Guilt, shame, and penitence are just a few of the emotions that are often associated with a great act of sin. Mr. Arthur Dimmesdale, a highly respected minister of a 17th century Puritan community, is true example of this as he was somehow affected by all of these emotions after committing adultery. Due to the seven years of torturous internal struggle that finally resulted in his untimely death, Mr. Dimmesdale is the character who suffered the most throughout Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. Mr. Dimmesdale’s ever present guilt and boundless penance cause him an ongoing mental struggle of remorse and his conscience as well as deep physical pain from deprivation and self inflicted wounds. The external influence of the members of his society
In choosing to contain his deep sin as a secret, Mr. Dimmesdale suffered from a festering guilt that plagued him until his death. After Hester was sentenced with the punishment for her act of adultery, Mr. Dimmesdale remained silent in refusal to confess to his inclusion in the sin. Over time, feelings of remorse gnawed at Mr. Dimmesdale’s conscience and left him in a self loathing state for his own hypocrisy. Dimmesdale felt excessive guilt in allowing Hester to undergo the entirety of the ridicule and punishment alone while he maintained a positioned of respected and idolized authority, yet could not find it in his heart to expose the sin. Looking upon his situation with the Puritan perspective, Mr. Dimmesdale “…loved the truth and loathed the lie, as few men ever did. Therefore above all things else, he loathed his miserable self” (136). Mr. Dimmesdale felt he was living a lie for he, the very man who preached to the community about living a pure life, was living one tainted with...
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...y, Dimmesdale suffered constantly from corporal afflictions as well as the internal conflict of coping with his actions. After the initial sin, Mr. Dimmesdale lived a life of endless struggle and underwent the most suffering throughout The Scarlet Letter. Dimmesdale allowed his life to become consumed with guilt and the quest to complete a suitable penance, which brought him sorrow, self-hatred, and the demise of his body and spirit. The outward influence of society played a key role in Arthur’s unvarying anguish by providing him with a constant reminder of his sin and hypocrisy and adding to the growing guilt and shame he kept bottled within him. Combinations of his mental, physical, and emotional struggles ultimately lead Mr. Dimmesdale to his untimely death. In the end, the suffering became too great to bear and Mr. Dimmesdale’s was forced him to succumb to it.
In the book The Scarlet Letter, the character Reverend Dimmesdale, a very religious man, committed adultery, which was a sin in the Puritan community. Of course, this sin could not be committed alone. His partner was Hester Prynne. Hester was caught with the sinning only because she had a child named Pearl. Dimmesdale was broken down by Roger Chillinsworth, Hester Prynne’s real husband, and by his own self-guilt. Dimmesdale would later confess his sin and die on the scaffold. Dimmesdale was well known by the community and was looked up to by many religious people. But underneath his religious mask he is actually the worst sinner of them all. His sin was one of the greatest sins in a Puritan community. The sin would eat him alive from the inside out causing him to become weaker and weaker, until he could not stand it anymore. In a last show of strength he announces his sin to the world, but dies soon afterwards. In the beginning Dimmesdale is a weak, reserved man. Because of his sin his health regresses more and more as the book goes on, yet he tries to hide his sin beneath a religious mask. By the end of the book he comes forth and tells the truth, but because he had hidden the sin for so long he is unable to survive. Dimmesdale also adds suspense to the novel to keep the reader more interested in what Reverend Dimmesdale is hiding and his hidden secrets. Therefore Dimmesdale’s sin is the key focus of the book to keep the reader interested. Dimmesdale tries to cover up his sin by preaching to the town and becoming more committed to his preachings, but this only makes him feel guiltier. In the beginning of the story, Dimmesdale is described by these words; “His eloquence and religious fervor had already given earnest of high eminence in his profession.”(Hawthorne,44). This proves that the people of the town looked up to him because he acted very religious and he was the last person that anyone expected to sin. This is the reason that it was so hard for him to come out and tell the people the truth. Dimmesdale often tried to tell the people in a roundabout way when he said “…though he (Dimmesdale) were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life.
Before Dimmesdale’s untimely death in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Dimmesdale committed the sins of adultery and lying. In order to keep his sins a secret, Dimmesdale spoke nothing of his involvement in the affair until it tore him apart from the inside out.When Dimmesdale tried to confess his sin to his congregation, they saw the confession as if it were part of his sermon. “He had spoken the very truth, and transformed it into the veriest falsehood”. (Hawthorne 171) Instead of correcting their assumption, Dimmesdale went along with it, once more hiding his sinfulness. When Dimmesdale finally confessed his sin openly...
As soon as Hester stands on the stocks with Pearl for a day without him, Dimmesdale becomes forever haunted from his guilty conscience. He self-inflicts a great deal of harm upon himself both physically and mentally. “And thus, while standing on the scaffold, in this vain show of expiation, Mr. Dimmesdale was overcome with a great horror of mind, as if the universe were gazing at a scarlet token on his naked breast, right over his heart. On that spot, in very truth, there was, and there had long been, the gnawing and poisonous tooth of bodily pain. Without any effort of his will, or power to restrain himself, he shrieked aloud; an outcry that went pealing through the night, and was beaten back from one house to another, and reverberated from the hills in the background; as if a company of devils detecting so much misery and terror in it, had made a plaything of the sound, and were bandying it to and fro” (Hawthorne 128). Dimmesdale comes close to confession many times, but cowardice and self-preservation come into play, affecting his decision. He is unable to summon the power to confess, but instead tortures himself and engraves an “A” by his heart. He quickly realizes that he will not survive long in his current situation.
Dimmesdale is very hypocritical in how he handles the subject of his sin. For example, he says "Be not silent from any mistaken pity or tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty he...
Every human has sinned but Dimmesdale’s evil deeds led him to live a double life—one as a godly minister and another as the “greatest sinner.” Meanwhile Hester was at trial and being punished for her sin, Dimmesdale showed no sign of guilt and he did not have the valor to stand by her side and take full accountability for his actions. Not only did Dimmesdale fail as a lover, but he also failed as a father by denying Pearl and allowing her to live as an outcast. The townspeople held the minister as a saint but little did they know that he disobeyed the eighth commandment from Exodus 20:16, by hiding the truth from his church Dimmesdale became a liar. Moreover, in chapter twenty Dimmesdale confesses all the evil thoughts that roam in his mind and that his flesh desires to do. He even states how he has used his eloquence to manipulate the youngest female member to attend church. As a result of all the evil deeds, the minister seems to depart from his relationship with God and is confused. Dimmesdale becomes lost and desperate, he habitually questions life and his identity but ironically the famed theologian finds no concrete answers to h...
Arthur Dimmesdale's inability to confess is strictly due to his fear of confrontation, thus characterizing him as a coward. The fact that Dimmesdale does not publicly acknowledge or reveal his sin only contributes in denouncing himself as well as his courage. His lack of a confession solely results in the loss of power, self-esteem, and dignity. His great lack of inner strength is easily grasped due to the lies he preaches every week for seven painful years about truth and in the manner in which he avoids confrontation. He spreads the word of holiness and goodness, yet he himself does not abide these simple laws of the Puritan lifestyle. The minister can only extol Hester when she refuses to reveal him as the father by expressing "the wondrous strength and generosity of a woman's heart!"(69), rather than confess his own half of the sin. He can only praise a woman who has more strength and pow...
“A bloody scourge…rigorously, and until his knees trembled beneath him, as an act of penance.” (Hawthorne, 141) In the Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Minister Dimmesdale starved himself, whipped himself, and tortured himself to get rid of the guilt caused by his sin with Hester Prynne. Hawthorne describes the minister’s guilt as the evil that anchored him down and shows how Dimmesdale tortures himself but can never get rid of it. His guilt came from many things. First was his guilt for committing the crime with Hester Prynne. Second is his guilt for not being with her at the time that she was put upon the scaffold. Last was his guilt from not revealing himself to his own daughter and from having to stay out of her life due to fear of being shamed by the community. Hawthorne’s views on guilt and Dimmesdale are mostly that his guilt controlled his life completely until the very end when the power of the sin and guilt took over to the point where he couldn’t control himself.
...scourse” (77). Dimmesdale as well, was greatly affected by the environment and by what was going on around him. Dimmesdale was accepted by society, but because he was greatly praised for being a “miracle of holiness” (125) he became greatly burdened and guilty. He was in a dilemma of wanting to tell all the townspeople about what he had done, yet he could not due to the fear that was inside of him. This pushed him to punishments in which he inflicted upon himself and always thinking about the incident pushed him to his limits mentally-seeing visions of his dead parents and Hester as they point a condemning finger at him along with judgmental looks in their eyes (127).
The Reverend Dimmesdale was another character that demonstrated the effects of sin. He committed the same offense that Hester committed, adultery. The difference between Dimmesdale and Hester was that Dimmesdale was not publicly punished for his crime while Hester was. Because of this, Dimmesdale felt extremely guilty. This feeling of guilt was so atrocious that it mentally and physically withered Dimmesdale, as he felt a very strong need to repent and cleanse his soul.
The town is all out to witness the punishment of Hester Prynne some of the women are suggesting other punishments and the women are telling us about Hester and Dimmesdale. People say," said another, "that the Reverend Master Dimmesdale, her godly pastor, takes it very grievously to heart that such a scandal should have come upon his congregation." (Page 49) Reverend Dimmesdale is seen as a godly man. A man who does not commit sin and in his own mind at this point he feels fine and does not have any guilt. Dimmesdale at this point in the novel is seen as godly and throughout the novel is seen as godly even at the end after the last scaffold scene. Consequently enough, Dimmesdale is trying to convince Hester to reveal the man who has sinned along with her , so the man can be relieved of his guilt, some what ironic because he is the man who has sinned along side with her. "What can thy silence do for him, except it tempt him--yea, compel him, as it were--to add hypocrisy to sin? Heaven hath granted thee an open ignominy, that thereby thou mayest work out an open triumph over the evil within thee and the sorrow without. Take heed how thou deniest to him--who, perchance, hath not the courage to grasp it for himself--the bitter, but wholesome, cup that is now presented to thy lips!" (Page 65) This is the first scaffold scene Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale is not showing any signs of guilt at this point, he is still fairly the same and has not began to inflict punishment on himself or so it appears. Dimmesdale in the first scaffold scene seems fairly normal and has not begun to transform himself but by the next time we see him at the scaffold he is taken a turn for the worst.
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Mr. Dimmesdale’s greatest fear is that the townspeople will find out about his sin of adultery with Hester Prynne. Mr. Dimmesdale fears that his soul could not take the shame of such a disclosure, as he is an important moral figure in society. However, in not confessing his sin to the public, he suffers through the guilt of his sin, a pain which is exacerbated by the tortures of Roger Chillingworth. Though he consistently chooses guilt over shame, Mr. Dimmesdale goes through a much more painful experience than Hester, who endured the public shame of the scarlet letter. Mr. Dimmesdale’s guilt is much more damaging to his soul than any shame that he might have endured.
...rets committing adultery with Hester. In The Scarlet Letter, Arthur Dimmesdale’s appearance, actions, and speech change from the beginning to the end of the novel, making him a dynamic character. Dimmesdale is a young clergyman in the beginning of the novel. He later turns into someone who is emaciated and full of guilt. Furthermore, he treats himself very harshly by whipping and starving himself. Dimmesdale does not trust Roger Chillingworth, but is a good friend to Hester. Even though he feels completely deceived when she tells him that Chillingworth is her husband, they have an honest relationship. He does not think that Hester and he commit the worst sin; he believes that Chillingworth does. Moreover, Chillingworth wants complete revenge on Dimmesdale. The novel ends with Arthur Dimmesdale dying on the scaffold and leaving the whole community in shock.
That man who Hester loves so deeply, Mr. Dimmesdale also undergoes major changes due the sin he bears. In the beginning of the book we see this man’s weakness and unwillingness to confess sin even as he begs Hester the person he committed his sin with to come forth with her other parties name (p56). As The Scarlet Letter progresses we see Dimmesdale become weaker physically and his religious speeches become even stronger so that his congregation begins to revere him. For a large part of the novel Dimmesdale has been on a downward spiral in terms of mental and physical health thanks to a so-called friend who was issued to take care of Mr. Dimmesdale, then because of a talk with Hester he is revitalized and given the power to do something, which he could not for seven long years. At the end of the novel Dimmesdale is finally able to recognize his family in public and confess his sin before all releasing the sin he held so long hidden in his heart (p218, 219).
Arthur Dimmesdale presented himself as an uncorrupted man by his social status. Inside he felt unworthy and corrupt form the sin he has committed. The town’s people looked up to Dimmesdale as a man who could commit no grand sin. “People say that the Reverend Master Dimmesdale, her godly pastor, takes it very seriously to heart that such a scandal should have come upon his congregation.” (48). Little did they know that the scandal that Dimmesdale took to hear was the fornication that happened between Dimmesdale and adulteress Hester Prynne. His sinful ways was affecting his health greatly. “Some declared, that, if Mr. Dimmesdale were really going to die, it was cause enough, that the world was not worthy to be any longer trodden by his feet.” (106). The town’s people respected him so much so that they figured it was the world that is corrupt and not Dimmesdale.
Elizabeth Kubler-Ross once said, “Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion of death.” This quote truly captures Dimmesdale’s death and journey to death, it is guilt that drives him to the grave and it accompanies him throughout all five grieving stages. Dimmesdale is one of many characters in The Scarlet Letter that is faced with problems both personally and spiritually. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a romantic novel about a young woman, Hester Prynne, who is permanently marked with her sin by a scarlet A she must bare on her chest and also by her daughter Pearl. Hester committed adultery with the young minister of Boston, Arthur Dimmesdale. Hester, and her beloved child Pearl, learn to over come the A and change the meaning of it from adulterer to able, while they are changing the way society views them, Dimmesdale is withering away under the “care” of Rodger Chillingworth, Hester’s past husband. Chillingworth knows about the sin and seeks revenge on Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale is helpless and in a downward spiral. He let the sin become who he is, even though the towns people don’t know of his adultery until his dying breath. The Scarlet Letter is a story about overcoming the darkness that hangs above you and stepping out of the sin or gloom that controls you. For characters like Hester this is a fairly easy thing to handle, but on the flip side characters like Dimmesdale struggle and can not seem to escape their heinous acts and don’t find peace of mind until they die. The Scarlet Letter mainly focuses on the process of overcoming these troubling times and how each individual character handles the pressure, stress, and guilt that come along with it differently. Arthur Dimmesdale is a lost soul after his sin, he expe...