The Scarlet Letter

"Ha, tempter! Methinks thou art too late!" answered the

minister, encountering his eye, fearfully, but firmly. "Thy

power is not what it was! With God's help, I shall escape thee

now!"

He again extended his hand to the woman of the scarlet letter.

"Hester Prynne," cried he, with a piercing earnestness, "in the

name of Him, so terrible and so merciful, who gives me grace, at

this last moment, to do what--for my own heavy sin and miserable

agony--I withheld myself from doing seven years ago, come hither

now, and twine thy strength about me! Thy strength, Hester; but

let it be guided by the will which God hath granted me! This

wretched and wronged old man is opposing it with all his

might!--with all his own might, and the fiend's! Come,

Hester--come! Support me up yonder scaffold."

The crowd was in a tumult. The men of rank and dignity, who

stood more immediately around the clergyman, were so taken by

surprise, and so perplexed as to the purport of what they

saw--unable to receive the explanation which most readily

presented itself, or to imagine any other--that they remained

silent and inactive spectators of the judgement which Providence

seemed about to work. They beheld the minister, leaning on

Hester's shoulder, and supported by her arm around him, approach

the scaffold, and ascend its steps; while still the little hand

of the sin-born child was clasped in his. Old Roger

Chillingworth followed, as one intimately connected with the

drama of guilt and sorrow in which they had all been actors, and

well entitled, therefore to be present at its closing scene.

"Hadst thou sought the whole earth over," said he looking darkly

at the clergyman, "there was no one place so secret--no high

place nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me--save

on this very scaffold!"

"Thanks be to Him who hath led me hither!" answered the

minister.

Yet he trembled, and turned to Hester, with an expression of

doubt and anxiety in his eyes, not the less evidently betrayed,

that there was a feeble smile upon his lips.

"Is not this better," murmured he, "than what we dreamed of in

the forest?"

"I know not! I know not!" she hurriedly replied. "Better? Yea;

so we may both die, and little Pearl die with us!"

"For thee and Pearl, be it as God shall order," said the

minister; "and God is merciful! Let me now do the will which He

hath made plain before my sight. For, Hester, I am a dying man.

So let me make haste to take my shame upon me!"

Partly supported by Hester Prynne, and holding one hand of

little Pearl's, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale turned to the

dignified and venerable rulers; to the holy ministers, who were

his brethren; to the people, whose great heart was thoroughly

appalled yet overflowing with tearful sympathy, as knowing that

some deep life-matter--which, if full of sin, was full of

anguish and repentance likewise--was now to be laid open to

them. The sun, but little past its meridian, shone down upon the

clergyman, and gave a distinctness to his figure, as he stood

out from all the earth, to put in his plea of guilty at the bar

of Eternal Justice.