How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
"The magistrates are God-fearing gentlemen, but merciful overmuch,—that is a truth," added a third autumnal matron. "At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne's forehead. Madame Hester would have winced at that, I warrant me. But she,—the naughty baggage,—little will she care what they put upon the bodice of her gown! Why, look you, she may cover it with a brooch, or such like heathenish adornment, and so walk the streets as brave as ever!" (2.5)
Uh, we're glad that this lady isn't a magistrate. She thinks that being publicly shamed is just a little too merciful. Hey, at least she doesn't want Hester to be executed, which is what another woman suggests.
Quote #2
"Ah, but," interposed, more softly, a young wife, holding a child by the hand, "let her cover the mark as she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart." (2.5-6)
Not everyone in the crowd wants to see Hester burn at the stake. This woman understand that Hester is so busy judging herself that she hardly cares what happens to her publicly.
Quote #3
Here, she said to herself, had been the scene of her guilt, and here should be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so, perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul, and work out another purity than that which she had lost; more saint-like, because the result of martyrdom. (5.3)
All the magistrates can do is force Hester to wear a scarlet letter: Hester is the one making herself endure the punishment of sticking around in a community that runs on judgment.
Quote #4
Why, then, had he come hither? Was it but the mockery of penitence? A mockery, indeed, but in which his soul trifled with itself […] He had been driven hither by the impulse of that Remorse which dogged him everywhere. (12.2)
Dimmesdale doesn't have the guts to face judgment—he can hardly even face his own soul's judgment. No wonder the narrator calls him a coward.
Quote #5
This feeble and most sensitive of spirits could do neither, yet continually did one thing or another, which intertwined, in the same inextricable knot, the agony of heaven-defying guilt and vain repentance. (12.2)
Our Shmoopster brains just can’t help but stare at the phrase "heaven-defying guilt" here—what does that mean? Does it mean that the guilt Dimmesdale endures will ultimately prevent him from getting into heaven? Or does it mean that the guilt he imposes upon himself is not necessarily the kind of guilt that heaven endorses?
Quote #6
"At the great judgment day!" whispered the minister, —and, strangely enough, the sense that he was a professional teacher of the truth impelled him to answer the child so. "Then, and there, before the judgment-seat, thy mother, and thou, and I, must stand together. But the daylight of this world shall not see our meeting!" (12.17-28)
All the judgment on earth is just preparation for the big judgment day, when it's not just a bunch of sour magistrates deciding your fate but God himself. We get the feeling that Hawthorne thinks that maybe the magistrates should leave the judging up to God.
Quote #7
It was none the less a fact, however, that, in the eyes of the very men who spoke thus, the scarlet letter had the effect of the cross on a nun's bosom. (13.35)
Hester's scarlet letter might be the community's version of justice, but it ends up being a judgment on them: she shows up the community by being better than all of them.
Quote #8
The judgment of God is on me," answered the conscience-stricken priest. "It is too mighty for me to struggle with!"
"Heaven would show mercy," rejoined Hester, "hadst thou but the strength to take advantage of it." (17.43-44)
Where Dimmesdale can only see judgment, Hester sees mercy. Is mercy a kind of justice? Or does it operate on a totally different scale?
Quote #9
For years past she had looked from this estranged point of view at human institutions, and whatever priests or legislators had established; criticizing all with hardly more reverence than the Indian would feel for the clerical band, the judicial robe, the pillory, the gallows, the fireside, or the church. (18.2)
How the tables have turned. Hester was judged by the clerical band and judicial robe, and now she's criticizing it in turn. Why does she stick around, then? If she judges it and finds that it's not all it's cracked up to be, why does she continue to let herself be confined by its laws?
Quote #10
Thus, we seem to see that, as regarded Hester Prynne, the whole seven years of outlaw and ignominy had been little other than a preparation for this very hour. (18.4)
If you throw people out of your community, then you shouldn't be surprised if they refuse to live by your rules. Hester is so over the Puritans right now.
Quote #11
"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!" (23.18)
Chillingworth was paying enough attention in church to hear the part about not cheating on your husband, but he evidently snoozed through the follow up: "judge not, lest ye be judged." Oops.
Quote #12
It bore a device, a herald's wording of which might serve for a motto and brief description of our now concluded legend; so somber is it, and relieved only by one ever-glowing point of light gloomier than the shadow:—"On a field, sable, the letter A, gules." (24.12)
The community's final judgment is Hester's tombstone: a scarlet letter A on a field of black. Have they forgiven her? Or is her punishment to be marked by the letter even in death?