Hawthorne recognizes how Puritan society is structured and discusses how one's sins and actions can affect one's position in society. The main element of the novel, Hester's scarlet letter, strongly attests to how sin alone can change one's entire social position. After receiving her letter, Hester "quotes living out of town" and is ostracized by the small community. Even the children begin to humiliate Hester, chanting horrible things like "let's throw mud at her." Nothing has changed about Hester, she still works as a seamstress, the only reason she has moved to the bottom rung of the social ladder is due to her sins in a very religious society. On the opposite side of the spectrum is Dimmesdale. As the local minister, Dimmesdale wields a lot of power in the town, but is placed on a pedestal as a figurehead because the townspeople believe he is so pure. Even when Dimmesdale confesses that he has sinned, the townspeople revere him more and believe that they are the ones who have sinned and are wicked. By the end of the book, Dimmesdale has inadvertently garnered enough support for people to revere him to the point that many doubted whether Dimmesdale had sinned or "inserted examples of how people think he died." In a society dominated by religion, ministers, by their very nature, are