Conscience

Conscience is the thing inside ourselves that drives us towards what we do. When we stray off that path, this "conscience" will attempt to rectify us by making us feel guilty. It's an uncomfortable feeling. Henry's eagerness to be a war hero is constantly calling out to him, and haunting him after acts and acts of cowardice. His conscience is telling him to do what's right. It can also be described as what's morally right and wrong. Henry feels a cognitive dissonance, a feeling that occurs when one's thoughts collides with one's actions, therefore they'll try to adjust their thoughts to their action. In Henry's case, his conscience fully ignored, he adjusts his thoughts by thinking of excuses to please the dissonance in between his running away and wish of heroism. Cognitive, meaning thought, and dissonance, meaning incongruity. In the Scarlet Letter, Dimmesdale's conscience is what's right, and basically it's driving him to want to say and speak out of his own sins, yet he could not bring his conscience forward and admit the truth.