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The Hidden Sin In The Scarlet Letter

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The Hidden Sin and The Revealed Sin As humans, we live in the that are brimming with sins and evil desire. As the creator of all the creatures, God, sent his only son to save the people from the control of devil. The only thing we have to do is to acknowledge our mistake. Bible teach us that we should tell the truth to God and your neighbors, and God will forgive you. But people are worse, they not only hide the sin and their evil behaviors but also try to deny it. We are born sinners, we can not be save only based on how we act but depend on do we acknowledge our sins. In the novel Scarlet letter, author Nathaniel Hawthorne compare and contract the hidden sin and the revealed sin but use the end of Dimmesdale and Hester to claim the consequence of hide sins. The …show more content…

He was the last person that people would think as a sinner. Dimmesdale was sin when he was committed adultery with Hester. He broke the law of church, but he was afraid to face the punishment and indifferent attitude from he masses. As a faithful follower, Dimmesdale also afraid the punishment of God, so he flog himself with a whip. The physical and spiral torture and the control of Chillingworth stranded him in a world that he cannot contact with others. As the moving of story, the “side effect” of the hidden sin has reveal. Dimmesdale become more sick and powerless. As the end of the story, Dimmesdale concede the sin and died as the winner of the fight with hidden sin. Dimmesdale as a combination of saint and sinner, his sin is not committed adultery, but it is that he cannot face the sin and admit it. He wanted to be all perfect in the eyes of the masses, but destroyed his perfectly in the eyes of God. In our life, lots of people were trying to get all perfect, but eventually make it was worse. Dimmesdale elucidate the consequence of the hidden

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Mentally, his guilt strains his mind, which causes his physical deterioration, and the weakening of his body. As Dimmesdale finally admits his sin to the townspeople, his guilt is lifted, and he is able to release himself from his captivity. Though he deteriorated both mind and body from his guilt, by telling the townspeople of his sin, it was as if “a spell was broken” (238). He no longer needed to force himself to hide his sin, which was what was hurting him. By finally dealing with his sin in a similar way to Hester, Dimmesdale was able to free himself of his self-imposed captivity and

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In the short story “The Minister’s Black Veil” and the novel The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne tells the stories of two men who keep their sins secret and are hurt deeply. In The Scarlet Letter, Reverend Dimmesdale does not reveal his sin to the community and experiences far more pain than Hester, whose sin is revealed. Years after the original sin, Hester has healed and is accepted by the community, while Dimmesdale still feels guilty, as can be seen when he mounts the scaffold. Dimmesdale’s experience is similar to that of Reverend Hooper, who covers his face after a secret sin and is eschewed by the community. When we refuse to admit our faults, we will feel guilty

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The reader is especially made aware of Dimmesdale's mental state in the eleventh chapter, “His inward trouble drove him to practices more in accordance with the old, corrupted faith of Rome, than with the better light of the church in which he had been born and bred” [150]. This suggests that he is racked with immense guilt and shame at the falsehood he is living and suggests that he is physically abusing himself as a result of this guilt. This directly contradicts Chillingworth's mental state of fury and vengeance that he falls deeper into as the story progresses. These two characters also hold striking incongruities as to what drives them onward as the account

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The minister should have confessed his sin since he would bear less shame. Unfortunately, most of the minister’s shame came from the fact that he was hiding his sin. The people would graciously forgive the minister and the shame and guilt, which he had borne for so long, would slowly start to melt away. The people loved the minister; they would not hold a grudge against him. The sooner the minister confessed, the sooner he would start to heal.

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Dimmesdale should have come clean right at the start but he instead he covered it up and this opens a door for people to use it against you if they find out. This happens in to Dimmesdale when Chillingworth who at the time was Hester’s ex-husband and Dimmesdale’s doctor, he finds out that his suspicions were right about Dimmesdale being the person that was involved in the affair with Hester when he finds the letter A written on his chest. This opens a door for

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This again shows that he is not afraid to be with Hester through this ordeal. Dimmesdale is also shown in the book to be a generally a nice person. An example of this is is throughout the book, he tries to get more involved in Pearl’s Life as he sees that they are precious moments with his daughter. Another example is when Dimmesdale says to everyone publically he has committed the sin of adultery. Instead of reporting him to the authorities and having him punished, they congratulate him for being holy as he’s always been.

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Dimmesdale starts living with Chillingworth so the doctor can keep the feeble minister ‘healthy’; the doctor, reversely, tries to make Dimmesdale feel conflicted about his morals which leads to Dimmesdale obsessively whipping himself “...on his own shoulders” and“... fast[ing]...in order to purify [his] body… rigorously...until his knees trembled beneath him[self]...” (132). He is enveloped in his sin, and cannot escape it unless he tells the truth. In fact, Dimmesdale could not stop thinking about his sin which “...continued to give Mr. Dimmesdale a real existence [which] was the anguish in his inmost soul” (133).

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Dimmesdale tortures himself by staying up all night practicing vigils and not taking care of his health. He is sleep deprived and a man named Roger Chillingworth make things worse. Dimmesdale is already in poor health when he starts to stay up all night doing vigils. Dimmesdale’s goal with all of his vigils and praying is to hopefully to get rid of his sin thereby freeing his conscious. He continually tries to purify himself, but comes to the conclusion that he “could not purify himself”.

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Dimmesdale is full of guilt, because he is a leader of the community and was true to his religion, yet he still committed the substantial sin. Not only did he commit the sin, but he continues to keep it hidden from his community. Dimmesdale is supposed to be true to the work that he does, and guilt is what he should feel for hiding who he truly is. “Whom would they discern there, with the red eastern light upon his brow? Whom,

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Sinner are forced to live with their sins for the rest of their lives, that is a moral consequence they must live with. Sin may not be affecting a person on the outside, but they will continue to feel its effect on the inside. Nathaniel Hawthorn 's The Scarlet Letter gives insight on how sin can affect a person without giving any outward appearance. This is shown when Reverend Dimmesdale becomes frail and dies because of the sin he had committed. Dimmesdale exclaims “God knows; and He is merciful!

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Dimmsdale really isn't that bad of a guy, he is more of a coward more than anything else. His guilt tortures him, it takes him seven years to own up to what he done, this is sign that he is one of the biggest cowards in the novel. One of the quotes that relates to this is “If thou feelest it to be for thy soul's peace, and that thy earthly punishment will thereby be made more effectual to salvation, I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and fellow-sufferer,” (5.2 shmoop.com). This quote depicts the character of

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Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter, revolves around an indefinite concept condemned from the biblical dawn of mankind (Adam, Eve, and their grave misconduct in the Garden of Eden): sin. The deadly seven exist within all of us; pride dances with greed, lust provokes envy, gluttony begets sloth, and wrath skulks in the recesses of our being. But, as explored through Hester Prynne’s infamous existence, there is a vital spirit and a certain passion that engenders sin. The basic plotline stands thus; a young, married woman engages in a passionate affair with Reverend Dimmesdale, bears an illegitimate daughter while imprisoned, and is constantly ostracized by her community for her terrible sin. However, Hester refuses to reveal the

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He knows that if he reveals what he has done, then his followers will lose their respect for him. He is burdened with his sin; therefore, he inflicts pain upon himself for his wrongdoing. Dimmesdale goes as far as having vigils all night, being tortured by “diabolic shapes,” and emaciating and whipping himself. Dimmesdale punishes himself because he wants to repent for the sin that he has committed.

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Whereas this mostly exists because of the antagonist this is not always the case. Every once in a while you may find a story that both the antagonist and the protagonist share this secret sin. One of his more known stories “The Scarlet Letter” is very renown for having such a large presence of this secret sin. Based on opinion it is thought to be the most clear and obvious to see out of any of the stories written by Hawthorne. In the “The Scarlet Letter” Hawthorne focused mainly on the specific topics of adultery and guilt in “The Minister’s Black Veil” he focused less on clear secret sins and more on the fact that everybody has them.

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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

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