National Morality In Hawthorne S The Scarlet

Letter Essay, Research Paper

NATIONAL MORALITY IN HAWTHORNE S THE SCARLET LETTER

Since the beginning of time, man has gathered himself in communities in order to better facilitate the needs and interests of individuals. As institutions developed to govern these communities, the idea of a collective good emerged. Central to the idea of a collective good is the responsibility of the community in forming a sense of national morality. Should this morality come from the government or religion. Perhaps, individuals should take responsibility to constitute a morality for themselves. Nathaniel Hawthorne addresses the question of national morality in his work The Scarlet Letter. Through a careful examination of the central characters of the work and an understanding of the underlying ideas of Hawthorne, a view on national morality emerges. Hawthorne criticizes the fundamentalist Puritan characters, particularly Dimmesdale, by showing their hypocrisy and displaying the failures of Puritans and their form of a national morality. The treatment of the outcast Hester

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reveals Hawthorne s desire to form a national morality founded on individual accountability and Transcendentalist beliefs.

Before disclosing his notions and beliefs on national morality, Hawthorne begins his story, The Scarlet Letter, with a discussion of the Puritan state of Salem set in the 1600’s. It is often problematic to discern Hawthorne s views about Puritanism due to his ambiguity. He reveres the Puritan conviction and their ability to conform to the controls of their faith (Gerber, 34). However, he condemns them for the bigotry and utter intolerance they show for opposing viewpoints and perspectives (Leavitt, 88). This ambiguity causes the reader to question Hawthorne s attitudes and tone throughout the course of the work. No where in The Scarlet Letter does Hawthorne criticize in particular the doctrines of the Puritan religion. Hawthorne only discusses the Puritanical beliefs such as predestination and the Doctrine of the Elect in the context of his narrative. In fact, Nathaniel

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Hawthorne himself was a second generation Puritan. Hawthorne s grandfather was a prominent judge during the Salem Witchcraft trials. Indisputably, Hawthorne s chief ideological complaint rests in the theocratic Salem where the government is heavily influenced and even dominated by the church. When the authority of the church in state affairs is addressed, Hawthorne s tone changes to one of disdainful contempt. This becomes evident as Hawthorne portrays the scene of Hester s punishment upon the scaffold at the very beginning of the story (Hawthorne, 65). Hawthorne regards Puritan Salem as a battleground in the early struggle for political liberty in America (Gerber, 36). Before the battles against the British crown and the ultimate formation of the United States, the rights of privacy and personal liberty were fundamental to the early settlers. The government suppression of individual thought and even individual morality is contemptuous to Hawthorne. For Hawthorne, subjugation of individual expression should never occur, but

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especially not by governmental forces. In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne chooses a very effective method to show his great distrust and hauteur of the theocratic Puritan state. He creates a major character, Arthur Dimmesdale, who is a highly respected member of the Puritan community who commits adultery, a crime against everything the Puritans believe in (Leavitt, 90).

Arthur Dimmesdale is the leader of the Salem community as minister of the local congregation. He is an ordained minister and highly educated at the best universities of Europe, nevertheless, he is not perfect despite what many of his parishioners may believe. Dimmesdale has numerous flaws which are illustrated to the audience by his adulterous affair with Hester Prynne. However, fornication is not Dimmesdale s chief crime in The Scarlet Letter. Hawthorne shows that it is Dimmesdale s concealment of the affair that is the true sin. The shielding of the affair from the town becomes a great burden on Dimmesdale s heart and ultimately leads to him to

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self-inflicted torture (Dibble, 63). Hawthorne utilizes dramatic irony when addressing the relationship between community members and Dimmesdale. As the story progresses, the townspeople begin to increasingly view Dimmesdale as the holiest man amongst them. However, Dimmesdale begins to see himself as a corrupt and withered old man far different from the holy man the town perceives him to be (Gross, 65). The character of Dimmesdale is used by Nathaniel Hawthorne to demonstrate the insufficiencies and failures of the Puritans lifestyle. In spite of the communion between the church and state, the ruling body of Salem could not discover Hester s co-conspirator. They made repeated attempts to discover her accomplice, but were unsuccessful in all of their tries. The failures of the Puritans way of life becomes exacerbated when the one person who was supposed to guide Salem spiritually was a corrupt and morally incapable man. The weak and tortured soul of Dimmesdale becomes a validating point for Hawthorne s opinion, that it is

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foolish to reside complete spiritual leadership in a single man. A man who could falter as easily has anyone. The ri