In The Scarlet Letter, is there a significance to Hester's viewing the crowd from the scaffold?

I believe that there is significance in the way in which
Hester Prynne is said to be at "about the height of a man's shoulders above the street."
There is a sense in which Hester Prynne, being made to stand on the scaffold so high
above the crowd, is shown to be morally superior and "above" the kind of narrow-minded
thinking that has only been able to punish her because of her pregnancy. If we bear in
mind the kind of criticism that this  novel contains regarding Puritanism and their
strict adherence to a creed of laws that make them seem more Pharisaical than Christian,
the way in which Hester stands with such dignity on the scaffold only serves to
reinforce the central idea of her godness and purity. Note how Hawthorne describes
her:

Had
there been a Papist among the crowd of Puritans, he might have seen in this beautiful
woman, so picturesque in her attire and mien, and with the infant at her bosom, an
object to remind him of the image of Divine maternity, which so many illustrious
painteres have vied with one another to
represent...

This quote of
course is highly ironic, and it is an irony that is not lost on the author, because
obviously the image of purity and sinless motherhood that Hester could be said to
resemble is the opposite for her reasons for being there. Nonetheless, I think it is
clear that the way that Hester is raised up from the crowd shows her different way of
thinking about her "terrible sin" and how she is able to look upon it in a maturer and
more understanding frame of mind, in spite of the hostility and punishment that she
faces.