According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary,
"sympathetic" means
feeling or showing concern
about someone who is in a bad situation : having or showing feelings of sympathy.
If that is the case,does not seem to be at all sympathetic in 's
. In fact, he seems to be just the opposite: unsympathetic.
The first time we meet Dimmesdale is at 's public punishment on the scaffold. This most
pious minister is standing above her, looking down on her along with the rather haughty Reverend
. It is true that Dimmesdale does not condemn Hester the way Wilson does in his sermon against
adultery; however, he obviously does not do the one thing he could do to
show sympathy for Hester. He does not reveal that he is the father of her child and her fellow
adulterer. Instead he allows her to suffer her shame alone. That is not a sympathetic
act.
Later in the novel, both on the scaffold and in the forest,senses the
connection between...
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