Tortured writers throughout history plagued by certain aspects of the human psyche brood obsessively over a small range of psychological themes. Nathaniel Hawthorne is one such author of that assemblage who, through his works such as The Scarlet Letter and "The Minister's Black Veil," has delved deep into specific aspects of the darker side of human nature and emotion. The literary investigations Hawthorne has performed in these writings have illustrated the consequences of three aspects of human emotion, pride, selfishness, and hidden guilt, and what each of these emotions' effect is on the behavior of the characters afflicted with them.

Hawthorne was able to illustrate of the consequences of pride on human nature in his work The Scarlet Letter. In that work the character of Roger Chillingworth has a great deal of pride that it drives him to insanity. In his absence, his wife, Hester Prynne, has had...