Nathanial Hawthorne: The Ministers Black

Nathanial Hawthorne: The Ministers Black Veil "the Minister's Black Veil:" Anti-Transcendentalists and Transcendentalists The philosophy of Transcendentalism, as espoused by Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, "led to an optimistic emphasis on individualism and the value of the individual over society" (Brulatour 1999). Transcendentalists believed that to achieve a state of higher moral perfection and find insight into one's true self, a person had to 'transcend' society and "be able to look past and beyond it. One must follow intuition and not conform to contrary social decree" (Brulatour 1999).

Inherent in this philosophy is the idea that human beings are basically 'good,' as only if one holds such an assumption will relying upon one's instincts prove to be beneficial. Society, in the Transcendentalist view, was inherently corrupting, but human beings as individuals possessed good instincts that would not lead them astray. In contrast, anti-Transcendentalists like Nathaniel Hawthorne were profoundly suspicious of assumptions regarding the innate goodness of humanity.

In his short story "The Minister's Black Veil" Hawthorne depicts a young, apparently sinless minister who elects to veil himself for the rest of his life, for an unnamed sin. Even the most apparently blameless, Hawthorne suggests, have sinful impulses. The community keeps the individual in line, to some degree, preventing the exercise of baser impulses. Without a sense of responsibility to his flock, the minister may have sinned even more and so he engages in a public act to prevent himself from transgressing again.

"Anti-transcendentalists feared that people who desired complete individualism would give in to the worst aspects of man's nature. Without external constraint, such as societal mores, people are free to wreak havoc, motivated by immediate need and the desire for sensory gratification" (Brulatour 1999). However, it is also possible to argue that "The Minister's Black Veil" has Transcendentalist impulses, given that the Reverend Mr. Hooper chooses, as a mechanism of self-control, to make himself a pariah in the community.

His sin is secret, and would not be seen by the rest of the world, had he not chosen to don the veil. He leaves normal society, as Transcendentalists like Thoreau advocated, to achieve moral goodness, and acts in an asocial manner.

On his deathbed, Hooper says "Why do you tremble at me alone?"..."Tremble also at each other! Have men avoided me, and women shown no pity, and children screamed and fled, only for my black veil? What, but the mystery which it obscurely typifies, has made this piece of crape so awful? When the friend shows his inmost heart to his friend; the lover to his best beloved; when man does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely treasuring up the secret of his sin; then deem me a monster, for the symbol beneath which I have lived, and die! I look around me, and, lo! On every visage a Black Veil!" (Hawthorne 888-889).

Mr. Hooper states that he is no better or worse than the other members of his community, who he believes also harbor secret sins, even though they act as though they do not. The anti-Transcendentalist concept, like Transcendentalism, suggests that society harbors a false surface, but it believes this is due to an innate sinfulness of humankind, not because human beings outside of society are better. Anti-transcendentalists believed that humans are hypocrites, and removing social constrictions will not heal the sins of humanity. Mr.

Hooper, unlike Emerson's joyful sense of solitude in nature also experiences his isolation as a penance. He chooses to punish himself, not to gain a more positive sense of his inner self, but to fully understand and apprehend its sinfulness. Another key concept of Transcendentalism is the idea that a person's inner life is more important than their social, outer life. However, in Mr. Hooper's estimation, there is a clear need for the individual to suffer social consequences, even for a private sin.

Of the first sermon that he gives after donning the veil: "The subject had reference to secret sin, and those sad mysteries which we hide from our nearest and dearest, and would fain conceal from our own consciousness, even forgetting that the Omniscient can detect them" (Hawthorne 874). Hawthorne's anti-Transcendentalism, like Transcendentalism states that there is a discrepancy between the social and the true self. But that 'true' secret self can be darker and more sinful than the 'bad' social self that Transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau were attempting to escape.

Mr. Hooper also seems to believe in a need for.