Puritan societies were based on religion and righteous deeds, the judgment of the sin of adultery, committed in The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthone, would have been the one that would have had a punishment of death. Hester Prynne, at the beginning of the story, is on trial with the letter A on her chest and her little girl, Pearl, in her arms, waiting to be seen publicly and forced into total isolation. Married to Roger Chillingsworth, Hester commits this sin with none other than the Reverend Dimmesdale, the most respected person in society; although society does not know Dimmesdale as the father. As time goes by, Dimmesdale, haunted by this sin, begins to isolate himself, and since people do not know about his wrong actions he also flagellates himself as punishment, and even when his sin is publicly known people seem to have a different reaction to it from what their reaction was with Hester. Society's view of sin and wrongdoing sends people into isolation, whether by their own choice or by society's choice. They use isolation as a way to create a point where someone should be shunned for fear that they are different or evil, that they are born into or inhabited by the "bogeyman" or the devil. Hester Prynne, after committing adultery, is condemned to wear the scarlet robe. letter as punishment, but what society is also trying to accomplish is to label it in a way that creates a feeling of isolation, as well as a public lesson on sin. An example of this would be the letter itself: “But the stitch which attracted all eyes, and, as it were, transfigured the wearer, so that both men and women, who had been familiar with Hester Prynne, were now impressed as if they saw it for the first time, - it was that Scarlet LETTER, so fantastic... in the center of the paper... there they worshiped him and would never have known that he had sinned if he had not come before them and confessed his deeds illicit. Through isolation, the characters in The Scarlet Letter paid for their sins and wrongdoings, from the isolation forced upon them to the isolation they chose. Hester was isolated from society, but she was also isolated from herself. Pearl, although young, was isolated from society, from herself, and from her mother. Dimmesdale was isolated only from himself, never from the public because his sin was never public until he was on his deathbed. Isolation will accompany anyone throughout their life, whether it is caused by themselves or others, it will always be human nature to isolate people who are marginalized or who don't seem to fit the mold of society. Works Cited Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. New York: Bantam, 1981. Print.