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2.3 Facts of Puritanism
The writer has been discussed characteristics of Puritan concepts, where the Puritans society applied these concepts in their daily life. Even tough the writer already
discussed about the puritan concepts, the writer need to know the facts of Puritans. 1.
Puritans would be given the covenant of salvation by God. J.D Legg 1986: 195 stated that Puritans spoke of salvation in terms of covenant for
those who had been freely by God. From the quotation we conclude that God gave the salvation freely, according to His mercy and righteousness. The salvation could not be
rejected by those who had chosen by God. 2. Puritans considered about the significant of personal Religious experience.
J.D Legg 1986: 199 also stated that salvation was God’s give to the person who was elected by God personally who persevered in the path of loneliness. We concluded that
the religious experience of Puritans was very important in receiving God’s salvation. Puritans had to do God’s law which was revealed in scripture.
3.Scripture provided the indispensable Guide to life. I.Morgan 1965:11 stated that Puritan view came from the scripture as principle of
doctrine and practice, the guidance of life. From this statement, we concluded that the source of Puritan tradition was a scripture. The scripture became the standard of living
and behaving in social life.
4.Puritanism has fought the flesh
Davies 1990: defined flesh as beauty, nudity, desires, modern way of thinking, and education. According to him, the flesh had to be subdued and hidden at all. Puritan
fought the flesh. From this statement above, the writer concluded that puritans could not develop the values of their selves and their sense of beauty. The spirit Puritanism had
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xxiv perverted the human mind that if it had lost the power to appreciate the beauty. It also
forced them to hide the natural form under the plea of chastity. In other words, Puritans had to practice self discipline which came from religions motives asceticism.
Therefore, flesh was thought as something evil puritans life. 5
Puritanism considered women as the inferior to men. Blumin 1995: 299- 338 stated that puritan women’s role was as domestic and private
which separated from the world of the market place and public life. It means, that women were expected as good mother, a faithful wife, and also a good daughter.
Women also were believed to be responsible for ethnical and spiritual character of the home as well as its comfort and tranquility.
Puritans considered women as the weak human, they were physically and skill fully inferior to the men. There fore, they were dependent on men in their lives. So, they
had to obey their husband and father, as people who had a great authority to them. 6. Punishment was associated with the Puritan tradition
Margreth W. Masson 1976: 304 stated puritans conceived of body and soul as integral parts of the self. As a result of the fall, the body and the soul suffered punishment that
had to be endured. From this statement means that Puritans would be given a punishment if they made mistake, or did not do their duties . The body as well as the
soul had to suffer for their sins. Puritans thought that the body was merely the instrument of the soul. The pair fit
together to form a complete person. So, the suffering came in two forms, private and positive. Private was defined that creatures could be denied things that would have
made their lives more comfortable. Positive, on the other hand, was defined that creatures could undergo manifest, both emotional and physical.
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xxv Puritan beliefs were filled with paradoxes. The puritans rebelled against others
in order to create the perfect world, a utopia that did not allow for rebellion the Puritan beliefs and goal created a tension filled paradoxical dilemma. Man was not to sin, but
he would sin anyway. Man was required to forgive but evil was ever present. Man was a seeker of salvation, but was helpless against evil. He was to live in hopes of eternal
salvation, but he may not have been predetermined by God for salvation. In the puritan discipline, dancing was acceptable, but sexual dancing was not.
Drinking alcohol was also acceptable but becoming a drunkard was not. The puritans believed very strongly in marriage and were opposed to illicit sexual activities. Adultery
was punishable by death, and fornication was to be punished be whipping. They wanted to purify the church of England and put and end to the hierarchy that led to corruption.
They believe that church should follow the scripture exactly. The puritans were just normal people, they were not supermen. They were not
monks, they did not shrink from life. The puritans were also neither prohibitionist, or sexual prudes. They were very open minded for the time they had the view that they had
to live in the world, but not become worldly. The dilemma of puritans living affected individual puritans differently. Some
went about their daily lives in uncertainty whether God had selected them for eternal salvation or condemned them to eternal damnation, tensions must have been tough on
those who worked hard for success but under the puritan doctrine were daring to enjoy their wealth and success.
The puritans had a strong in the supernatural and in the existence of Satan. They believed that the evil forces were present in the community. The puritans were fearful of
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xxvi God’s wrath for their failures and of their religious decay. They believed that satan may
have entered at this of faulting. The difficulty in maintaining the high pitch of fervor that the first generations
had also helped the fall of the puritans. Trying to live with such pressure such as original sin, predestination, and living in moderation proved to be more than the
Puritans could handle. Intolerance was also a factor in the fall of Puritanism. It demanded a standard way of thinking that was not compatible with their growing
society, even with rigid intolerance.
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xxvii
CHAPTER III AN ANALYSIS OF PURITANISTIC VALUES IN
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE’S THE SCARLET LETTER 3.1 Intolerance
Nathaniel Hawthorne used his writing skills to appropriately show the strict intolerant ways of the disciplined Puritan America of 1850, with his novel The Scarlet
Letter. This novel has become a classic, because of the accurate portrayal of the conservative Puritan ways. His novel is one of few to tell of the true Puritan lifestyle.
Hawthorne explains the ways in which society cast out any individual for standing apart from the common crowd. The ways in which a person was punished by an entire
community, only because their own ideas deviated from the common morals or values. And best of all, Hawthorne shows the way a “good Christian society” would lash out at
anything they were afraid of.
The first chapter of the novel introduces the main character Hester Prynne. She is being publicly humiliated as a punishment for breaking a puritan belief and one of the
ten commandments, adultery. She stands in front of the town for hours as the crowd tries to break her down with criticism and shaming words. After this she is given her
punishment of being forever branded with her sin by wearing the letter “A” on her chest, as a constant reminder to herself and the town of her sin. She is thrown out of the
town and is no longer a community member. She suffered these ordeals and punishments because she was a mystery to them, she was different from them all. These
perfect puritans threw her out of their lives because she was not mainstream, and she dared to do something they were forced to deny themselves.
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xxviii The Puritans’ fear is what drives them to outcast Hester. A group of people with
such over powering ethical beliefs has to focus their anger somewhere. They all live in fear they themselves will be outcast. So when the opportunity arises, they persecute
someone else. The women all see Hester as a threat, because they are unsure of who the male partner was that participated in this act of sin. So the women who push for a more
harsh punishment, act out not only due to the lack of morals behind her sin but they have an underlying selfish need as well. But everyone in the Puritan community can
agree that Hester no longer deserves to be in their society, because she is not the same as them. She has proven she can not conform to the community’s value system so now
she must wear the “A” on her chest. The town people want everyone to see she is different. Since she committed a defiant act, she will wear an obvious bright sign, to
visually show the difference between herself and the mainstream.
While Hester is living alone in a cottage, her illegitimate daughter Pearl comes into the story. She also is a sign of Hester’s wrongdoing, and a constant reminder to the
town of the sin. The Puritans automatically despise the child. She is the daughter of sin there fore she also is different. Society avoids both of them from fear they may too
become something unknown, may be looked at differently from their peers. So the towns people continue their lives conforming to whatever society expects from them.
While at the same time Hester lives in isolation and gains a true sight of the community. She sees their lives objectively and gains a new insight into their pain and grievances.
While the Scarlet letter is meant as a punishment, without it Hester would never know this detachment that lets her see the truth of the Puritan people. She could clearly see the
sin each man or woman had of their own, and their fear and desperation to hide it. So
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xxix while some find Hester’s pride in her letter “A” unusual, the reader can understand
where her pride comes from. She may not be directly proud of her sin, but she realizes she is honest about what she chose to do. Hester becomes a better person with the
lessons she learns from her punishment. She knows there is no reason for her to hide her shame as all of the others do, because she is honest about her values and choices. Her
lesson is: while she may not have conformed to the mold of society, she knows she is a better person because of that. She can admit her rights and wrongs to herself and
society, while everyone else lives in fear and keeps their own sins hiding in their hearts.
Throughout the novel it is mentioned the letter becomes more elegant and glamorous. This is a symbol for what the letter has come to mean to Hester. While it
was meant for a punishment, society began to see the letter as something beautiful, because it seems to have set Hester free. The Puritans may see the letter gaining in
beauty because they find the separation appealing, an escape from their own secrets and pain.
A good example of fear to break away from conformity is Arthur Dimmesdale’s character. He is overwhelmed with guilt for letting Hester be punished for an act he also
participated in. Dimmesdale is the embodiment of cowardice, envious of Hester’s courage. He wishes he too could break away from the conformed ways that have
swallowed his life. Yet he will keep all of his guilt and painful emotions inside, all because of his fear of being looked down upon by his society. He can not risk being
outcast from his high position in the community.
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xxx He would rather punish himself by concealing these over powering feelings of
guilt and pain, because in his mind there is no punishment worse then being different, being outcast. He sees and understands the courage Hester possesses and shows by
proudly exhibiting her letter, and by taking the punishment. While he can not help but hide his feelings, he envies the way Hester is set free by her confession. “Happy are you
Hester, that wear the scarlet letter openly upon yourbossom” Dimmesdale thinks that if he punishes himself for the sin, then his guilt will go away.
Throughout the story he goes through many ways to punish himself, such as fasting, staring at himself in the mirror for hours, whipping himself in the closet, and practicing
at the scaffold how he will confess the next day.
He continues to delude himself thinking that being harsh on himself will make up for his dishonesty and deceptions. Even though he keeps all of his emotions silent, it
eventually wears him down so much that it becomes noticeable in his appearance. “…His cheek was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous than before-when it
had now become a constant habit….to press his hand over his heart..” So until his very end, he keeps all of these feelings inside like all of the others. He is hiding behind a
character of purity and value, all in fear of being seen for whom he really is; an individual.
Whether courageous Hester is analyzed or Dimmesdale’s cowardice character, the results are the same. During a time that was filled with strict morals and very
conservative ideas, the most important value in self-learning and maturity was the realization of individuality. This time period strongly frowned upon diversity, so the
struggle to express oneself was extremely difficult. This novel was very focused on
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xxxi teaching the idea of valuing your own morals and ideas above everyone else’s. Even
when the battle is you versus everyone, even when a large conformed society is very hard to fight. The writer can see it from the introduction of The Scarlet letter.
The Custom House: introductory Sketch. The Custom house is largely an autobiographical sketch describing Hawthorne’s life as and administrator of the Salem
Custom house. It was written overall size of The Scarlet Letter, since Hawthorne deemed the story too short to print by itself. It also serves as an excellent essay on
society during Hawthorne’s times, and allows Hawthorne to pretend to have discovered The Scarlet Letter in the Custom House.
It is a little remarkable, that although disinclined to talk overmuch of my self and my affairs at the fireside, and to my personal friends- an autobiographical impulse
should twice in my life have taken possession of me, in addressing the public. The first time was three of four years since, when I favored the reader- in excusably, and
for no earthly reason, that either the indulgent reader or the intrusive author could image with a description of my way of life in deep quietude of an old manse
Hawthorne 1962:4
Hawthorne was granted the position of chief executive officer of the Custom house through the Presidents’ s commission. His analysis of the place is harsh and critical. He
describes his staff as a bunch of tottering old men who rarely rise out of their chairs, and who spend each day sleeping or talking softly to one another.
I ascended the flight of granite steps, with the president’s commission in my pocket and was introduced to the corps of gentlemen who were to aid me in my
weighty responsibility, as chief officer of the Custom House[Hawthorne1962:12]
Hawthorne tells the reader that he could not bring himself to fire any of them, and so after he assumed leadership things stayed the same.Hawthorne describes the
town of Salem as a port city which failed to mature into a major harbor. The streets and buildings are dilapidated, the townspeople very sober and old, and grass grows between
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xxxii the cobblestones. The Custom house serves the small ship traffic which goes through
the port, but is usually a quite place requiring only minimal amounts of work. They spent a good deal of time, also asleep in their accustomed corners, with
their chairs tilted back against the wall, awaking, however, once or twice in a fore noon, to bore one another with the several thousand the repetition of old
sea- stories, and mould jokes, that had grown to be pass- words and counter signs among them Hawthorne 1962:14
It would be sad injustice, the reader must understand, to represent all my excellent old friends as in their dotage. In the first place, my coadjutors were not
invariably old; there were men among them in their strength and prime, of market ability and energy, but as respect the majority of my corps veterans, there
will be no wrong done, if I characterize them generally as a set of wearisome old souls, who had gathered nothing worth preservation from their varied
experience of life Hawthorne 1962:18
The connection between Salem and the Puritans is made early on in the text. Hawthorne’s family originally settled in Salem, and he is a direct descendent of several
ancestors. He describes his ancestors as severe Puritans decked out in black robes, laying harsh judgment upon people who strayed from their faith. When discussing his
ancestors, Hawthorne is both reverent and mocking, jokingly wondering how an idler such as him self could have born from such lineage.
Much of the story then deals with long descriptions of the various men with whom he worked in the Custom House. General Miller, the collector, is the oldest in
habitant, a man who had maintained a stellar career in the military, but who has chosen to work in the Custom house for the remainder of his years. The other man described by
Hawthorne is the inspector. There is one likeness, without which my gallery of Custom House portraits
would be strangely incomplete; but which my comparatively few opportunities for observation enable me to sketch only in the merest outline. It is that of
collector, our old general. Hawthorne 1962:25
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xxxiii Hawthorne writes that the job was created by the man’s father decades earlier, and that
he has held the position ever since. The Inspector is the most light- hearted of the workers, constantly laughing and talking in spite of his age.
The upstairs of the Custom House was designed to accommodate a large movement of goods through the port, and is in ill- repair since it soon became extraneous.
the second story of the Custom House, there is a large room in which the brick- work and naked rafters have never been covered with paneling and plaster
Hawthorne 1962 :26
Hawthorne says that the large upstairs hall was used to store document, and it is here that he finds an unusual package.
At one end of the room, in a recess, were a number of barrels, piled one upon another, containing bundles of official documents. Hawthorne 1962:28
The package contains some fabric with a faded letter “A” imprinted on the lothe, and some papers describing the entire story behind the letter. This is the story
that Hawthorne claims is the basis for The Scarlet Letter. But the object that most drew my attention, in the mysterious package, was a
certain affair of fine red cloth, much worn and faded. There were traces about it of bold embroidery, which however. Was greatly frayed and defaced; so that
none, or very little, of the glitter, with wonderful skill of needle work, as was easy to perceive. This rag of scarlet cloth, for time and wear and sacrilegious
moth, had reduced it to little other than a rag, on careful examination, assumed the shape of a letter. It was the capital letter A Hawthorne 1962:29
Three year after taking his job as Surveyor, General Taylor was elected President of the United States, and Hawthorne received notice of his termination.
Hawthorne remarks that he is lucky to have been let go, since it allowed him the time to write out the entire story of The Scarlet Letter. He finishes the Custom House with a
description of his life since leaving his job as surveyor, and comments that, it may be, however… that the great- grandchildren of the present race may sometimes think kindly
of the scribbler of bygone days…”
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xxxiv At the beginning of this novel, the writer has analyzed the Custom House, and as
we know that the Custom House is the Introduction of this novel, where the writer Nathaniel Hawthorne.
So from the explanations above may be right as in Jim Cullen’s book “The American Dream” states: The word ‘Puritanical” is still in wide usage in the early
twenty first century, usually as a synonym for intolerance and knowledgeable observers at home and abroad have attributed American prurience and self righteousness.
Cullen 2003:12 from above statement, the writer will reveal the Puritans that they are as intolerance people and what makes them being intolerant as reflected in Nathaniel
Hawthorne “ The Scarlet Letter”. A throng of bearded men, in sad- colored garments and gray, steeple- crowned
hat, intermixed with women, some wearing hoods, and edifice, the door of which was heavily timbered with oak, and studded with iron spikes
Hawthorne 1962 :42
Quotation above, it is The opening chapter of The Scarlet Letter introduces several images and themes within the story to follow. This images will recur in several
settings and serves as metaphors for the underlying conflict. Where, Hawthorne describes the condition and tell us a group of people. Hawthorne starts his view by
describing the mixture of men and women. That may implies the society who is standing in the front of the jail. The crowd in front of the jail is a mixture of men and
women, all maintaining severe looks of disapproval, Several of the women begin to discuss Hester Prynne.
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xxxv A large crowd of Puritans stands outside of the prison, waiting for the door to
open. The prison is described as a “wooden jail” already marked with weather- stains and other indications of age which gave a yet darker aspect to its some of us beetle-
browed and gloomy front. the iron on the prison is rusting and creates an overall appearance of decay.
Out side of the building, next to the door, a rosebush stand in full bloom. Hawthorne remarks that it is possible “this rose bush” had sprung up under the foot
steps of the sainted Ann Hutchinson, as she entered the prison door. He then plucks one of the roses and offers it to the reader as a “moral blossom”
The prison represents several different symbols foremost it is a symbol for the puritanical severity of law. The description of the prison indicates that it is old, rusted,
yet strong with “an iron clamped oaken door” this represent the rigorous enforcement of laws and the inability to break free of them.
The prison also serves as a metaphors for the authority of the regime, which will not tolerate deviance. Hawthorne directly challenges this notion by throwing the name
Ann Hutchinson in to the opening pages. Hutchinson was a religious women who disagreed with the puritanical teachings and as a result was imprisoned is Boston.
Hawthorne claims that is possible that the beautiful rosebush growing directly at the prison door sprang from her footsteps. This implies that the Puritanical authoritarianism
may be too rigid, to the point of obliterating things of beauty. This rose bush, by a strange chance, has been kept alive in history; but whether
it had merely survived out of the stern old wilderness, so long after the fall of the gigantic pines and oaks that originally overshadowed it, or whether, as there is a
fair authority for believing, it had sprung up under the prison door, -we shall not take upon us to determine. Finding it so directly on the thresh old of our
narrative, which is now about to issue from hat inauspicious portal, we could hardly do otherwise than pluck one of its flowers and present it to the reader. It
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xxxvi may serves let us hope to symbolize some sweet moral blossom that may be
found along the track or relieve the darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow Hawthorne 1962:43
“ Goodwives” said a hard- featured dame of fifty, I’ll tell ye a piece of my mind. It would be greatly for the public be hoof, if we women, being of mature
age and church members in good repute, should have the handling of such male factresses as this Hester Prynne. What think ye gossips? If the hussy stood up
for judgment before us five, that are now here in a knot together, would she come of with such a sentence as the worshipful magistrates have awarded?
Marry I throw not? Hawthorne 1962: 45
The crowd in front of the jail is a mixture of men and women, all maintaining severe looks of disapproval, Several of the women begin to discuss Hester Prynne, and
soon vow that Hester would not have received such a light sentence for her crime if they had been the judges. One woman, the ugliest of the group, goes so far as to advocate
death for Hester. And states ” This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die”.
Hawthorne 1962: 45 The Puritans attitude toward Hester Prynne was punished by her guilt. The
intolerance means here by blaming and force her to tell who is the father of her baby, as long as she doesn’t open her month, she will receive the consequences and called as a
“hussy woman” and she has to wear her gown with embroidered letter A” On the breast of her gown, in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate with an
embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter A Hawthorne 1962:46
The most prominent part of this novel is The Scarlet Letter A so brazenly gown onto Hester’s clothing the “A” takes on many meaning during the course of the novel,
and even in this scene it immediately means more than just “ adultery” the fine stitch work and gold thread create the perception that the letter is ornamental or a decoration.
When stranger looked curiously at the scarlet letter, - and none ever failed to do so, they branded it afresh into Hester’s soul; so that, oftentimes she could
scarcely refrain, yet always did refrain, from covering the symbol with her hand.
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xxxvii But then, again, an accustomed eye had like wise its own anguish to inflict. Its
cool stare of familiarity was intolerable. Hawthorne 1962:74
Hester Prynne become a victim of the Puritan’s law and norms. Even stranger in her town treated poorly, throughout the way stare her curiously to her gown. And even
for infant baby, the Puritans considered that her baby is a symbol of her guilty and the product of her sins. Hawthorne, in write down his novel, emphasis the treatment of The
Puritan towards Hester’s baby. No one of the Puritans care her and even though for the children. The children always mock toward her and nobody likes her.
How strange it seemed to the sad woman, as she watched the growth, and the beauty that became every day more brilliant, and the intelligence that threw its
quivering sunshine over the tiny features of this child Her pearl- for so had Hester called her; not as a name expressive of her aspect, which had nothing of
the calm, white, unimpassioned. Hawthorne 1962:76
Governor Bellingham, accompanied by the Revered John Wilson, Arthur Dimmesdale and Roger Chillingworth, enters the hall of his mansion. He first sees
pearl, dressed lavishly in her scarlet outfit, standing in front of him. pearl introduces herself and tells them her name, at which point John Wilson state, “ Ruby, rather… or
Red Rose, at the very least, judging from thy hue.” The men then see Hester Prynne in the background. Governor Bellingham tells
her that he thinks it would be better for the child if pearl were removed from her mother’s care. Hester responds that she can teach the child what she has learned from
the Scarlet Letter, at which point Bellingham sternly indicates that the letter is precisely the reason they want to remove Pearl from her care.
As a test of pearl’s education, John Wilson is asked to examine pearl. He asks her who her maker is, to which Pearl replies that she was plucked off the rose bush that
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xxxviii grows by the prison door. The Governor is so shocked by her reply that is immediately
prepared to take Pearl away from Hester. Hester grabs pearls and screams that she will die before the men are allowed to
take her daughter. Finally, in act of desperation, she turns to Arthur Dimmesdale and pleads with him to speak on her behalf. He comes forward with his hand over his heart
and argues that God has obviously given pearls to Hester for some divine reason, and that it would meddle with ways of the Lord to take Pearl away from her. He then
indicates that Pearl is punishment for Hester as well, evidenced by the “ grab of the poor child, so forcibly reminding us of that red symbol which sears [ Hester’s ] bosom”
Much of in this novel, is dedicated to drawing stronger parallels between pearl, The Scarlet letter, and the red rose. Thus pearl is called a “Red Rose”. Even stronger is
pearl’s response to Wilson’s question concerning who made her, where she says that she was plucked off of the rose bush outside the prison door. This directly tells the
reader that Pearl is the person to reveal the moral element of the story, for she embodies the morality which will appear.
3.2 Cruelty
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