People everywhere, no matter how holy or evil, tend to conceal their sins and dark secrets. These sins, which many hide, eventually eat away at their conscience, building up guilt and bitterness. In The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, a man died with hidden secrets, which he never revealed. People should confess their wrongdoing before time passes away and causes on to regret not revealing their sin. All sins have its consequences and will eventually be exposed. Dimmesdale admits that his guilt and conscience was his punishment; the constant thought of Hester and the child she bears…
? ? Hiding your sins tends to ‘allow the heart [to make] itself guilty of such secrets… until the day when all hidden things shall be revealed’ (128).
Those who believe that one can hide their sins and continue to live a guiltless life simply ‘deceive themselves,’ (129)! Therefore do not hide you sin, confess and make things right because sin contaminates the heart, no matter how had one tries, all secrets will eventually be exposed. Throughout The Scarlet Letter, Arthur Dimmesdale is faced with the guilt of his sin, which he kept to himself for seven years.
Hester, on the other hand, ‘openly wears the sin, upon her chest? ? ? ? … .’ Arthur suffers both internally and externally as a result of his guilt. Because ‘by his nature… he loved the truth and loathed the lie… [and so] he loathed his miserable self’ (141) ‘ With this in mind this gradually effected his health and later led to his death.
The Essay on Guilt in Crime and Punishment
“If he has a conscience he will suffer for his mistake. That will be punishment-as well as the prison. ” (Dostoyevsky 336). Guilt is commonly understood to be an emotion that results as an outcome of an evil act. However, is it always this simple? No human being with any sense has the ability to commit an atrocious crime without some feeling of guilt or remorse afterwards. Gradually, this ...
How can one ‘seek to glorify God… [but] lift heaven your unclean hands’ (129)? As the holy minister, Arthur’s conscience was tortured with the question of how ‘can a ruined soul like mine effect towards the redemption of other souls… [his own being] a polluted soul’ (187).
