Hawthorne's novel describes the life of an adulteress, Hester Prynne, who is shunned by her judgmental community. She gave birth to her daughter Pearl out of wedlock, while her “partner of iniquity,”(Hawthorne 59) a minister named Arthur Dimmesdale, never revealed his “black secret” of their affair. Although Hester suffered public ridicule, the minister suffered no immediate consequence. However, guilt has a way of killing a person silently. In the end, Dimmesdale's black secret had a greater negative impact on him t ....