It is not possible to read the second chapter of “The Scarlet Letter,” and fail to perceive one animating principle of the Puritan’s life. The townspeople who watch Hester Prynne stand in the pillory are moved by no common emotions. They savour the spectacle, as church-goers of an earlier age savoured the spectacle of a penitent in sackcloth at the portal; but they have also a sense of personal participation in the dragging of frailty to light. Hawthorne endeavours to make this clear, when, in answer to Roger Chillingworth’s questions, a bystander congratulates him upon the timeliness of his arrival on the scene. “It must gladden your heart, after your troubles and sojourn in the wilderness, to find yourself at length in a land where iniquity is searched out, and punished in the sight of rulers and people.” An unfortunate speech to make to the husband of the culprit (Hawthorne is seldom so ironic), but a cordial admission of content. There was a picturesque quality about the laws of New England, and a nicety of administration, which made them a source of genuine pleasure to all who were not being judged. A lie, like an oath, was an offense to be punished; but all lies were not equally punishable. Alice Morse Earle quotes three penalties, imposed for three falsehoods, which show how much pains a magistrate took to discriminate. George Crispe’s wife who “told a lie, not a pernicious lie, but unadvisedly,” was simply admonished. Will Randall who told a “plain lie” was fined ten shillings. Ralph Smith who “lied about seeing a whale,” was fined twenty shillings and excommunicated--which must have rejoiced his suffering neighbours’ souls. The rank of a gentleman, being a recognized attribute in those days, was liable to be forfeited for a disgraceful deed. In 1631, Josias Plastowe of Boston was fined five pounds for stealing corn from the Indians; and it was likewise ordered by the Court that he should be called in the future plain Josias, and not Mr. Plastowe as formerly. Here was a chance for the community to take a hand in punishing a somewhat contemptible malefactor. It would have been more or less than human if it had not enjoyed the privilege. By far the neatest instance of making the punishment fit the crime is recorded in Governor Bradford’s “Diary of Occurrences.” The carpenter employed to construct the stocks for the Plymouth colonists thought fit to charge an excessive rate for the job; whereupon he was speedily clapped into his own instrument, “being the first to suffer this penalty.” And _we_ profess to pity the Puritans for the hardness and dulness of their lives! Why, if we could but see a single profiteer sitting in the stocks, one man out of the thousands who impudently oppress the public punished in this admirable and satisfactory manner, we should be willing to listen to sermons two hours long for the rest of our earthly days.