.
Hester believes that to run away would not only be to deny herself, but would also be an acknowledgment of the towns power over her. Ultimately, Hester uses the letter as stigma for personal growth. The scarlet letter "was her passport into regions where other woman dared not to tread. Shame, Despair, Solitude!" (180). The shame that the scarlet letter brings, allows her in a sense, to follow her own ideals and explore territory in which no other person dares to go. Because of this, Hester is molded into a person that is to be reverenced. Instead of seeing the letter as adulterer, people begin to see it as "the symbol of her calling. Such helpfulness [is] found in her.They said that it meant Able; so strong was Hester Prynne, with a woman's strength" (146). Through Hester's tribulations, she is able to stand against the status quo and become her own ideal individual.Throughout the novel, Arthur Dimmesdale is known as a venerable reverend. He is "considered by his more fervent admirers as little less than a Heaven ordained apostle" (109). .
Although Dimmesdale bares this title, he is possibly the ultimate example of conformity. He has committed the same sin as Hester, but unlike Hester, he is in denial of it. He refuses to accept his own sinful identity and thus conforms to the .
society's ideals. He is constrained to what the catholic church views as orthodox, and because of this, he faces and inward battle between how he views himself and how society views him. Because of his rejection to his sin, he brings suffering upon himself. He believes that "It is inconceivable, the agony with which the veneration tortured him!"(180). He is a hypocrite because he remains being a respected and saintly minister on the outside, but his guilty conscience is constantly eating at him on the inside. He wants people to see him for who he really is, but he is ambivalent because he also fears that his reputation will be ruined.
