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The Scarlet Letter

 

            
             One belief that people live by is that evil is the nature of mankind, yet there are others that feel man has good intentions but those intentions can be overrun by the devil. Nathaniel Hawthorne points out that the former is true of all people in the novel The Scarlet Letter. In this novel, there are three main characters who commit evil and sinful acts, but each act is at a different degree of sinfulness. For example the sins get worse as the story goes on. .
             These three sinners, in the eyes of the puritan community are the beautiful Hester Prynne, the esteemed Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, and the cold-hearted doctor, Roger Chillingworth. Like Hawthorne, I believe 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. .
             In the novel, Hester received a scarlet letter, "A," for her sins, which she had to wear upon her chest for the rest of her life in Boston. This was the Puritan way of punishing her for her criminal action of adultery. She wondered the streets to be given sour looks from all. This caused so much mental and physical anguish that she eventually questioned why she should live if it weren't for her Pearl. Pearl was a bundle of life sent from God to remind her of her wrong doing each and every moment and as a walking sermon to preach against sin for others.
             Hester Prynne, a strong willed and brave woman, in respect to the two additional people, has committed the least amount of sin in the novel. In the eyes of the Puritan community, though, she has committed one of the worst possible sins that can be imagined: adultery. They feel she is horrendously corrupt, yet it is not truly her fault.
             Hester is the victim of her husband, Roger Chillingworth's stupidity by sending her to New England by herself, while he remained in Europe. Chillingworth even admitted that it was his fault when he said, "It was my folly, and thy weakness"(15).


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