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CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE

HAWTHORNE'S FICTION:

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SIN AND GUILT

A thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts with

Honors in English

by

Edward Alfred Gika

May 1984 The Thesis of Edward Alfred Gika is approved:

Arthur Lane

Arthur Lane, Committee Chairman

California State University, Northridge

ii Q .

This thesis is dedicated to my parents and my brother

Hector whose constant support and love gave me

the strength to say "Yes."

iii ABSTRACT

HAWTHORNE'S FICTION:

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SIN AND GUILT by

Edward Alfred Gika

Bachelor of Arts with Honors in English

Throughout his career, dealt with themes of sin and guilt in his fiction. His treatment of these concepts was not that of the theologian or the moral philosopher who attempt to both define and judge the moral nature of such concepts. Rather, Hawthorne•s emphasis was on the psychological mechanisms and ultimate consequences of sin and guilt. Hawthorne's emphasis was one of effect and not so much one of cause.

Hawthorne's interest in the psychology of sin and guilt stemmed undoubtedly from his fascination with his Puritan past. The self-righteous attitudes and judgemental stance that his forefathers often assumed helped to shape his views on sin, guilt, and man.

Among the various aspects of sin that Hawthorne dealt with, the effects of the sin of intellectual pride was his

iv foremost concern. Hawthorne's view that pride was the result of a separation, either physical or intellectual, from the community of man is illustrated in many of his short stories and is the crucial mechanism by which the

Unpardonable Sin is created. It was this separation and consequent isolation of the individual, which in turn in­ stilled a lack of sympathy in that individual, for his fellow man. This separation between the heart and the intellect was, for Hawthorne, the most unpardonable of human sins.

v At the time Nathaniel Hawthorne was writing, the field of psychology was just beginning to be organized as a valid and useful approach to the study of human behavior. Con­ cepts of good and evil were beginning to be viewed not sim­ ply as built in, innate states of being but rather as psy­ chological processes. External social forces were looked at as possible influences on the human psyche as opposed to the physiological approaches of the past. Old beliefs in the validity of such behavioral measurements as phrenology or body humors were being supplanted by studies in person­ altiy, social influences, and interrelationships. In its early development the field of psychology was likened to what we may term today a branch of para-psychol­ ogy. Mesmerism, hypnosis, and mysticism were considered part of, or stemming from this approach toward the under­ standing of human nature. Hawthorne's own interest in these fields is evident in his novels, The B1ithedale Ro­ mance and The House of the Seven Gables. Hawthorne adopted this psychological approach in his portrayal of human nature and in his treatment of the themes of sin and guilt in his fiction. Hawthorne's treat­ ment of these themes was radically different from that of past writers. It was not that of the theologian or the moral philosopher who attempt to both define and judge the moral nature of sin and guilt; rather, Hawthorne's emphasis

1 2 is on the psychological mechanisms and ultimate conse­ quences of sin and guilt for man's soul. His interest was therefore not so much one of immoral causality as it was one of psychological effect.

Hawthorne was reluctant to make any moral judgments in his fiction preferring to allow the reader to form his own opinion from what is presented in the work. In many cases, he refused even to deal explicitly with the evil or sin in the work. His focus instead was on the psycholo­ gical effect of the dead rather than on the dead itself.

This reluctance to condemn any character or action directly is in part responsible for the ambiguity that is charac­ teristic of his writing. While it is true that Hawthorne is very often ambiguous, more often than not the ambiguity serves to underline the thematic structure and message of his stories: "" is perhaps the most notable example. In part, the ambiguity is also a reflection of Hawthorne's reluctance to assume the accusa­ tory stance of his Puritan ancestors. This fear of re­ peating the judgmental role that his ancestors played is essential to the understanding of Hawthorne's major themes, namely, the isolation of the individual from the community, the "unpardonable sin," and the influence of the past on the present.

In order to fully comprehend these themes in Haw­ thorne's work, it is necessary to look at the various influences that helped to shape his view of sin and its 3

effect on mankind. One of the greatest of these was his

Puritan ancestry; many of Hawthorne's ideas carne as a I. direct result of the historical accounts of the brutality

and hypocrisy of his early Puritan forefathers.

Hawthorne understood the fundamental message of Puri-

tan doctrine and realized the often contradictory and

hypocritical behavior of the most pious Puritans. The

puritan belief in the universal depravity of man stirred

his imagination with ideas of a common brotherhood even if

it were a brotherhood of man fallen in sin. With this

belief carne another: that man must not, in order to be

"good," try to estrange himself from the community.

In Hawthorne's story, "Fancy's Show Box," he states

explicitly his view on the doctrine of universal depravity

as well as his view on the necessity of remaining linked

to the chain of humanity.

Man must not disclaim his brotherhood, even with the guiltiest, since, though his hand be clean, his heart has surely been polluted by the flitting phantoms of iniquity.l

But this belief in the universal depravity of man

carried with it an idea that was both difficult and fruit-

ful for Hawthorne. If all men were sinful due to original

sin, then how can one man be the moral judge of another?

This question would pervade much of his fiction and be

brought to its most intense light in the novel, The Scarlet

Letter. 4

Hawthorne's view that man should not attempt to es­ trange himself from others revealed a marked difference be­ tween him and the other noteworthy Trancendentalists of his time. Unlike Emerson, Hawthorne was not disturbed by the dangers of conformity or compromise; he was more dis­ turbed by what he considered the evil formed in man's na­ ture by the conscious or unconscious separation of the in­ dividual from the community of man. Hawthorne felt that this separation led toward a tendency to hold oneself not only aloof but also superior to other men. He viewed the many judgments and punishments handed down from the Puri­ tan magistrates as just this sort of separation and con­ sidered that this ability to pass judgments on morality was a result of pride. "I wrap myself in pride as in a mantle," declares the heroine of "Lady Eleanore's Mantle." Most of Hawthorne's characters wrap themselves in some such cloak but the pride they symbolize may take on many forms: the pride of social rank, the pride of moral self­ righteousness, the pride of wealth and power, or the pride of the intellect. Of all these different forms of pride, the pride of the intellect for Hawthorne was the most dan­ gerous and the most unforgivable. To take undue pride in one's intellectual prowess or attainments, to cultivate and develop the intellect at the expense of the sympathies, to take only an intellectual or scientific interest without sympathy or compassion; this was for Hawthorne the deadli- 5 0 '

est form human guilt could take. This form of pride was indeed the "unpardonable sin" of Ethan Brand, Hr. Hooper, Dr. Rappaccini, and Roger Chillingsworth. Hawthorne didn't have to look far to find models for

such characters. His own ancestors supplied hi~ with the necessary role models. Hawthorne's first American ancestor, William Haw- thorne (1607-1681), was a member of the general court of Massachusetts and later became a member of the Governor's advisory council. Frederick Crews, in his book The Sins of the Fathers, relates some of the punitive sentences Hawthorne employed in his attempt to stamp out evil in Es­ sex County. For a man caught in burglary he and his fellow judges prescribed the lopping off of one ear and the branding of a "B" on his forehead; for someone convicted of man­ slaughter they ordered that the offending hand be burned; another man who insulted the judges' dignity had his ear nailed to a pillory and then amputated, after which he ".;as whipped and fined; a boy convicted of bestiality with a mare saw the animal bludgeon2d to death and then was hanged himself. Crews goes on to relate an incident in which an adulterer was made to stand in the market place of Boston wearing a paper with the words, "Thus I stand for my adult­ erous and whorish carriage." Clearly, the events of New England's history as well as those of his own family pro­ vided Hawthorne with rich material for his favorite themes. 6

In the sketch, Main Street, Hawthorne illustrates the sadistic treatment of a woman who is made to stand naked, tied to a cart, while being whipped. He loves his business, faithful officer that he is, and puts his soul into every stroke, zealous to fulfill the injunc­ tion of Major Hawthorne's warrant, in the spirit and to the letter. There comes down a stroke that has drawn blood! Ten such stripes are to be given in Salem, ten in Boston, and ten in Dedham.3 At first the reader is appalled by the constable's sadistic brutality, but he is only an agent of the Major, who is ultimately responsible. In singling out his ances­ tor by name, Hawthorne as narrator becomes both spectator, and as heir to the Major, a vicarious participator. This heritage of brutal judges and executioners who hide them­ selves behind a doctrine of moral self-righteousness was to haunt Hawthorne throughout his career. But Hawthorne's attitude toward his ancestors was ambivalent. It is safe to say that he treats his family history with a mixture of both shame and pride: the shame obvious from the inci­ dents of sadistic brutality I have already noted. The pride comes from the fact that his early ancestors achieved a fame and dignity, even though it be perverse, that he and his impoverished sisters lacked. These stories of sadism and hypocrisy among the early Puritans affected Hawthorne greatly. They instilled in him a certain moral fear of repeating the crimes that his forefathers had forged into the family history. This fear 7

of repeating the sins of the fathers, which was to find its greatest expression in his novel, The House of the Seven Gables, was primarily influenced by his belief in the Puritan doctrine of the hereditary nature of sin. It was this belief, along with his insistence that it is both impossible and harmful to attempt to disconnect oneself from the past and mankind, that underlay much of his fiction and helped to form his views on man, sin, and guilt. Among Hawthorne's major concerns was the creation of sin itself and the possible psychological mechanisms by which the "unpardonable sin" is created. This sin, which appears in various guises in the short stories and novels, consists essentially in the violation of the sanctity of the heart by an outside party, for the mere purpose of either satisfying the curiosity or as a means of gaining knowledge of that person without the intention of giving consolation or sympathy. Hawthorne had formulated this concept in his journal as early as 1844: The Unpardonable Sin might consist in a want of love and reverence for the Human Soul; in consequence of 'tvhich, the investigator pried into its dark depths, not ~vith a hope or purpose of making it better, but from a cold philosophical curiosity, content that it should be -vvicked in whatever kind or degree, and. only desiring to study it out. ~.Jould not this, in other 'tvords, be the sepa­ ration of the intellect from the heart?4 8

This concept of the unpardonable sin reflects Haw­ thorne's preoccupation with the idea of the accuser who judges and condemns his equals. Since all of mankind is sinful, to pry into the heart of another with the express purpose of revealing hidden sin is an act of pride. In Christianity, the concept of sin implies that there is a method of redemption. The sinner can be saved through true repentance and good works. The "unpardonable" sin implies that there is no means of redemption or salva­ tion. By its very nature, the sin is without possibility of pardon, either by man or God. The man who enacts the unpardonable sin does so without any sense of sympathy; it is this lack of sympathy that leads to the separation of the heart from the intellect. Havlthorne indicates various ways by which this sepa­ ration takes place. Among these are the effects of pride, isolation, and self-seclusion. In many of Hawthorne's stories, pride is the cause for both the isolation of the individual and finally the desire on his part to seclude himself from the rest of the community. The act of secluding oneself from the community re­ sults in a tendency to treat other people as objects of study rather than as parts of a chain of humanity. This prideful and scientific position is a direct result of cut­ ting oneself out of the mainstream of humanity. This theme of isolation bears a closer relation than any other 9

to the author's own life. Hawthorne's isolated life after his graduation from Bowdoin College is well known. In a letter to Longfellow on June 4, 1837, he wrote: By some witchcraft or other -- for I really cannot assign any reasonable why and wherefore -- I have been carried apart from the main current of life, and find it impossible to get back again. Since we last met ... I have secluded my­ self from society; and yet I never meant any such thing, nor dreamed what sort of life I was going to lead. I have made a captive of myself and put me into a dun­ geon; and now I cannot find the key to let myself out and if the door were open, I should be almost afraid to come out ... there is no fate in this world so horrible as to have no share in either its joys or sorrows. For the last ten years, I have ~ot lived, but only dreamed about living. It is therefore no surprise to see so many of Haw­ thorne's characters portrayed as obsessive, is.olated ar­ tists, clergymen, or scientists who seclude themselves from society. Characters such as Ethan Brand, Minister Hooper, and Young Goodman Brown isolate themselves andre­ fuse to accept a sense of human commonality. In most cases their denial is a result of excessive pride and a removal of sympathy (heart). They stand as accusers and moral judges of mankind and in so doing deny any connec­ tion with it. They are experimenters, standing over hu­ manity dissecting with their intellect the hidden recesses of the heart. Because of their self-imposed exile, and due to their self-righteous pride and intellectual posi- 10

tion, they lack the necessary sympathy that would bind them to the rest of mankind. This self-righteous attitude is brought to its most extreme dramatization in "Ethan Brand," the clearest de- piction of the unpardonable sin. In "Ethan Brand," Hawthorne illustrates the means by which the separation of the intellect and the sympathies creates such a sin. As in most of his stories, this sepa- ration is initiated through the conscious or unconscious isolation of the individual. Ethan Brand has sought the world over for the unpar­ donable sin. At the beginning of the story, Brand returns to the lime-kiln beside which the idea of the unpardonable sin first came to him during his lonely vigils tending the fire. Hawthorne's setting is on a lonely, isolated hill­ side surrounded by a dark forest. There are many such lime-kilns in that tract of country, for the purpose of burn­ ing the white marble which composes a large part of the substance of the hills. Some of them, built years ago, and long deserted, with weeds growing in the vacant round of the interior, which is open to the sky, and grass and wildflowers rooting themselves into chinks of the stones, look already like relics of antiquity, and may yet be overspread with the lichens of centuries to come. Others, where the lime burner still feeds his daily and night long fire, afford points of interest to the wanderer among the hills, who seats himself on a log of wood or a frag­ ment of marble, to hold a chat with the solitary man. It is a lonesome, and, when 11

the character is inclined to thought, may be an intensely thoughtful occupa­ tion; as it proved in.the case of Ethan Brand, who had mused to such strange pur­ pose, in days gone by, whilg the fire in this very kiln was burning. It was indeed this secluded lifestyle and this detach­ ment from society that allows Brand to formulate his idea and to separate himself from the rest of mankind. Like the scientist performing experiments on mice, Ethan Brand has had to dissociate his feelings from the object of his analysis. He has had to remove any sympathy or compassion in his own breast in order to perform the experiment and this is Brand's ultimate tragedy. Because of his isola­ tion from man, Brand is able to detach his sympathies from mankind. He had lost his hold of the magnetic chain of humanity. He was no longer a brother­ man, opening the chambers or the dungeons of our common nature by the key of holy sympathy, which gave him a right to share in all its secrets; he was now a cold observer, looking on mankind as the sub­ ject of his experiment, and, at length, converting man and woman to be his puppets, and pulling the wires that moved them to such degrees of crime as were demanded for his study.7 On viewing Ethan Brand's case, the unpardonable sin might be said to consist in the very search for the un- pardonable sin. The idea that obsessed Ethan Brand in the end consumes him '>vhen he realizes that the sin resides in his own breast. Hawthorne's emphasis in the story is not to condemn 12

Brand, but rather to reveal, through the different charac­ ters, varying degrees of human imperfection and spiritual grace. The characters in the story may be placed on a spectrum, diverging from the ideal to a greater or lesser extent. Ethan Brand is, of course, the farthest from the ideal of spiritual grace. Brand, who was once "simple and loving," has sinned from an almost inconceivable amount of pride, which in turn alienates him from both God and man. Brand has taken on an almost Faustian role of trying to know of good and evil alike and he is uniquely punished for his presumption. From being a simple and loving soul, Ethan Brand has become a cold, compassionless analyzer, violating the sanctity of the heart for the sake of mere knowledge. Through his pride, he has gained knowledge without love and has tainted the human spirit by cold and prying intellectu­ al analysis. When Brand is asked if during his journey he happened to meet the daughter of one of the men gathered by the lime-kiln, we come to see the full effects of this prideful intellectual prying into the heart. Ethan Brand's eye quailed beneath the old man's. That daughter, from whom he so earnestly desired a word of greeting, was the Ester of our tale, the very girl whom, with such cold and remorseless pur­ pose, Ethan Brand had made the subject of 13

an psychological experiment, and wasted, absorbed, and perhaps annihilated her soul, in the process.8 If Ethan Brand is at the farthest extreme of the spec- trum, then Bartram, the new lime burner, must fall next in line. Unlike Brand, Bartram's position on the spectrum is not due to his intellectual pride, rather it is due to his insensitivity and brutish nature. Hawthorne tells us early in the story that the business of tending the kiln is a "thoughtful occupation," whereas Brand took this aspect of his profession to its most extreme point, Bartram "troubled himself with no thoughts save the very few that were re- quisite to his business." Bartram's uncaring, dull, and insensitive character is brought to full light at the close of the story when he discovers the limestone heart of Ethan Brand in the kiln. "Was the fellow's heart made of marble?" cried Bartram, in some perplexity at the phenomenon. "At any rate, it is burnt into what looks like special good lime; and, taking all the bones together, my kiln is half a bushel the richer for him." So saying, the rude lime-burner lifted his pole, letting it fall upon the skele­ ton, the relics of Ethan Brand were crumbled into fragments.9 Bartram is presented as Brand's foil in the story. Ethan Brand, the prideful man of intellect is pitted against Bartram, the obtuse man of the earthly senses. The final scene in which Bartram reduces Brand's skeleton to fragments, while it is at once a reflection on the cal- 14 lous nature of the new lime-burner, also drives horne

Hawthorne's point that this is the ultimate end of pride and misguided ambition; a rejoining -- in the dust -- of the community he had spurned.

The three village worthies likewise have places on

Hawthorne's moral spectrum, but their positions are some- what closer to spiritual grace than either Brand's or

Bartram's. All three characters have come to wonder at

Brand's unpardonable sin. They too, like Bartram, are insensitive to Brand's discovery and mock him. Each char- acter is portrayed as sinful in one way or another.

Hawthorne's side notes on these characters reveal them as sinners -- but they are human sinners who still maintain a connection with society.

There, among other old acquaintances, was a once ubiquitous man ••.• It was the stage agent. The present specimen of the genus was a wilted and smoke-dried man, wrinkled and red-nosed, .•• who, for a length of time unknown, had kept his desk and corner in the bar-room •••• Another well-remembered, though strangely altered, face was that of lawyer Giles, as people still called him in courtesy; an elderly ragmuffin, in his soiled shirt-sleeves and tow-cloth trowsers •••• A maimed and miserable wretch he was; but one, nevertheless, whom the world could not trample on, and had no right to scorn, either in this or any previous stage of his misfortunes, since he had still kept up the courage and spirit of a man, asked nothing in charity, and with his one hand -- and that the left one -- fought a stern battle against want and hostile circumstances •..• Among the throng, too, came another personage, who, 15

with certain points of similarity to Lawyer Giles, had many more differences. It was the village doctor; ... He was now a purple-visaged, rude, and brutal, yet half-gentlemanly figure, with some­ thing wild, ruined, and desperate in his talk, and in all the details of his ges­ ture and manners. Brandy possessed this man like an evil spirit, and made him as surly and savage as a wild beast, and as miserable as a lost soul; but there was supposed to be in him such wonderful skill, such native gifts of healing, beyond any which medical science could impart, that society caught hold of him, and would not let him sink out of its reach.10 Physically as well as mentally these three characters have "come to be but fragments" of human beings. They are symbolic of defective and mutilated humanity, but unlike Ethan Brand, they have not lost hold of "the magnetic chain of humanity. 11 Hawthorne comes closest to the ideal of spiritual grace and human perfection in his portrayal of the lime­ burner'~ son, little Joe. Joe is a kind of ideal observer and is in direct contrast to the consistently obtuse Bar- tram. At the beginning of the story, Bartram mistakes the hollow laughter of Ethan Brand for the cheery tones of a village drunk, but Joe senses something ghastly and out of key in the sound. Again, at the end of the story, when Brand offers to tend the fire until morning, it is little Joe who understands Brand's situation. 16

As the boy followed his father into the hut, he looked back at the wayfarer, and the tears came into his eyes, for his tender spirits had an intuition of the bleak and terrible loneliness in which this man had enveloped himself.ll Like Ethan Brand, little Joe sees deep into men's hearts, but he does so by an intuitive knowledge and love. While Brand violates the sanctity of the heart through the agency of cold, analytical intellect, Joe understands and apprehends it intuitively by being in harmony with the community of man. He has not separated himself from the chain of humanity and is therefore able to understand and sympathize with the loneliness and despair of Ethan Brand. Ethan Brand has gone on a journey of accusation. He has gone to seek out the sinner, as in the case of Ester, in order to both judge and condemn that sinner without sympathy, mercy, or any sense of pardon. He has done so for the sake of mere intellectual curiosity without the thought of consolation or redanption for that sinner. In so doing, he has denied his connection to the sinning brotherhood of man, and, consequently, has created in his own breast the unpardonable sin. This separation and accusatory stance takes on a slightly different shade and form in Hawthorne's tale of

Minister Hooper and his black ~eil. The meaning o£ the veil in "The Minister's Black Veil" has plagued critics and readers ever since its first publication in the collec-· 17

tion ~vice-Told Tales. It is agreed by most critics that the veil, like many of Hawthorne's symbols, is symbolic of pride, and works in much the same manner that Ethan Brand's occupation at the lime-kiln works in isolating the indivi­ dual from the community. Unlike Ethan Brand, the minister does not go out and accuse the people directly of hidden sin; rather, he allows the veil to act for him. The veil can be seen to work as a symbol on several levels. It may be interpreted to stand for the secret sins that man seeks to hide from the eyes of the community, as the minister states at the end of the story, or it may be interpreted as symbolic of the minis­ ter's own obsessive preoccupation with the concepts of good and evil. To attempt to read the story on only one level would be to over-simplify the story's thematic mes­ sage. As in many of Hawthorne's sto~ies, the ambiguity serves to underline the moral. Many critics -- Poe being the earliest -- have at­ tempted to reduce the meaning of the veil to a single sym­ bol. The issue for them is: is Hooper a prideful sinner who deserves the isolation that he imposes on himself, or is he a pious clergyman who utilizes the effect the veil has on his congregation in order to be a nore effective minister? Poe's opinion on this question is quite clear from his comments in his review of Twice-Told Tales: 18 p •

"The Minister's Black Veil" is a masterly composition of which the sole defect is that to the rabble it exquisite skill will be ~av~a~e. The obvious meaning of this article will be found to smother the in­ sinuated one. The mo~al put into the mouth of the dying minister will be supposed to convey the t~ue import of the narrative: and that a crime of dark dye (having refer­ ence to the "young lady"), has been com­ mitted, is a point which only minds con­ genial ~ith that of the author will per­ ceive.l Poe's view then is that the minister's wearing the veil is not to condemn the community but rather to do penance for some crime in his past. There are quite a few references in the story that would point toward such a conclusion. Hawthorne's decision to have the funeral of the "young lady" as the day on which the minister first appears with the veil might be cited as a good argument for Poe's position. The remarks of the "superstitious woman 11 that the corpse had "slightly shuddered" when the features of the minister were disclosed to it, might also strengthen the critic's position. Perhaps the most illuminating reference to a connection between the clergyman and the de­ ceased is the remarks of two of the parishioners: "Why do you look back?" said one in the procession to his partner. "I had a fancy," replied she, "that the minister and the maiden's spirit were walking hand in hand." "And so had I, at the same moment," said the other.l3 Other critics such as Frederick Crews approach the question on a psychological level, citing Freudian inter- 19 :;1 '

pretations to explain Mr. Hooper's behavior. Crews sees Hooper's use of the veil in strictly sexual terms. He cites Hooper's connection with the "young lady" as Poe does, but in a different respect. Crews places Hooper in a category of sexual escapists. He cites various passages in the story that suggest a note of womanliness in the minister's behavior. Crews takes note of Hawthorne's portrayal of the minister as conspicu­ ously tidy in regard to his clerical garb. Mr. Hooper, a gentlemanly person, of about thirty, though still a bachelor, was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a careful wife had starched his band, and brushi~ the weekly dust from his Sunday's garb. This note of womanly tidiness is even more evident in the frequent mention of the veil by several of the parish- ion.ers. "How strange," said a lady, "that a simple black veil, such as any woman might wear on her bonnet should become such a terrible thing on Mr. Hooper's face!"l5 Such hints at an effeminate nature and at an explicit liason between the young lady and the minister are them­ selves highly suspect. It is "a superstitious old woman" who thinks that the corpse has shuddered and it is "a fancy" of two parishioners that Hooper and the maiden's spirit were walking hand in hand. The fact that both par- ishioners share the fancy does not render it as truth. 20

Rather it is a reflection on the preoccupation of exposing secret sin in the collective minds of the town. These hints at Hooper's psychology are quite trivial until we realize that the minister is engaged to be married, and it is his reaction to his fiancee that sheds the greatest light on his character. When Elizabeth attempts to per­ suade the minister to remove and discard the veil and de- livers the ultimatum that she will leave him if he does not, Hooper refuses. Hooper's reaction to her farewell is an odd smile at the thought that "only a material emblem had separated him from happiness." Crews argues from this passage that it was Hooper's intention to prevent his mar­ riage to Elizabeth. It could be plausibly argued, I think, that Hooper has donned the veil in order to prevent his marriage. On the one hand we see that he is already quite prim enough without a woman in the house, and on the other we find that he broods over dark, unspecified horrors that must sep­ arate the fondest of lovers. Where have these horrors come from, if not from his own imagination? It is possible that Hooper, who like Goodman Brown is obliged to confront the sexual aspects of woman­ hood, shares Brown's fears and has hit upon a means of forestalling their realization in marriage. His literal wearing of the veil, ... acts as a defense against normal adult love.l6 Crews's point is well taken yet it seems co reach too far with its Freudian overtones. Richard Fogle, in his book, Hawthorne's Fiction: The Light and the Dark, deals 21

explicitly with these t"tvo interpretations. Fogle's view on this question of interpretation is the most neutral and perhaps the most valid. Fogle refuses to reconcile the doubt that the story presents. While he recognizes that the veil affects different parishioners in different ways, thus. making an argument for the position that Hooper is attempting to reveal hidden sin in the townspeople, he goes on to say that Mr. Hooper's self-im- posed martyrdom corresponds more with a deep necessity in his own nature than with a need to reveal sin in his par- ishioners. He w'ho isolates himself in the outward fact must already have performed the deed in spirit. The act of donning the veil has in it something of caprice; it is entirely out of proportion to any obvious necessity or benefit. By it the minister forfeits the affection of his congregation, the chance of human love and marriage, and the sympathy of society in general -- and to what end?l7 Fogle's point is true to the degree that Hooper's veil may be an overt manifestation of his obsession with sin, yet in one respect, the veil does have a benefit: it makes the minister a more effective clergyman, allowing him to "sympathize with all the dark affections" of his parish- ioners. Dying sinners cried aloud for Mr. Hooper, and "tvould not yield their breath till he appeared; though over, as he stooped to 22

whisper consolation, they shuddered at the veiled face so near their own.l8 Whether the veil is representative of the secret sins of man, or of the eccentricities of the minister himself, who severs himself from men either through perverse pride or through some other compulsion, the effect is one of iso- lation. In this manner Mr. Hooper spent a long life, irreproachable in the outward act, yet shrouded in dismal suspicions; kind and loving, though unloved, and dimly feared; a man apart from men, shunned in their health and joy, but ever I~oned to their aid in mortal anguish. Hawthorne's emphasis in the story is not the actual sin or reason for wearing the black veil; rather, his em- phasis is on the psychological effect the veil has on both the townspeople and the minister himself. Hawthorne de­ liberately leaves the meaning of the veil ambiguous so that the reader (and the critic) is not forced to make or wit- ness any moral judgments. Hawthorne goes to great pains to emphasize the effect of, and not the cause for, wearing the black veil. He loads the story with qualifying phrases that lend to the overall ambiguity; one could very easily go through the story enumerating the many it wa~ ~aid's, it wa~ ~umo~ed's, or, it wa~ believed's that allow the reader to form his own opinions about causes. The total effect of such a treatment is at once to assert and to cast doubt on the reality of what the veil both po~trays and 23

hides. Perhaps the strongest argument for this view is the effect the veil has on the townspeople. To those who claim a "superiority to popular prejudice," the veil is a mere whim; to the vulgar in the community, the black veil represents some horrible crime in the minister's past. Each interpretation reflects the character of the inter­ preter. Each interpreter projects his own mode of thinking into the symbol lending it a personalized significance. Thus, from beneath the black veil, there rolled a cloud into the sunshine, an ambiguity of sin or sorrow, which envel­ oped the poor minister, so that love or sympathy could never reach him.20 Hawthorne's use of different rumors and interpreta­ tions of the veil's meaning push the reader to consider the psychological effect rather than the symbol's moral meaning. A similar insistence on the effect as opposed to the cause plays its greatest role in Hawthorne's short story, ''Young Goodman Brown." In "Young Goodman Brown," the concepts of sin and evil are again dealt with in terms of psychological effect ra­ ther .than judgmental morality. As in most of Hawthorne's fiction, causes are only vaguely alluded to; he rarely deals explicitly with the "sin," allmving the reader to witness only the effect of the act. This deliberate o- mission forces the reader to consider multiple meanings from the allegory. The use of ambiguity, in essence, serves to underline the story's thematic message that if we 24

perceive a situation to be the reality, it becomes a real­ ity because of its consequences in the community of human sensibilities. Goodman Bro~vn has gone into the forest to seek out evil and perhaps, as Ha~vthorne hints, is himself on a mission of "evil purpose." The fact is that Goodman Brown already believes in the evil he will find. Because of his preconceived beliefs, the night in the forest can have no other outcome than to reveal the evil that his per­ ceptions have already made into a reality. Hawthorne is able to illustrate this idea not by means of simple narra­ tion but through what Coleridge termed the reconciliation of opposites. Hawthorne blends ambiguity of meaning with clarity of technique to such a balanced degree than an essentially simple tale is raised to a level of richness which analytic scrutiny could never exhaust. \ihile Hawthorne's use of allegory serves as a pivotal point on which both clarity of technique and multiplicity of meaning turn, it is his use of images and a reliance on the reader's ability to associate the images with distinct concepts that reconciles these opposites and helps focus the moral. In the interval of silence he stole for­ ward until the light glared full upon his eyes. At one extremity of an open space, hemmed in by the dark wall of the forest, arose a rock, bearing some ~ude, natural resemblance either to an altar or 25

a pulpit, and surrounded by four blazing pines, their tops aflame, their stems untouched, like candles at an evening meeting. The mass of foliage that had overgrown the summit of the rock was all on fire, blazing high into the night and fitfully illuminating the whole field. Each pendant twig and leafy fes­ toon was in a blaze. As the red light arose and fell, a numerous congregation alternately shone forth, then disappeared in shadow, and again grew, as it were, out of the darkness, peopling the heart of the solitary woods at once.21 Hawthorne's technique is clear and direct in his vivid use of imagery, yet the very fact of what Goodman Brown witnesses is rendered ambiguous by these same images. The rising and falling fire sheds doubt on the reality of what Brown sees. Is the rock really a pulpit for devil wor- shippers, or, is it merely a rock transformed by Goodman Brown's imagination into what he has already convinced himself that he will see? Many examples of this stylistic technique can be ci- ted in the story. The juxtaposition of such images as day and night, town and forest, pink and brown, with their associative connotations of good and evil are perhaps the most conspicuous. The beauty of this technique is that these images do not exist in a one-to-one relationship. The associative connotations of the color pink, for exam- ple, in reference to the pink ribbons that Faith wears, does not necessarily stand for innocence or purity. Cri- tics have interpreted the pink ribbons as proof of Faith's 26

feminine passion,22 and even as symbolic of the psychologi­ cal state of man bet-,;v-een the scarlet of total depravity and the white of innocence. 23 In a purely psychological way, these images can be understood to stand for a division of consciousness and it is through this interpretation that another insight into the story's meaning may be arrived at. Each of the opposing images I have mentioned may be said to correspond to one of two states of consciousness.

~fuile the mundane yet lucid portrayal of town life at day­ break and sunset may be said to represent the normal, wak­ ing state of consciousness, the dusky and often surreal portrayal of the forest scenes at nighttime correspond to the subconscious processes of the mind. In this respect, everything Goodman Bro-,;vn witnesses at the witch's sabbath is a projection of his own subconscious. The evil Goodman Brown perceives is a manifestation of his own thoughts. This view is strengthened if we look at the different ways Hawthorne handles these scenes. Daytime in the town is described through concrete, verifiable sensual interaction. Hawthorne allows Brown to

interact on a physical level with the envi~onment as a way of proving reality. At the moment Brown "awakens" from his experience in the forest, there is a transition from a surreal narrative quality to a proof of reality described through the interaction of the senses. 27

Hardly had he spoken when he found him­ self amid calm night and solitude, li~ten­ ing to the roar of the wind which died heavily away through the forest. He staggered against the rock, and 6~lt it chill and damp: while a hanging twig, that had been all on fire, bespr~nkled his cheek with the coldest dew.2 Proof of objective reality is separated from illusion through clear, direct narration and an affirmation of that reality through the character's sensual interaction with the setting. Daytime in the town is knowable. The faces of the Deacon and Goody Cloyse are recognizable. Time is han­ dled chronologically and space conforms to natural laws. Nighttime in the forest, on the other hand, conforms to no such laws. Goodman Brown is seen to almost fly through the forest, time leaps from sunset to midnight, staffs turn to snakes, faces change from mothers to sinners, from fathers to devils, fear and evil seem to permeate the forest. It is interesting to note that the characters who appear in the forest are usually preceded by Brown's mentioning them; this lends further credence to the theory of subconscious projection. "What if the devil himself should be at my very elbow!" His head being turned back, he passed a crook of the road, and, looking forward again, beheld the figure of a man, in grave and decent a25ire, seated at the foot of an old tree. · 28

While the narration of the daytime scenes is from an omniscient point of view, the nighttime scenes are narrated subjectively through the eyes of Goodman Brown. Hawthorne forces the reader to view Brown as an unreliable narrator because of his undiscerning nature. Goodman Brown witnesses many things that would perplex a questioning mind, yet Brown does not question. The events in the forest are taken at face value because Goodman Brown has already con- vinced himself that they will take place. Hawthorne is tireless in his subtle reminders that it is Brown's own perceptions that are at work. In truth, all through the haunted forest there could be nothing more frightful than the figure of Goodman Brown.26 At the witch's sabbath, Goodman Brown recognizes the faces of many of the more pious elders of the church. The congregation of devil worshippers is made up of both saints and sinners. All of mankind is represented, from the holiest to the lowliest, but the reality of their pre­ sence is made questionable through Hawthorne's treatment. Either the sudden gleam of light flashing over the obscure field bedazzled Goodman Brown, or he recognized a score of church members of Salem village famous for their especial sanctity. Good old Deacon Gookin had arrived, and \vaited at the skirts of that venerable saint, his reverend pastor. But, irreverently con­ sorting with these grave, reputable, and pious people, these elders of the church, these chaste dames and dewy virgins, 29

there were men of dissolute lives and women of spotted fame. Wretches given over to mean and filthy vice, and sus­ pected even of horrid crimes. It was strange to see that the good shrank not from the wicked, nor were the sinners abashed by the saints.27 Because of Hawthorne's use of ambiguity, various ques- tions about the story surface. Why does Goodman Brown go into the forest? Are the people and events he witnesses

real or imagined? ~Vhy is Goodman Brown a permanently em­ bittered man after his experience? These questions can be answered along several lines. Frederick Crews adopts a psychological approach ·in or­ der to explain Goodman Brown's behavior. Crews classifies Goodman Brown, like minister Hooper, as a sexual escapist. Crews cites Brown's reason for going into the forest as an trnmature reaction toward normal adult sexuality. There is some evidence to support this theory in his almost child- like desire to "cling" to Faith's skirts and in his desire to leave Faith, both in the allegorical sense of a loss of faith in mankind and in the literal level of leaving his wife after only three months of married life. There is a suggestion of a maternal relationship hinted at in the story and a definite sexual squeamishness on the part of Goodman Brown at the end. But too much has been made of this view without enough concrete evidence to support such a theory. The best reason for Goodman Brown's journey into 30

the forest is given by Hawthorne himself. The road grew wilder and drearier and more faintly traced, and vanished at length, leaving him in the heart of the dark wilderness, still rushing onward with the instinct that guides moral man to evil. 28 This instinctual view coincides with Hawthorne's view of man's depravity and echoes the Puritan belief in pre­ destination. Ironically, it is Goodman Brown who has in essence laid out his own destiny. Bro~vn has gone into the forest vrith the pre-conceived belief in the existence of evil. Like Ethan Brand, he has gone to search out and ex­ pose that evil. In his greatest moment of despair, Goodman Brown cries out his belief in the evil nature of mankind.

There is no good on earth; and sin is but ·.... ~ . a name. Come, dez~l; for to thee is this world given. Brown recognizes the evil in everyone, from the most pious to the lowest sinner, but denies the fact in himself. Through his admission that all mankind is evil and then his subsequent accusatory reactions against the community, Good- man Brown, like Ethan Brand and Mr. Hooper, denies his commonality with the rest of mankind. His subconscious pro- jections fail to make him realize that he is also tainted by sin. He becomes a sort of recluse, unable to maintain a connection with the village community or to find comfort in the arms of Faith. His self-righteous inability to sympa­ thize with or pardon the members of the supposed witch's 31

sabbath makes him an outcast. It is difficult to say whe­ ther Goodman Brown had isolated himself from the rest of the community before he went into the forest (and thus his projections on that night had been founded on the principles of the separation of the heart and head), but it is evident that his isolation after that night was complete: A stern, a sad, a darkly meditative, a distrustful, if not desperate man did he become from the night of that fearful dream. 30 Was it only a dream, or did the sabbath actually take place? Hawthorne answers the question himself: Be it so if you will; but alas! it was a dream of evil omen for young Goodman Brown.31 The aobiguity concerning the actuality of the sabbath serves to underline the essential message of the story. The emphasis is not on whether man is good or evil but that the effects of Goodman Brown's belief has caused him to be an outcast. His subconscious, instinctual desire to seek out the evil first sent Goodman Brown into the forest; his ina- bility to recognize that evil in his own breast is his tra­ gedy. The emphasis is not the question of appearance and reality, but on the consequences of Goodman Brown's final attitude toward the people in the town. Hawthorne's final statement is not the moral judgment that all mankind is evil; it is a statement on the consequences of making a moral judgment on one's peers and ignoring its applicability 32

to oneself. The consequence of Goodman Brown's view is that "his dying hour was gloom"; like Ethan Brand, he has lost hold of the magnetic, charitable chain of humanity and so his final days could find no hopeful verse for his tomb­ stone. We have seen, from the examples I have mentioned, Haw­ thorne's psychological approach to the concept of sin. His emphasis is not on the fact of sin itself, but on the ef­ fect that sin has on the human soul. The effect in most cases is one that forces the sinner to remove himself from

the community. In 11 Ethan Brand," it is the pride of in­ tellect and the lack of sympathy that separates Brand from the community. In "Young Goodman Brown," it is a similar self-righteous pride that blinds Brown to his own sinful­ ness. In almost all of Hawthorne's short stories there is an attempt to portray the ultimate consequences of a parti­ cular form of sin, but it is not until that the source of the psychological anguish is explicitly dealt with. Guilt is that source. Guilt is the psychologi­ cal tormentor of Ethan Brand, of Mr. Hooper (if we read the veil to stand for a hidden sin in the minister's past), guilt is what sends Goodman Brow~ into the forest because he too senses the evil in his own soul .. It is not the sin that brings about the character's downfall bat sin's soul­ mate: guilt. Guilt is the agent of anguish that produces 33

both the psychological and the physically debilitating dam­ age in man. In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne demonstrates the psy­ chological mechanisms by which sin and guilt work in ulti­ mately destroying the spirit. Whereas in the short stories characters are drawn along somewhat flat, two-dimensional lines, giving the stories a fable-like quality which does not lend itself to psychological character analysis, the characters in The Scarlet Letter are drawn with more depth; one can see the inner workings and motivations that both guide and obstruct their actions. By looking at the devel­ opment of the four major characters in the novel, Dimmes­ dale, Chillingsworth, Hester, and Pearl, the reader can gain a deeper insight into how both sin and guilt work on the human psyche. Talking to Hester in the forest, Dimmesdale explains the agony he has gone through in the past seven years. In his tormented state, he allows himself to be swayed by Hes­ ter's insistence that the past can be forgotten, that deep in the wilderness or across the ocean, he can free himself from the revengeful and prying gaze of Chillings~vorth. What Hester does not understand is the ultimate source of Dirnmes­ dale's anguish. His anguish is not due to Chillingsworth, but to his own remorse, and his remorse cannot be left be­ hind him. Hawthorne tells us clearly enough that Heste!:" has mis- 34

judged Dirnmesdale in his metaphor demonstrating the psycho­ logical mechanisms of guilt and sin. And be the stern and sad truth spoken, that the breach which guilt has once made into the human soul is never, in this mortal state, repaired. It may be watched and guarded, so that the enemy shall not force his way again into the citadel and might even, in his subsequent assaults, select some other avenue, in preference to that where he had formerly succeeded. But there is still the ruined wall, and, near it, the stealthy tread of the foe that would win over again his unforgotten tri­ umph. 32 Because of Dimmesdale's highly ascetic beliefs, the sin of adultery, along with the emotional reaction of guilt, has made a breach in his conscience. Given the high devel­ opment of his conscience and his wish to be holy, there was no other way to deal with his sinful act than to have vio­ lently expelled and then denied the sexual impulse, once it was gratified. It was in the psychological repression of both his libidinous desires and the memory of his actions, that the real psychological damage was done. One part of Dimmesdale's nature, the intellectual portion that wishes to remain pure and holy, has passed judgment on the other portion, the sensual. In one sense Dimmesdale has exiled the libidinal impulse, and yet the memory and the fact that it remains an essential part of his psychological makeup, induce his feelings of guilt. It can be said that Dimmesdale has t-.;v-o internalized 35

enemies, one moral and one psychological. The moral enemy is his Puritan urge to judge as sinful the sensual impulse. The psychological enemy is guilt. It is difficult to make a practical distinction between the two, for they always appear together in a cause and effect relation to each other. The usurper of the citadel is the libidinal impulse carrying with it overtones of guilt. The "watchful guard" in Hawthorne's metaphor can be viewed as Dimmesdale's con­ science. It is up to his conscience to see that a repeti­ tion of the "unforgotten triumph" or admittance of the sen­ sual impulse never occurs. The weapon by which the con­ science combats the temptation of the "foe" is its capacity to emphasize the feelings of guilt. To admit the sensual impulse through the breach would be to admit an insupporta­ ble amount of guilt. While the "watchful guard" is gearing all its defenses along the original breach, Dimmesdale's libidinous impulses seek to gratify themselves along "other avenues." Because Dimmesdale's mental energies are not directed toward simply avoiding sin, but toward expelling the one act from his memory, different sinful impulses filter in through these other avenues. Upon his return from his meeting with Hes­ ter, Dii:liDesdale is filled ~vith desires to corrupt the youth, blaspheme God in front of the most devout of his 36

parishioners, and other equally destructive acts. The for­ bidden impulse seeks to gratify itself along whatever avenue is possible, admitting other sins into the soul on the way. In the chapter entitled, "The Minister in a Maze," Dimmesdale reveals his subconscious desire to seek an out- let for his sensual impulses; having no opportunity to do so, he allows sins to infiltrate his soul and act as a sub- stitute for his libidinal desires. After parting from the old church member, he met the youngest sister of them all. It was a maiden newly won -- and won by the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale's own sermon, on the Sabbath after his vigil -- to bar­ ter the transitory pleasures of the world for the heavenly hope that was to assume brighter substance as life grew dark around her, and which \vould gild the utter gloom with final glory. She was fair and pure as a lily that had bloomed in para­ dise. The minister knew well that he was himself enshrined within the stain­ less sanctity of her heart, which hung its snowy curtains about his image, im­ parting to religion the \

mesdale's torment is, of course, the concealed and unre- pented act of adultery. It is Dimmesdale's cowardice that prevents him from confession and true ~epentance, and as Hawthorne explains, Dimmesdale's cowardice is "the sister and closely linked companion" of his remorse. Because remorse and not true repentance is Dimmesdale's method of penance, there is little hope for redemption. Dimmesdale's penance, which includes self-flagellation and a submission to Chillingsworth's revenge, does not have the effect of purifying his soul because it is not accompanied by a feeling of penitence: the resolution to sin no more. Dimmesdale himself realizes the ineffectual process of re- pentance that he is undertaking when in despair he cries: Of penance, I have had enough! Of peni­ tence, there has been none! Else, I should long ago have thrown off these garments of mock holiness and have shown myself to mankind as zhey will see me at the judg­ ment seat.3 It is only through true, strict repentance that the soul abandons the sin and focuses on holier thoughts. Re- morse, on the other hand, is attached to a continual re- enactment of the sin in order for one to punish oneself. Because the Reverend continually re-enacts, in fantasy, the original sin, there is a constant need to renew the penance and self-punishment. Dimmesdale's nightly vigils· and fasts are evidence of this continual need for self-punishment. The "stealthy foe," sin and guilt, has re-entered the 38

citadel through the avenue of remorse. If Dimmesdale had confessed, the insupportable guilt -- along with the other sins of hypocrisy and blasphemy would not have been al- lowed in. Dimmesdale's remorse and lack of true repentance by means of open confession is what allows new sins into his soul, and with them, the psychological reaction of guilt. Chillingsworth, the ultimate villain in the novel, understands this process perfectly and employs it as a means by which he may gain his vengeance . ... all the fear, the remorse, the agony, the ineffectual repentance, the backward rush of sinful thoughts, expelled in vain! All that guilty sorrow, hidden from the world, whose great heart would have pi­ tied and forgiven, to be revealed to h~~· the Pitiless, to him, the Unforgiving! We see in the character of old Roger Chillingsworth the epitome of Hawthorne's unpardonable sinner. While it is true that both Hester and Dimmesdale are sinners, their sins, like those of the three village worthies in "Ethan Brand," are human sins that do not isolate them from the community. It is evident from Hawthorne's character treat­ ment and portrayal that we are meant to view Chillingsworth as the worst of sinners. Dimmesdale, after listening to what Hester knows about Chillingsworth's intentions toward revenge, realizes the degrees of blackness and evil that sin can assume and finds temporary consolation in the fact that he is not the worst of sinners. 39

May God forgive us both! We are not, Hester, the worst of sinners in the world. There is one worse than even the polluted priest! That old man's revenge has been blacker than my sin. He has violated, in cold blood, the sanctity of a human hej6t. Thou and I, Hester, never did so!

While it is clear that of all the sinners in the novel,

Chillingsworth is by far the blackest, critics such as

Richard Fogle see some redeeming qualities in the old phy­ sician. Fogle cites the ambiguity of Chillingsworth's character, noting that all of Chillingsworth's actions may be viewed in a positive way. Fogle takes note of Chapter

IV, in which the old physician ministers to Hester's sick baby Pearl, and to the fact that he leaves all his money to

Pearl: the product and symbol of Hester's unfaithfulness.

Fogle also notes that Chillingsworth ministers to Dimmes- dale and that his actions may be seen as charitable, but this argument loses its validity once we take note of

Chillingsworth's transformation at the end of the novel.

Chillingsworth's physical decay is symbolic of his spiritual and moral decay. The ambiguity that Fogle brings up in re- gard to Chillingsworth's motives is cleared up by the fact that in seeking to damn Dimmesdale, he himself has fallen into damnation.

As in the character of Dimmesdale, Hawthorne reveals

Chillingsworth through a description of his physical as well as spiritual corruption. 40

Nothing was more remarkable than the change which took place, almost immedi­ ately after Mr. Dirnnesdale's death, in the appearance and demeanor of the old man known as Roger Chillingsworth. All his strength and energy -- all his vital and intellectual force -- seemed at once to de­ sert him; insomuch that he positively withered up, shrivelled away, and almost vanished from mortal sight, like an up­ rooted weed that lies wilting in the sun.37 It is characteristic of Hawthorne's treatment that Chillingsworth is the only character that comes to ultimate ruin at the end of the novel. Although both Dirnmesdale and Chillingsworth come to know and feel the effect that guilt has in destroying the human spirit, Hawthorne forces the reader to view the effects of sin on the blacker of the two sinners, namely, Chillings\vorth. The description of his worsening phsyical deformity is symbolic of a deeper, spiri- tual deformity of the soul. Hester, in contrast to Dimmesdale and Chillingsworth, does not feel the self-destructive power of guilt. Through her open act of wearing the letter, her confession, and her refusal to be a moral judge of her fellow man, Hester has abandoned the sin. Unlike Dimmesdale, Hester couples true repentance with various modes of penitence. Hester's form of penitence follows in part the Puritan doctrine of faith and good "tvorks but stops short of the Puritan self-righteous judgmental stance. While most of the townspeople ridicule her, Hawthorne's cormnent on her faith in humanity helps to 41

illustrate Hester's charitable and pardoning qualities. 0 Fiend, whose talisman was that fatal symbol, wouldst thou leave nothing, whe- ther in youth or age, for this poor sin- ner to revere? -- such loss of faith is ever one of the saddest results of sin. Be it accepted as a proof that all was not corrupt in this poor victim of her own frailty, and man's hard law, that Hester Prynne yet struggled to believe that no fellow-mortal was guilty like herself.38 Hester's faith in her fellow man is the crucial dis- tinction between herself and the other sinners in the novel. Her compassion and ability to forgive is what raises her above every other character and forces the read­ er to conclude that it is not the act or sin that charac- terizes the evil in the soul. Hawthorne makes the point that regardless of the sin committed it is the sinner's sincerity to repent and one's perception of humanity that ultimately redeems the sinner. While Hester's faith is proof of her sincerity, it is not her only method of peni- tence. Her needlework for the community likewise has in it a sense of penitence. Except for that small expenditure in the decoration of her infant, Hester bestmv-ed all her superfluous means in charity, on wretches less miserable than herself, and who not unfrequently insulted the hand that fed them. Much of the time which she might readily have applied to the better efforts of her art, she employed in making coarse garments for the poor. It is prob­ able that there was an idea of penance 42

in this mode of occupation, and that she offered up a real sacrifice of enjoyment in devotin~ so many hours to such rude handiwork. 9

Through her faith in her fellow man and her needlework for the poor, Hester's character is elevated from that of sinner to one who is in fact morally superior to the people in the town. Much like the character of Minister Hooper,

·.~ Hester becomes the sinner whom other sinners come to for redemption and sympathy.

Such helpfulness was found in her -- so much power to do and power to sympathize -- that many people refused to interpret the scarlet "A" by its original signifi­ cation. They said that it meant "Able"; so strong was Hester Prynne, with a wo­ man's strength.40

In this transference of significance of the letter's meaning and in the transformation of Hester from sinner to redeemer, Hawthorne hints at the idea that was to become the major premise of his novel, , namely, the concept of uel~x culpa, or the fortunate fall. While

Hester's fall from purity and innocence carries with it many negative features, the worst of which is the repres- sion of her passion which leaves her "marble cold,'' Haw- thorne illustrates various positive aspects of such a fall.

Hester's fall from purity renders her a more thoughtful and meditative person able now to view the world and humanity not in the simple and naive manner that was at first the possible cause of her fall, but in a new light 43

that makes her a better person. In one respect, this new view of life has the quality of liberating Hester from the rigid and often ignorant doctrines of Puritan society. Much of the marble coldness of Hester's impression was to be attributed to the circumstance that her life had turned, in a great measure, from passion and feeling to thought. Standing alone in the world -- alone as to any dependence on society, and with little Pearl to be guided and protected -- alone, and helpless of re­ trieving her position, even had she not scorned to consider it desirable -- she cast away the fragment of a broken chain. The world's law was no law for her mind. It was an age in which the human intellect, newly emancipated, had taken a more active and a wider ~ange than for many centuries before.4l In this positive sense, the forced isolation due to her sin has developed her mind and freed her from the binds and laws of Puritan society. Because of her forced isola­ tion and the repression of her sexuality, Hester undergoes a transformation similar to both Dimmesdale and Chillings­ worth. It is said of her that her hair had lost its luxur- iance and that her skin had likewise lost most of its radi- ance. Hester becomes in one sense hardened. She loses those qualities that had made her a "heart" character and becomes more of a "head" character .. In a typically Haw­ thornesque fashion all three major characters: the sympa- thetic Hester, the pious Dimmesdale, and the vengeful Chillingsworth, are tainted by the combined effect of their 44

acts. Only Pearl, the product and emblem of the sinful union, has a future which is rendered in a positive light. This is not to say that Hawthorne directly condemns any of his characters, but in Chaucerian fashion he allows their very actions and attitudes to speak for him. The character of Pearl seems largely symbolic. As the product of sin, Pearl is also symbolic of the hereditary nature of sin, a view that Hawthorne develops in his novel, The House of the Seven Gables. In the preface to the novel, Hawthorne states his view directly: The author has provided himself with a moral -- the truth namely, that the wrong doings of one generation lives into suc­ cessive ones, and, divesting itself of every temporary advantage, b~2omes a pure and uncontrollable mischief. Pearl is the living embodiment of the scarlet letter. She is dressed in the same colors as well as the same ma- terial. Beside the fact that she is the offspring of a sinful union, Pearl also stands as an agent of repentance in that she acts as a constant reminder to Hester of her sin. In the forest scene, Hester throws the scarlet letter away but is forced to resume it at Pearl's insistence. Pearl does not recognize her mother without it and refuses to even acknowledge her mother's call. "I see what ails the child," whispered Hester to the clergyman, and turning pale in spite of a strong effort to conceal her trouble and annoyance. "Children will 45

not abide any, the slightest, change in the accustomed aspect of things that are daily before their eyes. Pearl misses something which she has always seen me weart43 Pearl, as the symbolic emblem and product of sin, does not allow Hester to give up her life of penitence. Al­ though Pearl does not repeat or perpetuate the original sin, she is Hawthorne's symbol of the consequences of one generation's "wrong doings" visited on the next generation. Pearl's symbolic mission is to keep Hester's adultery al­ ways before her eyes in order to prevent Hester from at­ tempting to escape the moral consequences. In one way, Pearl is even more stern and rigid than the Puritans that condemn Hester. The pelting of the letter with flowers is in its own way more cruel than the ridicule Hester endured on the scaffold. Although Pearl serves as a mode by ~vhich a sense of penance and morality is imposed on Hester, she is perhaps the one character totally removed from Puritan doctrine and dogma. At the conclusion of The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne reveals where his own sentiments lie in regard to little Pearl. So Pearl -- the elf child -- the demon offspring, as some people, up to the epoch, persisted in considering her -- became the richest heiress of her day, in the New World. Not improbably, this circum­ stance wrought a very material change in the public estimation, and, had the mother and child remained here, little Pearl, at a marriageable period of life, 46

might have mingled her wild blood with the lineage of z~e devoutest Puritan among them all. From this ironic passage, we see that Hawthorne's em- phasis is not on the moral right or wrong of Hester and Dimmesdale's sin, for if it were so, Pearl would be ren- dered in a less positive light; rather Hawthorne's empha- sis is on the ultimate effect the sin has had on them. We can easily conclude from the specific works reviewed in this paper that Hawthorne's major emphasis in his treat­ ment of the themes of sin and guilt in his fiction is not so much one of moral causes as it is one of psychological effects. Hawthorne's treatment of these themes does not push the reader into making any direct moral judgments on the nature of his characters; rather, his psychological portrayals help give an extra dimension to his characters lending a certain roundness to his otherwise allegorical figures. Among the various effects of sin that Hawthorne illus- trates, the isolating principle must be viewed as the most psychologically harmful. All other sins such as pride, lack of compassion, and despair stem from some form of iso­ lation. \Vhether the isolation is due to an inordinate amount of pride as in the case of Ethan Brand, or from so­ ciety's habit of ostracizing what it considers to be a sin­ ful member as in the case of Hester Prynne, the destructive 47

effect that isolation has on the individual is what Haw­ thorne as a writer of psychological romances attempts to portray. While the effects that isolation has on the individu­ al's perception of humanity is perhaps Hawthorne's primary concern, the consequent effects of pride usually followed by despair is a theme given careful consideration. Haw­ thorne establishes a link between isolation and pride throughout his fiction. The isolation of such characters as Ethan Brand is shown to promote the lime-burner's specu­ lation on the nature of the unpardonable sin. This specu­ lation consequently instills in Brand a sense of pride, superiority and detachment from the rest of humanity. This detachment in turn initiates his desire to judge others and creates the very sin he has gone to seek. Through these various mechanisms, Hawthorne illustrates the cycli­ cal perpetuation of sin from the act itself, to the isola­ tion of the sinner, through his acts of penance, to the acquisition of self-righteous pride, which for Hawthorne is a re-entry into sin. While the perpetuation of sin echoes the theological concept of original sin, it reveals Hawthorne's puritan belief in the universal depravity of man and the consequences of man's attempt to remQve himself from his bond with the rest of humanity. In each of his portrayals, Hawthorne emphasizes the effect and perpetua- 48

tion of the sin rather than the moral right or wrong of the act. Hawthorne's emphasis on effects as opposed to causes is unmistakable when we note that in almost every short story the causes of the sin (and even the very act) are not dealt with explicitly. The sin is rarely defined in the text of the stories or novels. The action of the stories usually begins after the sin has been committed. In The Scarlet Letter, the word adultery is never mentioned--the act having been committed before the opening of the novel. The actual "sins" in Hawthorne can only be inferred from the effect they have on the different characters. Through Hawthorne's analytic treatment of character and his refusal to condemn any character directly, the author's own attitudes toward the concepts of sin and guilt sur­ face. His insistence on the self-destructive processes by which guilt works and his emphasis on the redeemable nature of sin through true repentance is what separates Hawthorne the moralist from Hawthorne the psychologist. Hawthorne's interest in the concept of sin is not that of the self­ righteous accuser who judges without compassion the behav­ ior of others. Rather it is an interest based on humanistic psychology and an attempt to understand the inner workings of the mind. One has to wonder, if the science of psychology had 49 been more fully developed in Hawthorne's time, whether or not his model for the unpardonable sinner would still have been an artist or scientist. Ironically, it would have probably been a psychologist like Hawthorne himself. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Arvin, Newton. The Heart of Hawthorne's Journals. New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc., 1967. Bertani, Lea and Vozar Newman. A Reader's Guide to the Short Stories of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Boston, Mass.: G. K. Hall & Co., 1979. Crews, Frederick C. The Sins of the Fathers. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966.

Ferguson, J. M., Jr. "Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown." Explicator, 28 (1969), p. 32.

Fick, Rev. Leonard J. The Light Beyond: A Study of Hawthorne's Theology. Folcroft, Pa.: The Folcroft Press, Inc., 1955. Fogle, Richard H. "Ambiguity and Clarity in Hawthorne's 'Young Goodman Brown.'" New England Quarterly, XVIII (December, 1945), pp. 448-465.

Fogle, Richard H. Hawthorne's Fiction: The Light and the Dark. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1952.

Gale, Robert L. Plots and Characters in the Fiction and Sketches of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hamdon, Conn.: Archon Books, 1968.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables. Ohio State University Press.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Marble Faun. Ohio State University Press. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. . Ohio State University Press, 1974. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. Ohio State University Press, 1962.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Snow Image. Ohio State University Press, 1974.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. Twice-~old Tales. Ohio State University Press, 1962.

50 51

Hough, Robert L. The Literary Criticism of E. A. Poe. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1965.

Morris, Lloyd. The Rebellious Puritan: Portrait of Mr. Hawthorne. New York: Harcort, Brace & Co., 1927.

Robinson, E. A. 11 The Vision of Goodman Brown: A Source and Interpretation ... American Literature, 35 (1963), pp. 218-225. Rountree, Thomas J. Critics on Hawthorne. Coral Gables, Florida: University of Miami Press, 1972. Stewart, Randall, editor. The American Notebooks. New Haven, Conn.: Yale Un~versity Press, 1932. FOOTNOTES

1 Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Fancy's Show Box," Twice-Told Tales (Ohio State University Press, 1962), P~ 226. 2Frederick c. Crews, The Sins of the Fathers (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966), p. 34. 3Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Main Street," P~ 70. 4Randall Stewart, editor, The American Notebooks (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1932), p. 106. 5 Letter 1n . t h e possess1on. o f H. w. L. Dana. The American Notebooks.

6Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Ethan Brand," The Snow Image (Ohio State University Press, 1974), pp. 84-85.

7Hawthorne, p. 99. 8Hawthorne, p. 94.

9Hawthorne, p. 102. 10Hawthorne, pp. 91-92.

11 Hawthorne, p. 98.

12 Ro b er t L. Houg h , T h e Llterary . Cr1t1c1sm. . . o f E. A. Poe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1965), p. 138. 13Nathaniel Hawthorne, "The Minister's Black Veil," Twice-Told Tales (Ohio State University Press, 1974), p. 48. 14Hawthorne, p. 38.

15Hawthorne, p. 41. 16Frederick c. Crews, The Sins of the Fathers (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966), pp. 108-109.

17Richard H. Fogle, Hawthorne's Fiction: The Light and the Dark (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1952), p. 34.

52 53

18 Nathaniel Hawthorne, "The Minister's Black Veil," Twice-Told Tales (Ohio State University Press, 1974), p. 49. 19 Hawthorne, p. 49. 20 Hawthorne, p. 48. 21 Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown," Mosses From an Old Manse (Ohio State University Press, 1974}, p. 84. 22 E. A. Robinson, "The Vision of Goodman Brown: A Source and Interpretation," American Literature, 35 (1963), pp. 218-225. 23 J. M. Ferguson, Jr., "Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown," Explicator, 28 (1969), p. 32. 24 Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown," (Ohio State University Press, 1974), p. 88. 25 Hawthorne, p. 75. 26 Hawthorne, p. 83.

27Hawthorne, p. 85. 28 Hawthorne, p. 83. 29 Hawthorne, p. 83. 30 Hawthorne, p. 89. 31 Hawthorne, p. 89. 32Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter (Ohio University Press, 1962), pp. 200-201.

33Hawthorne, pp. 219-220. 34 Hawthorne, p. 192. 35 Hawthorne, p. 139.

36Hawthorne, p. 195. 37 Hawthorne, p. 260. 38 Hawthorne, p. 87. 39 Hawthorne, p. 83. 54

:-1e, p. 141.

:1e, p. 164.

~l Hawthorne, The House of the Seven Gables iversity Press), preface vii.

~el Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter (Ohio State SS 1 1962) f P• 21Q •

:~e, p. 261 ..