Scarlet Letter Notes 8

Chapter 22: The Procession

• 163: Dimmesdale in the procession “There was no feebleness of step, as at other times; his frame was not bent; nor did his hand rest ominously upon his heart . . . his strength seem not of the body. It might be spiritual . . .” seems beyond their reach, Pearl barely recognizes him
• Mistress Hibbins knows Dimmesdale’s secret, thinks he has made a pact with the devil, hidden “tokens”—165-166
• Oppostion of wilderness and civilization

forest and town

devil and God

Indians and Puritans

Pearl &Hester and Dimmesdale

• Dimmesdale’s voice: 166-167
• “At the final hour, when she was so soon to fling aside the burning letter, it had strangely become the centre of more remark and excitement, and was thus made to sear her breast more painfully than at any time since the first day she put it on” 169
• “the admirable preacher was looking down from the scared pulpit upon an audience, whose very inmost spirits had yielded to his control. The sainted minister in the church! The woman of the scarlet letter in the market-place! What imagination would have been irreverent enough to surmise that the same scorching stigma was on them both?