” (51). Further, in the Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne makes frequent references to the importance of confession (132-33, 186-87 ) and according to Baughman, “[confession] is basic to the fabric of [The Scarlet Letter] because it is an essential of church discipline and civil law” (540). If Hawthorne was so critical of Puritan society and their method of enforcing and reacting to

Unlike Hawthorne’s leading Puritans who were “typically short on forgiving love” (Harper, 55), Hawthorne believed that “all who love and live honestly, keeping no vital secrets from the community, can experience a kind of redemptive love” (Harper, 65). In refusing to repent and confess, Hester refuses to be reunited with the church and cuts herself off from God. It isn’t until Hester confesses that she may become truly a part of her society (Baughman, 544, 540) because confession is the only “proof and consequence” of repentance (Hawthorne,