The Scarlet Letter

What is Mistress Hibbins saying about the people of Salem Village? In chapter 22.

What is Mistress Hibbins saying about the people of Salem Village? In chapter 22.

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Mistress Hibbins is noting that a majority of the townspeople are as hypocritical as she knows Dimmesdale to be.

"Now, what mortal imagination could conceive it!" whispered the old lady confidentially to Hester. "Yonder divine man! That saint on earth, as the people uphold him to be, and as--I must needs say--he really looks! Who, now, that saw him pass in the procession, would think how little while it is since he went forth out of his study,--chewing a Hebrew text of Scripture in his mouth, I warrant,--to take an airing in the forest! Aha! we know what that means, Hester Prynne! But, truly, forsooth, I find it hard to believe him the same man. Many a church-member saw I, walking behind the music, that has danced in the same measure with me, when Somebody was fiddler, and, it might be, an Indian powwow or a Lapland wizard changing hands with us! That is but a trifle, when a woman knows the world. But this minister! Couldst thou surely tell, Hester, whether he was the same man that encountered thee on the forest-path?"

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The Scarlet Letter