I have to be
honest: I like this paper. And I really like the story it
examines. While my efforts here didn’t earn any serious accolades from the
professor (who was easily one of my favorites in
college), I sometimes found it hard to discern what he really
even wanted in a paper. So I suppose I just decided to write the kind
of paper I wanted.
The Parishioners’ Black Veils
English Composition II | March 2, 2012
Nathaniel
Hawthorne’s “The Minister’s Black Veil” is a short
story about the universal human tendency to hide sin from God and the
world. In the story, Mr. Hooper, the parson of Milford meeting-house,
troubles his congregation by perpetually wearing a black veil that
covers most of his face. The veil is clearly emblematic, as Mr.
Hooper states later in the story: “This veil is a type and a
symbol, and I am bound to wear it ever.”1
Many readers are tempted to assume that Mr. Hooper’s black veil is
merely a symbol of some specific secret sin he himself has committed,
and this assumption fuels an attempt to discern from the details of
the narrative what that sin actually is. However, such an endeavor
misses the larger significance of the veil within the story. The veil
is not primarily a statement about Mr. Hooper himself, but it is
rather an indictment against the members of his congregation, and
more broadly, all “who vainly shrink from the eye of
his Creator – loathsomely treasuring up the secret of his
sin.”2
The
veiled appearance of Mr. Hooper immediately causes a stir among the
parishioners of Milford meeting-house. When he ascends into the
pulpit he stands “face to face with his congregation, except for
the black veil.”3
The veil completely hides Mr. Hooper’s countenance from the people
in his congregation, which denies them the ability to read their
pastor on an emotional level. He has shaded the windows of his soul,
so to speak, and this effect of the veil is clearly articulated later
in the story when the elders of the congregation approach Mr. Hooper
to inquire about the meaning of the veil. It “seemed to hang down
before his heart, the symbol of a fearful secret between him and
them.”4
Whose is the secret, Hawthorne cleverly leaves ambiguous.
In
his first veiled sermon, Mr. Hooper’s subject “had reference to
secret sin and those sad mysteries which we hide from our nearest and
dearest.”5
The sermon itself is not characterized by any style or diction
uncommon to Mr. Hooper, but the mere presence of the veil makes his
delivery unusually powerful. His words are not confrontational, but
the veil itself is. It causes every member of the congregation to
feel “as if the preacher had crept upon them behind his awful veil
and discovered their hoarded iniquity of deed or thought.”6
After the sermon, Mr. Hooper mingles with his congregation, giving
special attention to each demographic, for “such was always his
custom on the Sabbath-day.”7
The parishioners, on the other hand, are so spellbound by the
minister’s veil that his greetings are met with only strange and
confused looks. “None, as on former occasions, aspired to the honor
of walking by their pastor’s side,”8
and even Old Squire Saunders, who consistently opened his home to the
parson every Sunday afternoon, “neglected to invite Mr. Hooper to
his table.”9
We see in this entire scenario a focus on the effect the veil evokes
in the members of the congregation. Even though Mr. Hooper is the one
whose visible appearance has changed, his behavior remains normal,
and this radically contrasts him with his parishioners, who retain
their customary Sabbath attire and yet behave in a very uncomfortable
and unusual way. The veil is Mr. Hooper’s comfort, but the
congregation’s dread.
The story culminates at the
deathbed of “Father Hooper,” as he comes to be known, and it is
here that we most clearly see the meaning of the veil. Reverend
Clark, the minister at parson Hooper’s bedside, insists that the
dying man remove the veil that has for years hidden his face. But Mr.
Hooper is unwavering in his commitment to wearing the veil, and the
ensuing argument concludes with these words from the dying parson:
“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?”10
With these rhetorical questions, Mr. Hooper clearly pinpoints the
real power behind his veil. The people are not troubled by Mr.
Hooper’s veil merely for its appearance, but for its phenomenal
ability to reveal their own veils. The “simple piece
of crape”11
that hides Mr. Hooper’s face from the world is a perpetually
delivered sermon, a constant indictment against the folly of
pretending, even before God, that you are not too bad a person. Mr.
Hooper says, “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.”12
He compares his own veil with the insistence of depraved men to hide
their secret sin from God and the world. As Mr. Hooper goes about his
daily life with his countenance hidden, he is openly doing what
everyone else is pretending not to do. His dying words capture the
essence of what the veil is meant to communicate: “I look around
me, and, lo! on every visage a black veil!”13
It
is important for readers of “The Minister’s Black Veil” to
understand that while Mr. Hooper’s veil does, in some sense,
represent his own secret sins, its purpose is much wider than that
alone. We as readers find ourselves identifying with the parishioners
in the story, and asking the same questions they ask: What does this
veil mean? Why do we find it disturbing? When we recognize that the
veil is primarily a statement about the secret sins that the members
of the congregation hide deep within their own hearts, we will
understand why the story itself haunts us as readers. Those who are
familiar with the New Testament are immediately reminded of texts
like Hebrews 4:13: “And no creature is hidden from his sight, but
all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give
account.” We all have sin that we intend to keep hidden, and
Hawthorne’s story, much like parson Hooper’s veil, is an
uncomfortable reminder of that fact. In the way of Mr. Hooper with
his parishioners, Hawthorne creeps up on his readers, making them
feel as if he has “discovered their hoarded iniquity of deed or
thought,” and this is what makes the story powerful.
Notes
1. Nathaniel Hawthorne, “The Minister’s Black Veil,” In Twice-told Tales: Vol. 1 (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1900), 42.
2. Ibid., 49.
3. Ibid., 34.
4. Ibid., 41.
5. Ibid., 35.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid., 36.
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid., 49.
11. Ibid., 34.
12. Ibid., 49.
13. Ibid.
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