Greatest Sinner In Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter

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Greatest Sinner Sins are almost always performed on a daily basis. All three characters do not make an exception to this. Hester Prynne, the protagonist of the novel, commits the terrible sin of adultery with Reverend Dimmesdale. Roger Chillingworth happens to be the husband of Hester. He attempts to have revenge on Dimmesdale for his affair with Hester. Sin is one of the most important things that happens in the story. In fact, the entire plot is based around the sin of Hester. However, in The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Roger Chillingworth commits the greatest sin of the characters. Chillingworth performs a sin by marrying Hester when he is not able to fully commit to her. His marriage to her is an interesting point of study, because it seems that they were never truly in love.…show more content…
Hawthorne makes it seem that he enjoys having power over others. It seems almost as if he becomes a high school bully who makes everyone’s lives miserable. He shows off this “power” over Hester when he tells her to keep quiet about their relationship status by saying, “My finger…would have hurled [Dimmesdale]…to the gallows!"(123). This threat is true however, because Chillingworth did have a large portion of control over Dimmesdale’s life. His willingness to slaughter the man for so weak a reason is frightening though. It helps to show how twisted Chillingworth truly is. During the end of the novel though, Dimmesdale thwarts Chillingworth’s revenge plot by telling the Puritan community how he had an affair with Hester. This act absolutely ruins Chillingworth because he no longer possesses the power over Dimmesdale. All the horrible acts he had done in the past were undone, because Dimmesdale "Hast escaped me!"(228). In the end, it turns out that Dimmesdale is able to best Chillingworth. This proves how Dimmesdale commits much less of an offense than what Chillingworth

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