He Bids You Again Look at Hesters Scarlet Letter

"Is non this better [said Dimmesdale to Hester on the scaffold] than what we dreamed of in the forest?" (Chapter 23)

The power of the scaffold in The Scarlet Alphabetic character is most amply manifested by the redemption and salvation of Mr. Chillingworth – ane of the well-nigh menacing and evil characters in all of literature! Simply Chillingworth manages to get in up upon the scaffold, and even to kneel down for a moment, when a prayer is said for him. In this lite, as I hope to demonstrate, The Scarlet Letter is a tale about repentance, forgiveness, rebirth and redemption.

Henry James, the famous novelist, wrote a note mostThe Ruby Letter of the alphabet in which he called it "the finest piece of imaginative writing yet put forth" in the Us. His principal criticism of the novel was that it contained "a great deal of symbolism…I think, too much." The point, still, is that symbolism is very important to understandingThe Scarlet Alphabetic character, and in this curt notation I will make much of two very important symbols used by Nathaniel Hawthorne in the novel, namely, the scaffold and theforest. I will maintain that the scaffold, formally a penal musical instrument of penalty, shame and humiliation, is ultimately a symbol of salvation, and the wood a symbol of liberty from conventional moral restraints. Especially by the employ of these two symbols, I promise to demonstrate that all four of the principal characters inTheScarlet Alphabetic character – Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, Mr. Roger Chillingworth and Pearl – were saved (and past saved I am referring ultimately to the Christian significant of that term, although information technology has other meanings likewise).

Let me get straight to my chief point (knowing that yous are already familiar with the facts of the novel): no 1 is saved inThe Scarlet Letter unless he climbs up upon the scaffold. In other words, the pathway to redemption and salvation in the novel is direct connected to the scaffold. Dimmesdale flees the scaffold, or mounts it in a cowardly and imaginary manner under the comprehend of darkness, when no one can encounter him, and thus suffers incredible interior pain throughout the course of the novel due to the concealment of his sin (and Hawthorne's psychological description of Dimmesdale's astute suffering is quite remarkable). Hester Prynne, by dissimilarity, who was forced to undergo the public humiliation of standing on the scaffold (as described in the opening chapters) fairs much better. Her mental well-being and fortitude is impressive, and her growth in virtue as described by Hawthorne in Chapter 13 results in her being called a "Sister of Mercy." Nevertheless, there is a temptation inside Hester's soul that attracts her to the illusion of salvation offered by the woods (and ane tin can naturally sympathize with her allure to the type of (seemingly) liberating moral calculus offered by the forest given the Puritanical oppression she has heroically endured).

"Such was the sympathy of Nature—that wild, heathen Nature of the wood, never subjugated past human constabulary, nor illumined by higher truth—with the elation of these two spirits! Dearest, whether newly born, or angry from a deathlike slumber, must ever create a sunshine, filling the heart then total of radiance, that it overflows upon the outward world. Had the wood however kept its gloom, it would have been brilliant in Hester's eyes, and brilliant in Arthur Dimmesdale'southward!" (Chapter eighteen).

But equally before long every bit Dimmesdale leaves the forest and reenters the civilized world he is attacked by diabolical temptations so vehement that he is on the verge of saying blasphemous, vile and wicked things to people passing by (most of whom are associated with his congregation). At some betoken, upon returning home, Dimmesdale must sense or discern that his spiritual life is under assail ("…am I given over utterly to the fiend?" he wondered on his walk habitation) and that no amount of miles between himself and Boston tin always really solve his underlying problems of guilt and concealment. This is clearly supposition on my part, simply it seems to be confirmed later when Dimmesdale says to Chillingworth, "Ha, tempter! Methinks thousand art too late," which evidences the Reverend's change of heart (and 1 theory is that Dimmesdale'southward modify of center was the result of his preparation for his Election Day sermon, only in any upshot Hester recognizes a definite change in him on Ballot Day before he delivers the sermon). Thus, the true path to liberty for Dimmesdale volition be to mount the scaffold of guilt and confession, to "unconceal" to all what he has been hiding for seven years. It is on the wooden beams of the scaffold that he can unveil his eye to the oversupply, and reveal publicly his truthful situation.

I thus turn to the final, dramatic scene on the scaffold that takes place after the procession on the 24-hour interval of the Governor's inauguration, post-obit Reverend Dimmesdale'southward very moving Election Twenty-four hours sermon, three days after the meeting of Hester and Dimmesdale in the forest. In the lengthy but crucial quotes prepare forth below (from chapter 23) yous can see clearly that Dimmesdale, Hester, Pearl and Chillingworth all go far on to the scaffold, which I have referred to equally a symbol of conservancy in the novel. Here we notice Dimmesdale being helped by Hester and Pearl to mount the scaffold of his terminal confession (1 might even say, in proper context, being helped to bear his cantankerous).

"Hester Prynne," cried Dimmesdale, with a piercing earnestness, "in the proper noun of Him, then terrible and so merciful, who gives me grace, at this final moment, to do what—for my own heavy sin and miserable desperation—I withheld myself from doing seven years ago, come up hither now, and twine thy strength almost me! Thy strength, Hester; but let it exist guided by the volition which God hath granted me! This wretched and wronged old man is opposing information technology with all his might!—with all his ain might, and the fiend'due south! Come, Hester, come! Support me upwards yonder scaffold!"

The crowd was in a tumult…they remained silent and inactive spectators of the judgment which Providence seemed well-nigh to work. They beheld the government minister, leaning on Hester'south shoulder, and supported by her arm around him, arroyo the scaffold, and arise its steps; while still the little mitt of the sin-born child was clasped in his. Quondam Roger Chillingworth followed, as 1 intimately connected with the drama of guilt and sorrow in which they had all been actors, and well entitled, therefore, to exist present at its closing scene.

"Hadst yard sought the whole earth over," said [Chillingworth], looking darkly at the chaplain, "there was no 1 identify so secret,—no high place nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me,—salvage on this very scaffold!"

"Thanks be to Him who hath led me here!" answered the government minister.

Yet he trembled, and turned to Hester with an expression of dubiousness and anxiety in his eyes, not the less manifestly betrayed, that there was a feeble smile upon his lips.

"Is not this better," murmured he, "than what we dreamed of in the forest?" ***

"For thee and Pearl, be it as God shall club," said the minister; "and God is merciful! Let me now do the will which he hath made plain before my sight. For, Hester, I am a dying man. And so allow me make haste to take my shame upon me!"

And so nosotros finally reach the climax of the novel, Dimmesdale's powerful confession of guilt:

Partly supported by Hester Prynne, and belongings one manus of piffling Pearl's, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale turned to the dignified and venerable rulers; to the holy ministers, who were his brethren; to the people, whose corking heart was thoroughly appalled, nevertheless inundation with tearful sympathy, as knowing that some deep life-matter—which, if total of sin, was full of anguish and repentance besides—was now to be laid open to them. The sunday, just footling by its meridian, shone downwardly upon the clergyman, and gave a distinctness to his effigy, equally he stood out from all the earth, to put in his plea of guilty at the bar of Eternal Justice.

"People of New England!" cried he, with a voice that rose over them, high, solemn, and imperial,—nevertheless had ever a tremor through it, and sometimes a shriek, struggling up out of a fathomless depth of remorse and woe,—"ye, that accept loved me!—ye, that have deemed me holy!—behold me hither, the one sinner of the globe! At last!—at last!—I stand up upon the spot where, seven years since, I should accept stood; here, with this adult female, whose arm, more than the little strength wherewith I have crept hitherward, sustains me, at this dreadful moment, from grovelling downwardly upon my face! Lo, the scarlet letter which Hester wears! Ye have all shuddered at it! Wherever her walk hath been,—wherever, then miserably burdened, she may have hoped to find repose,—it hath cast a lurid gleam of awe and horrible repugnance round about her. But at that place stood i in the midst of you, at whose brand of sin and infamy ye have not shuddered!"

It seemed, at this betoken, every bit if the minister must go out the remainder of his cloak-and-dagger undisclosed. But he fought back the bodily weakness,—and, even so more than, the faintness of middle,—that was striving for the mastery with him. He threw off all assistance, and stepped passionately forward a pace before the woman and the child.

"It was on him!" he continued, with a kind of fierceness; so determined was he to speak out the whole. "God's center beheld it! The angels were forever pointing at it! The Devil knew it well, and fretted it continually with the touch of his called-for finger! But he hid it cunningly from men, and walked among you with the mien of a spirit, mournful, because so pure in a sinful world!—and sad, because he missed his heavenly kindred! At present, at the death-hr, he stands upwards before y'all! He bids you lot look again at Hester's scarlet letter of the alphabet! He tells y'all, that, with all its mysterious horror, it is but the shadow of what he bears on his ain breast, and that even this, his own red stigma, is no more than the type of what has seared his inmost center! Stand any here that question God's judgment on a sinner? Behold! Behold a dreadful witness of it!"

With a convulsive movement, he tore away the ministerial band from before his breast. It was revealed! Just information technology were irreverent to depict that revelation. For an instant, the gaze of the horror-stricken multitude was concentred on the ghastly miracle; while the minister stood, with a flush of triumph in his face up, as one who, in the crisis of acutest pain, had won a victory. Then, down he sank upon the scaffold! Hester partly raised him, and supported his head against her bosom.

Erstwhile Roger Chillingworth knelt down beside him, with a blank, boring countenance, out of which the life seemed to have departed.

"Thou hast escaped me!" he repeated more than than in one case. "1000 hast escaped me!"

"May God forgive thee!" said the minister. "Thou, as well, hast deeply sinned!"

He withdrew his dying eyes from the onetime man, and stock-still them on the adult female and the child.

And then we come up to ane of the most touching scenes in the book which speaks to the remarkable transformation of the child, Pearl, who is, in essence, given her humanity dorsum upon the the scaffold (she who had been fabricated essentially unreal by her father's darkening) .

"My little Pearl," said he, feebly,—and there was a sweet and gentle smile over his face, every bit of a spirit sinking into deep repose; nay, now that the burden was removed, it seemed almost as if he would be sportive with the child,—"beloved trivial Pearl, wilt 1000 kiss me now? Thou wouldst not, yonder, in the forest! But now chiliad wilt?"

Pearl kissed his lips. A spell was cleaved. The neat scene of grief, in which the wild babe bore a part, had developed all her sympathies; and as her tears fell upon her male parent's cheek, they were the pledge that she would grow up amid human joy and sorrow, nor forever do battle with the world, but exist a woman in information technology. Towards her mother, too, Pearl's errand as a messenger of anguish was all fulfilled.

Finally, only before he dies, Dimmesdale says his adieu to Hester.

"Hester," said the clergyman, "farewell!"

"Shall nosotros non meet once more?" whispered she, angle her face down close to his. "Shall we not spend our immortal life together? Surely, surely, we accept ransomed ane another, with all this woe! M lookest far into eternity, with those vivid dying optics! So tell me what thou seest?"

"Hush, Hester, hush!" said he, with tremulous solemnity. "The police we broke!—the sin here so awfully revealed!—allow these solitary be in thy thoughts! I fear! I fright! Information technology may be, that, when nosotros forgot our God,—when nosotros violated our reverence each for the other's soul,—it was thenceforth vain to hope that we could come across hereafter, in an everlasting and pure reunion. God knows; and He is merciful! He hath proved his mercy, about of all, in my afflictions. By giving me this burning torture to impact my breast! By sending yonder dark and terrible old homo, to continue the torture always at red-oestrus! By bringing me here, to die this death of triumphant discredit before the people! Had either of these agonies been wanting, I had been lost forever! Praised exist his proper name! His will be done! Farewell!"

That final word came forth with the minister's expiring breath. The multitude, silent till then, bankrupt out in a strange, deep vox of awe and wonder, which could not every bit yet find utterance, save in this murmur that rolled so heavily after the departed spirit."

Did Dimmesdale's prayer of mercy for Chillingworth on the scaffold piece of work? Apparently and then. We read in the novel that "nothing was more remarkable than the change which took place, almost immediately after Mr. Dimmesdale's death, in the advent and demeanor of the old man known as Mr. Chillingworth." Is 1 act of slap-up charity sufficient to save a soul? We read that Chilingworth died "inside the yr," but that in his last volition and testament he bequeathed (rather amazingly) "a very considerable amount of property, both hither and in England, to little Pearl, the daughter of Hester Prynne," all of which supported a very fine existence for Pearl (who Hawthorne intimates got married and had a child across the bounding main). All of this evidences a changed heart and a saved soul for the man who had been the very embodiment of revenge.

Merely what about Hester Pyrnne? Did she become dorsum to the wood, so to speak, to find her salvation there (on her ain terms)? We know that "for many years" afterwards Dimmesdale's expiry she left New England and ventured somewhere "across the sea." But Hester ultimately returns to New England because, as Hawthorne tells u.s., "at that place was a more real life here for Hester Pyrnne…hither had been her sin; here, her sorrow, and here was yet to be her penitence." And in that location from her cottage, where she had so long lived in isolation, Hawthorne tells us she ministered to the needs of women "who besought her counsel" because they were wounded in honey or could discover none at all. And so endsThe Scarlet Letter, and the woman who wanted to flee New England ends her life in that location in gentle penitence, caring for other women harmed by the difficulties of life and love.

And the "A" on Hester stands for "Able," and the scaffold she iii times stood upon for salvation.

Thomas Fifty. Mulcahy, M.A.

Image: Hester Prynne & Pearl before the stocks, an 1878 illustration for the book by Mary Hallock Foote (Public Domain, U.South.A.)

Note/References: The critical essays inThe Scarlet Alphabetic character, A Norton Disquisitional Edition were valuable (come across particularly the essays by Carpenter, Fogle and Stewart). Hoffman adds: "The salvation of Pearl depends upon Dimmesdale. Until he acknowledges himself her male parent she can have no human patrimony, and must remain a Nature-spirit, untouched by the redemptive society that was broken in her conception" (p. 371). I could also argue that the salvation of Chillingworth depended upon Dimmesdale. Information technology was Dimmesdale, too, who seems to have played a certain function in the salvation of Hester. The unity of these iv principal characters on the scaffold at the end of the novel warrants boosted reflection. If I were to place this tale in a specific Catholic context, I might say to myself: "When is the concluding time you went to Confession?" The point seems clear: confession has powerful ramifications.

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