Dimmesdale and Guilt
             The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne is one of the most well known novels of the romantic writing era. It is a fascinating story about human frailty and its attempt to redeem itself. Set in Boston, the story involves a woman, Hester Prynne, who has a child by another man after Indians abduct her husband. She is made to stand on a scaffold with the entire town watching while she wears an "A" on her breast for her great sin of adultery. Hester's husband, Roger Chillingworth, torments the illegitimate child's father, Arthur Dimmesdale, during the course of the story as his need for vengeance increases. Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Dimmesdale attempts to atone for his sin by making his own kind of confessions, but without a confession like Hester's, his guilt remains a debilitating factor in his life.
             Dimmesdale's guilt about his and Hester's sin causes him to try to redeem himself in many ways that do not involve an actual confession. For instance, he is too afraid in the beginning to tell of his sin, so he tries to put the burden onto Hester when he says:
             Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on they pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life. What can thy silence do for him, except it tempt him – yea, compel him, as it were – to add hypocrisy to sin (47)?
            
             To the town, it simply appears as if the minister wants to know the identity of Hester's fellow sinner so that he can be punished as well. However, from another point of view, Dimmesdale is speaking literally. He wants Hester to tell the people that he is the child's father so that his guilt will be gone.
             While Dimmesdale and Chillingworth are having a conversation and Chillingworth mentions Hester and the great burden of sh...