Sins in the scarlet letter
Sins in the scarlet letterThe overpowering vengeance and hatred felt by Chillingworth caused his life to be centered on demeaning Dimmesdale and tormenting him until the end of time. From the beginning, Chillingworth showed no signs of guilt and let his life be consumed by sin. Roger Chillingworth committed the greatest sin in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter because he let himself be ruled by hatred and the consuming desire for vengeance. This becomes visible through examination of the other sins present in the novel and the comparison of them in relation to Chillingworth. In essence, there were three main sins committed in The Scarlet Letter: The sins of Hester, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale, and Roger Chillingworth.
Unknowingly, Hester Prynne sailed from Europe to the Americas betrayed and tricked. Waiting for the arrival of her husband, Roger Chillingworth, she lost hope in him ever arriving or even still being alive. After enduring two years of tortured loneliness and lost love, Hester wished to feel the warmth of love again. She tried to fill this emptiness by making love with the Reverend Dimmesdale. When her child Pearl was born, Hester's adulterous sin was discovered and she was cast out from their society and required to wear an embroidered “A” on her bosom in punishment. Hester felt guilt for her sin the rest of her life and sought repentance and absolution until the time she died. Hester never had true love for Chillingworth, but was tricked into marriage. She later told him this while speaking in her jail cell saying to him, “... thou knowest that I was frank with thee, I felt no love, nor feigned any.” Hester was betrayed, tricked and allowed herself to become caught up in the evil desires of another. She then allowed herself to be trapped by sin, causing great remorse in her life; making her sin the lesser of the three committed in The Scarlet Letter. (Pg.53)
Reverend Dimmesdale was a renowned, prideful man stricken with sin and extreme guilt. From the time Hester and Dimmesdale made love, he was grievous of his sin but he also felt a great love towards her. Dimmesdale's stubborn pride troubled him greatly, and although he...
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