It is to the credit of human
nature that, except where its selfishness is brought into play,
it loves more readily than it hates. Hatred, by a gradual and
quiet process, will even be transformed to love, unless the
change be impeded by a continually new irritation of the
original feeling of hostility. In this matter of Hester Prynne
there was neither irritation nor irksomeness. She never battled
with the public, but submitted uncomplainingly to its worst
usage; she made no claim upon it in requital for what she
suffered; she did not weigh upon its sympathies. Then, also, the
blameless purity of her life during all these years in which she
had been set apart to infamy was reckoned largely in her favour.
With nothing now to lose, in the sight of mankind, and with no
hope, and seemingly no wish, of gaining anything, it could only
be a genuine regard for virtue that had brought back the poor
wanderer to its paths.
It was perceived, too, that while Hester never put forward even
the humblest title to share in the world's privileges--further
than to breathe the common air and earn daily bread for little
Pearl and herself by the faithful labour of her hands--she was
quick to acknowledge her sisterhood with the race of man
whenever benefits were to be conferred.
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