C 23
The eloquent voice, on which the souls of the listening audience had
been borne aloft as on the swelling waves of the sea, at length came
to a pause. There was a momentary silence, profound as what
should follow the utterance of oracles. Then ensued a murmur and
half-hushed tumult, as if the auditors, released from the high spell
that had transported them into the region of another’s mind, were
returning into themselves, with all their awe and wonder still heavy
on them. In a moment more the crowd began to gush forth from the
doors of the church. Now that there was an end, they needed more
breath, more fit to support the gross and earthly life into which they
relapsed, than that atmosphere which the preacher had converted
into words of flame, and had burdened with the rich fragrance of his
thought.
In the open air their rapture broke into speech. The street and the
market-place absolutely babbled, from side to side, with applauses
of the minister. His hearers could not rest until they had told one
another of what each knew better than he could tell or hear.
According to their united testimony, never had man spoken in so
wise, so high, and so holy a spirit, as he that spake this day; nor had
inspiration ever breathed through mortal lips more evidently than it
did through his. Its influence could be seen, as it were, descending
upon him, and possessing him, and continually lifting him out of the
written discourse that lay before him, and filling him with ideas that
must have been as marvellous to himself as to his audience. His
subject, it appeared, had been the relation between the Deity and
the communities of mankind, with a special reference to the New
England which they were here planting in the wilderness. And, as he
drew towards the close, a spirit as of prophecy had come upon him,
constraining him to its purpose as mightily as the old prophets of
Israel were constrained, only with this difference, that, whereas the
Jewish seers had denounced judgments and ruin on their country, it
was his mission to foretell a high and glorious destiny for the newly
gathered people of the Lord. But, throughout it all, and through the
whole discourse, there had been a certain deep, sad undertone of
pathos, which could not be interpreted otherwise than as the natural
regret of one soon to pass away. Yes; their minister whom they so
lovedÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯and who so loved them all, that he could not depart
heavenward without a sighÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯had the foreboding of untimely death
upon him, and would soon leave them in their tears. This idea of his
transitory stay on earth gave the last emphasis to the effect which
the preacher had produced; it was if an angel, in his passage to the
skies, had shaken his bright wings over the people for an instantÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯at
once a shadow and a splendourÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯and had shed down a shower of
golden truths upon them.
Thus, there had come to the Reverend Mr. DimmesdaleÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯as to
most men, in their various spheres, though seldom recognised until
they see it far behind themÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯an epoch of life more brilliant and full of
triumph than any previous one, or than any which could hereafter be.
He stood, at this moment, on the very proudest eminence of
superiority, to which the gifts or intellect, rich lore, prevailing
eloquence, and a reputation of whitest sanctity, could exalt a
clergyman in New England’s earliest days, when the professional
character was of itself a lofty pedestal. Such was the position which
the minister occupied, as he bowed his head forward on the
cushions of the pulpit at the close of his Election Sermon. Meanwhile
Hester Prynne was standing beside the scaffold of the pillory, with
the scarlet letter still burning on her breast!
Now was heard again the clamour of the music, and the measured
tramp of the military escort issuing from the church door. The
procession was to be marshalled thence to the town hall, where a
solemn banquet would complete the ceremonies of the day.
Once more, therefore, the train of venerable and majestic fathers
were seen moving through a broad pathway of the people, who drew
back reverently, on either side, as the Governor and magistrates, the
old and wise men, the holy ministers, and all that were eminent and
renowned, advanced into the midst of them. When they were fairly in
the marketplace, their presence was greeted by a shout. ThisÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
though doubtless it might acquire additional force and volume from
the child-like loyalty which the age awarded to its rulersÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯was felt to
be an irrepressible outburst of enthusiasm kindled in the auditors by
that high strain of eloquence which was yet reverberating in their
ears. Each felt the impulse in himself, and in the same breath,
caught it from his neighbour. Within the church, it had hardly been
kept down; beneath the sky it pealed upward to the zenith. There
were human beings enough, and enough of highly wrought and
symphonious feeling to produce that more impressive sound than
the organ tones of the blast, or the thunder, or the roar of the sea;
even that mighty swell of many voices, blended into one great voice
by the universal impulse which makes likewise one vast heart out of
the many. Never, from the soil of New England had gone up such a
shout! Never, on New England soil had stood the man so honoured
by his mortal brethren as the preacher!
How fared it with him, then? Were there not the brilliant particles of
a halo in the air about his head? So etherealised by spirit as he was,
and so apotheosised by worshipping admirers, did his footsteps, in
the procession, really tread upon the dust of earth?
As the ranks of military men and civil fathers moved onward, all
eyes were turned towards the point where the minister was seen to
approach among them. The shout died into a murmur, as one portion
of the crowd after another obtained a glimpse of him. How feeble
and pale he looked, amid all his triumph! The energyÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯or say, rather,
the inspiration which had held him up, until he should have delivered
the sacred message that had brought its own strength along with it
from heavenÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯was withdrawn, now that it had so faithfully performed
its office. The glow, which they had just before beheld burning on his
cheek, was extinguished, like a flame that sinks down hopelessly
among the late decaying embers. It seemed hardly the face of a man
alive, with such a death-like hue: it was hardly a man with life in him,
that tottered on his path so nervously, yet tottered, and did not fall!
One of his clerical brethrenÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯it was the venerable John WilsonÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
observing the state in which Mr. Dimmesdale was left by the retiring
wave of intellect and sensibility, stepped forward hastily to offer his
support. The minister tremulously, but decidedly, repelled the old
man’s arm. He still walked onward, if that movement could be so
described, which rather resembled the wavering effort of an infant,
with its mother’s arms in view, outstretched to tempt him forward.
And now, almost imperceptible as were the latter steps of his
progress, he had come opposite the well-remembered and weather-
darkened scaffold, where, long since, with all that dreary lapse of
time between, Hester Prynne had encountered the world’s
ignominious stare. There stood Hester, holding little Pearl by the
hand! And there was the scarlet letter on her breast! The minister
here made a pause; although the music still played the stately and
rejoicing march to which the procession moved. It summoned him
onwardÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯inward to the festival!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯but here he made a pause.
Bellingham, for the last few moments, had kept an anxious eye
upon him. He now left his own place in the procession, and
advanced to give assistance judging, from Mr. Dimmesdale’s aspect
that he must otherwise inevitably fall. But there was something in the
latter’s expression that warned back the magistrate, although a man
not readily obeying the vague intimations that pass from one spirit to
another. The crowd, meanwhile, looked on with awe and wonder.
This earthly faintness, was, in their view, only another phase of the
minister’s celestial strength; nor would it have seemed a miracle too
high to be wrought for one so holy, had he ascended before their
eyes, waxing dimmer and brighter, and fading at last into the light of
heaven!
He turned towards the scaffold, and stretched forth his arms.
“Hester,” said he, “come hither! Come, my little Pearl!”
It was a ghastly look with which he regarded them; but there was
something at once tender and strangely triumphant in it. The child,
with the bird-like motion, which was one of her characteristics, flew
to him, and clasped her arms about his knees. Hester PrynneÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
slowly, as if impelled by inevitable fate, and against her strongest will
Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯likewise drew near, but paused before she reached him. At this
instant old Roger Chillingworth thrust himself through the crowdÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯or,
perhaps, so dark, disturbed, and evil was his look, he rose up out of
some nether regionÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯to snatch back his victim from what he sought
to do! Be that as it might, the old man rushed forward, and caught
the minister by the arm.
“Madman, hold! what is your purpose?” whispered he. “Wave back
that woman! Cast off this child All shall be well! Do not blacken your
fame, and perish in dishonour! I can yet save you! Would you bring
infamy on your sacred profession?”
“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 whatÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯for my own heavy sin and miserable
agonyÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯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!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯with all his own
might, and the fiend’s! Come, HesterÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯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 sawÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
unable to receive the explanation which most readily presented itself,
or to imagine any otherÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯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 secretÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯no high place
nor lowly place, where thou couldst have escaped meÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯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-matterÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
which, if full of sin, was full of anguish and repentance likewiseÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯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.
“People of New England!” cried he, with a voice that rose over
them, high, solemn, and majesticÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯yet had always a tremor through
it, and sometimes a shriek, struggling up out of a fathomless depth of
remorse and woeÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯”ye, that have loved me!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯ye, that have deemed
me holy!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯behold me here, the one sinner of the world! At lastÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯at
last!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯I stand upon the spot where, seven years since, I should have
stood, here, with this woman, whose arm, more than the little
strength wherewith I have crept hitherward, sustains me at this
dreadful moment, from grovelling down upon my face! Lo, the scarlet
letter which Hester wears! Ye have all shuddered at it! Wherever her
walk hath beenÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯wherever, so miserably burdened, she may have
hoped to find reposeÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯it hath cast a lurid gleam of awe and horrible
repugnance round about her. But there stood one in the midst of you,
at whose brand of sin and infamy ye have not shuddered!”
It seemed, at this point, as if the minister must leave the remainder
of his secret undisclosed. But he fought back the bodily weaknessÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
and, still more, the faintness of heartÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯that was striving for the
mastery with him. He threw off all assistance, and stepped
passionately forward a pace before the woman and the children.
“It was on him!” he continued, with a kind of fierceness; so
determined was he to speak out tile whole. “God’s eye beheld it! The
angels were for ever pointing at it! (The Devil knew it well, and
fretted it continually with the touch of his burning finger!) But he hid it
cunningly from men, and walked among you with the mien of a spirit,
mournful, because so pure in a sinful world! Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯and sad, because he
missed his heavenly kindred! Now, at the death-hour, he stands up
before you! He bids you look again at Hester’s scarlet letter! He tells
you, that, with all its mysterious horror, it is but the shadow of what
he bears on his own breast, and that even this, his own red stigma,
is no more than the type of what has seared his inmost heart! Stand
any here that question God’s judgment on a sinner! Behold! Behold,
a dreadful witness of it!”
With a convulsive motion, he tore away the ministerial band from
before his breast. It was revealed! But it were irreverent to describe
that revelation. For an instant, the gaze of the horror-stricken
multitude was concentrated on the ghastly miracle; while the minister
stood, with a flush of triumph in his face, as one who, in the crisis of
acutest pain, had won a victory. Then, down he sank upon the
scaffold! Hester partly raised him, and supported his head against
her bosom. Old Roger Chillingworth knelt down beside him, with a
blank, dull countenance, out of which the life seemed to have
departed,
“Thou hast escaped me!” he repeated more than once. “Thou hast
escaped me!”
“May God forgive thee!” said the minister. “Thou, too, hast deeply
sinned!”
He withdrew his dying eyes from the old man, and fixed them on
the woman and the child.
“My little Pearl,” said he, feebly and there was a sweet and gentle
smile over his face, as of a spirit sinking into deep repose; nay, now
that the burden was removed, it seemed almost as if he would be
sportive with the childÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯”dear little Pearl, wilt thou kiss me now?
Thou wouldst not, yonder, in the forest! But now thou wilt?”
Pearl kissed his lips. A spell was broken. The great scene of grief,
in which the wild infant bore a part had developed all her
sympathies; and as her tears fell upon her father’s cheek, they were
the pledge that she would grow up amid human joy and sorrow, nor
forever do battle with the world, but be a woman in it. Towards her
mother, too, Pearl’s errand as a messenger of anguish was fulfilled.
“Hester,” said the clergyman, “farewell!”
“Shall we not meet again?” whispered she, bending her face down
close to his. “Shall we not spend our immortal life together? Surely,
surely, we have ransomed one another, with all this woe! Thou
lookest far into eternity, with those bright dying eyes! Then tell me
what thou seest!”
“Hush, HesterÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯hush!” said he, with tremulous solemnity. “The law
we broke IÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯the sin here awfully revealed!Ä�ā‚¬ā€¯let these alone be in thy
thoughts! I fear! I fear! It may be, that, when we forgot our GodÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯
when we violated our reverence each for the other’s soulÄ�ā‚¬ā€¯it was
thenceforth vain to hope that we could meet hereafter, in an
everlasting and pure reunion. God knows; and He is merciful! He
hath proved his mercy, most of all, in my afflictions. By giving me this
burning torture to bear upon my breast! By sending yonder dark and
terrible old man, to keep the torture always at red-heat! By bringing
me hither, to die this death of triumphant ignominy before the people!
Had either of these agonies been wanting, I had been lost for ever!
Praised be His name! His will be done! Farewell!”
That final word came forth with the minister’s expiring breath. The
multitude, silent till then, broke out in a strange, deep voice of awe
and wonder, which could not as yet find utterance, save in this
murmur that rolled so heavily after the departed spirit.
