Both Uses of
diabolical
in
The Scarlet Letter
- This diabolical agent had the Divine permission, for a season, to burrow into the clergyman's intimacy, and plot against his soul.†
p. 86.7 *
- Now it was a herd of diabolic shapes, that grinned and mocked at the pale minister, and beckoned him away with them; now a group of shining angels, who flew upward heavily, as sorrow-laden, but grew more ethereal as they rose.†
p. 97.9
Definition:
evil; very bad; or cruel and clever (like something of the devil)