The Scarlet Letter - Essay Example

Hawthorne creates a powerful image of false morals and low social values which ruin the lives of innocent people. The psychological impact of low morals is heated by traditions existing in Puritan society and preached by members of this society. Hawthorne comments "Morally, as well as materially, there was a coarser fiber in those wives and maidens of old English birth and breeding than in their fair descendants, separated from them by a series of six or seven generations (Hawthorne, Chapter 2).

The 'dark necessity' in all human affairs is the inheritance Hawthorne did not quite know what to do with. Hawthorne depicts that the society is blind towards other people who differ from the crowd. Hawthorne portrays that when actions of one character begin to affect another person, the society has moved from personal morals to social morals which set limits on human behavior. If social morals are low it leads to low sufferings of people who do not follow social traditions and stipulated norms.

The novel shows the human necessity for survival and the lengths at which a person will go to save his life.Hawthorne writes "She would become the general symbol at which the preacher and moralist might point, and in which they might vivify and embody their images of woman's frailty and sinful passion" (Hawthorne, Chapter 5). In general, the novel's morality reflects 'primitive' views of the Puritans based on religious traditions and norms transferred into their "morals". Hester's only companion is her mischievous, provocative daughter Pearl - an emblem of the 'lawlessness' in her mother's suppressed nature.

Social morals of the Puritans are reflected in problems of individual choice and social injustice. As Hester stands at the Boston's square about to be castigated for her sin by two leading clergymen, who demand the name of her lover, Hester is horrified to see in the crowd Roger Chillingworth, her shriveled old husband. "She bore in her arms a child, a baby of some three months old, who winked and turned aside its little face from the too vivid light of day" (Hawthorne, Chapter 2), but nobody feels sympathy to the mother.

Hawthorne describes that people are full of cruelty and desire for punishment. The author vividly portrays that values and beliefs have dominated in the society ruling social opinion and behavior of people. Taking into account historical perspective, to a 'new world' these Puritans have transferred intact from old England everything rigid, intolerant, aged, and cramped in spirit. The contrast between the old world and new, between terrible old Roger Chillingworth and his life-affirming estranged young wife, Hester Prynne, is fundamental to a novel so overwhelming in its pictures and driving in its symbols that amounted to 'importunity'.