ery week gets up on his pulpit to hear his congregation's sins. Somehow, Dimmesdale is too weak to confess his own sin. By hiding it, his sin becomes even worse; it's now a concealed sin. Dimmesdale pleads with Hester, while she is sentenced on the scaffold, to confess his guilt. "I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and fellow-sufferer! Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life. What can thy silence do for him, except it tempt him--yea compel him, as it were—to add hypocrisy to sin?" Dimmesdale's guilt is overwhelming. He must act as if nothing has happened. He remains silent so that he can continue to do God's work as a minister. Throughout the seven years of the novel, Dimmesdale's sermons get more and more tantalizing the weaker he grows. He must wear one face for the world, another for himself. Dimmesdale is trying to excuse his behavior, when his soaring career may be a justification for concealing a sin. He is struggling to confess, and in each sermon, he comes closer and closer in doing so. He is also under pressure from Chillingworth, who has brought Dimmesdale almost to the point of insanity. His guilt is heightened when he sees Hester suffer alone with the sin he was a part of. It seems to be Dimmesdale's nature that has led him to be a coward. Dimmesdale's triumphant day, when he finally confesses the truth, comes on Election Day. After giving the greatest sermon of his life, he climbs the scaffold. It is on the very scaffold that he first pleaded with Hester to reveal his identity, now he releases his secret. Chillingworth's remarks show the importance of Dimmesdale's confession: "Hadst thou sought the world earth over, there was no place so secret no high place not lowly place where thou could...
