The Scarlet Letter

This idea was countenanced by the strong interest which the

physician ever manifested in the young clergyman; he attached

himself to him as a parishioner, and sought to win a friendly

regard and confidence from his naturally reserved sensibility.

He expressed great alarm at his pastor's state of health, but

was anxious to attempt the cure, and, if early undertaken,

seemed not despondent of a favourable result. The elders, the

deacons, the motherly dames, and the young and fair maidens of

Mr. Dimmesdale's flock, were alike importunate that he should

make trial of the physician's frankly offered skill. Mr.

Dimmesdale gently repelled their entreaties.

"I need no medicine," said he.

But how could the young minister say so, when, with every

successive Sabbath, his cheek was paler and thinner, and his

voice more tremulous than before--when it had now become a

constant habit, rather than a casual gesture, to press his hand

over his heart? Was he weary of his labours? Did he wish to die?

These questions were solemnly propounded to Mr. Dimmesdale by

the elder ministers of Boston, and the deacons of his church,

who, to use their own phrase, "dealt with him," on the sin of

rejecting the aid which Providence so manifestly held out. He

listened in silence, and finally promised to confer with the

physician.

"Were it God's will," said the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, when, in

fulfilment of this pledge, he requested old Roger

Chillingworth's professional advice, "I could be well content

that my labours, and my sorrows, and my sins, and my pains,

should shortly end with me, and what is earthly of them be

buried in my grave, and the spiritual go with me to my eternal

state, rather than that you should put your skill to the proof

in my behalf."

"Ah," replied Roger Chillingworth, with that quietness, which,

whether imposed or natural, marked all his deportment, "it is

thus that a young clergyman is apt to speak. Youthful men, not

having taken a deep root, give up their hold of life so easily!

And saintly men, who walk with God on earth, would fain be away,

to walk with him on the golden pavements of the New Jerusalem."

"Nay," rejoined the young minister, putting his hand to his

heart, with a flush of pain flitting over his brow, "were I

worthier to walk there, I could be better content to toil here."

"Good men ever interpret themselves too meanly," said the

physician.

In this manner, the mysterious old Roger Chillingworth became

the medical adviser of the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale. As not only

the disease interested the physician, but he was strongly moved

to look into the character and qualities of the patient, these

two men, so different in age, came gradually to spend much time

together. For the sake of the minister's health, and to enable

the leech to gather plants with healing balm in them, they took

long walks on the sea-shore, or in the forest; mingling various

walks with the splash and murmur of the waves, and the solemn

wind-anthem among the tree-tops. Often, likewise, one was the

guest of the other in his place of study and retirement. There

was a fascination for the minister in the company of the man of

science, in whom he recognised an intellectual cultivation of no

moderate depth or scope; together with a range and freedom of

ideas, that he would have vainly looked for among the members of

his own profession. In truth, he was startled, if not shocked,

to find this attribute in the physician. Mr. Dimmesdale was a

true priest, a true religionist, with the reverential sentiment

largely developed, and an order of mind that impelled itself

powerfully along the track of a creed, and wore its passage

continually deeper with the lapse of time. In no state of

society would he have been what is called a man of liberal

views; it would always be essential to his peace to feel the

pressure of a faith about him, supporting, while it confined him

within its iron framework. Not the less, however, though with a

tremulous enjoyment, did he feel the occasional relief of

looking at the universe through the medium of another kind of

intellect than those with which he habitually held converse. It

was as if a window were thrown open, admitting a freer

atmosphere into the close and stifled study, where his life was

wasting itself away, amid lamp-light, or obstructed day-beams,

and the musty fragrance, be it sensual or moral, that exhales

from books. But the air was too fresh and chill to be long

breathed with comfort. So the minister, and the physician with

him, withdrew again within the limits of what their Church

defined as orthodox.