Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne goes to detail on how revenge can be a powerful force.

In “The Scarlet Letter” Nathaniel Hawthorne presents three main characters that commit evil and sinful acts, where each act is at a different degree of sinfulness. These three sinners (in the eyes of the Puritan community) are: the beautiful Hester Prynne, the esteemed Reverend Dimmesdale, and the cold-hearted doctor Roger Chillingworth. Hawthorn believes that evil is the nature of man but that there are different magnitudes of evil- some choose to fight it, like Hester, and some choose to give in, like Chillingworth.

Hester Prynn, a strong willed and brave women, in respect to the two additional people, has committed the least amount of sin in the novel. However, in the eyes of the Puritan community, she has committed one of the worst possible sins that can be imagined: adultery.

Though, in their eyes, she is horrendously corrupt, it is not her fault in fact; He

ster is the victim of her husband, Roger Chillingworth’s stupidity by sending her to New England by herself, while he remained in Europe. She is also a victim of fate- when Chillingworth is captured by the Indians when he arrives in North America, Hester has no way of knowing if he is alive or dead. But in fact, she still goes against the strict Puritan rules, and breaks commandment seven, which was often punished by death.

The death of Dimmesdale is the ultimate penalty. It is used to compensate for his falsification and the wrong things he did and the secrets that he hide. The author however allows death to be an end with grace. The character is allowed to die in peace because of the repentance he went through. The same applies to Chillingworth. He had secretly lived his life in hate; he too began to show his rotten inner self on the outside. Never having revealed his true identity to everyone, he died without solace and alone.

Arthur Dimmesdale, a strong pillar of the community, and a very devoted Puritan, goes a little further into the same sin. First of all, he commits adultery with the abandoned Hester, and instead of admitting his sin to the public, he keeps his dark secret in his heart, much like an unwanted reminder of the past that someone of this nature would lock up but w

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