Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1878-07-11
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.
Address Of Hon. J. w. symonds, before
BOwdoin Alumni, Wednesday, JAIv 10.

| the intervening distances affe cton and memory go
| TO join hands with those who shall not return
again. There are footsteps here which do not press
| the green OF the fields; in many favorlte haunt,
faces, long unseen, glmmer upon our thought in
| the splendor Of MONDAY, or brighten out of the
haunted darkness; while forms of men, unknown
forgotten of the world. glide silently among the
| lettering strangers, who do not observe them, and
walk arm in arm with us along "the CLEAN and
shadow" of familiar paths
| Nor do our thoughts dwell only within the do
| main of personal recollection. The traditions of
| the college inheritance. The halo of early
dreaming was over them all when first we Jour.
| neyed hitner. They made part of the enchant-
ment OF college life. They greet us on every re-
| turn.
! Yet. in the retrospect, we do not all look upon
| the same picture. In the foreground and in clear
light each the figures and events of his own
| time. No cloud obscures them-whe, grouped
| around these, in more shadowy outline, but pres
| ent in every picture that here passes before the
| Imagination stand the men whose genius and fame
| have become part OF our common inheritance.
And among these, somewhat aloof fIom the
group, in the seclusion OF strange experience,
| with shadow resting upon his face that might be
OF passing cloud, but does not pass, intent alb
| sorbed as If he had questioned guilt and sorrow
| for their darkest secret and was awaiting reply
| or As if he were following to the utmost verge oil
| thought the threads oil sombre hue on which hui
man life is woven in wool of changeful light aud
| shade there, however memory may recall, fan
| cy paint him, will forever remain the noble pres
| ence of Nathaniel Hawthorne.
| The orator then proceeded to give a sketch of
his boyhood, early traits of character and early
reading, and then continued:
| But while he had all the heathfulncss, and, in
| a certain sense, the happiness Of childhood, there
was early developed a love Of solitude which ab-
stracted him even from the society of his fellows
IA I'M a E.yn 40.
schoolboy pastlme. HIS father, captain, died
| abroad of fever in 1908. Hawthorne's earliest
| thought of him must have been Of one who had
Jailed away, never to return. II was an event that
| bore upon lis gloomy wings not only the da kness
of mystery, but the burden Of perpetual loss. Day
| by day, year by year. the boy grew into
scIousncss of the hopes that had persisted on the
distant shore. The tendrils of thought prlng
! the light. found only dark and mysterious phase
of life to cling to, 1t shows either a native ten
dercy the effect of this early experience, that
| III his reading gloomy but picturesque phrase
always arrested his attention and renamed IN his
memory. One of his favorite quotations was the
| line from Richard Ill:
"Stand back, my lord, and let the coffin pass"
Fancy was already fitting in dark places. Among
the mental visitors were already they who yelled
their beauty 10 sombre gulse.
AT the age Of fourteen Hawthorne came to re-
side with his mother in the house which her broth
er- had bullt Tor her on TIER new lands in Maine
a large house, the walls Of which are still stand.
| ing near the shores of Sebsgo Lake, in RAYMOND
There is It'll another feature of his life In Raw
mond. 1t was very solitary. at was there" he
eSclaims IN moment of unreserye, at was there
| | first got my cursed habits Of solitude" The
| grand hermitage Of nature was around hlm IN, and
he sought out its most secret hsunts of beauty and
unbrokon silence. while in his heart and at his
home, there the Loneliness of sorrow. This
experience strengthened tendency that had al.
| " ton ltF r.at ~. T..
IN it an element of harm to himself whatever NAV
| be the wealth il has added to our literature. He
needed the sunshine and ripple of life more than
the gloom Of the pine woods or the sound of the
voices that whisper mournfully 10 mountain glens
The orator dwelt upon some OF the details of
his college life, aud made allusIon to Prof Pack
| ard, As venerable man. from whose lips Haw
thorne learned the charmed secret of grace and
elegance OF diction.
The twelve years of absolute seclnsion that fol.
| lowed his graduation, during which "Faushawe,"
published aDony mously, and 1.-The Twice Told
Iaes were written, as well as the "Seven Tales
OF my Native Land. and other stories that were
never published; the phases of this experience
and It's effect upon him, apparent in his works
we've lrested at length. His loneliness obscurlty
and self coinmuning were illustrated by extracts
| from his record of his inner life and from
the stories IN which strange phases of it appear.
Then followed rapid sketch of bis later
works and the leading events Of his career until
his sudden d ath in 1864, the harvest of life still
| unresped, the ripe wealth of autumn, all about
| him, ungsthered into sheaves.
One of the striking chsracteristics of Haw-
thorne, which we may emphasize TODAY is the
fact that in all respects in his history his person
alily and his works, he is distinctively of New
| England type. With but the most trifng excen.
tons until he went to England as consul in 1853.
| his feet had trod only New England soil The
| town in which he was born had been the scene of
| the darkest and most intense manifestations of
early Puritan life, while IN ITS modern stiffness
| and isolation, as in a placid lake. there was
clear reflection of that austere and picturesque
period. There was dark shading in Inc pictnre
hut Hawthornes mind was fascinated by it, and
the charm was perhaps all the stronger for the
elements OF strangeness, terror and gloom that
were mixed IN the spell. He studied it till the
figures of that time walked through bis thought
as clearly If he were to meet them in the his
tonic places with which their presence was ascot
ated.
Yet. however conscious he might be of the ex-
| cesses OF Puritan zeal, it was the Puritan blood
in his veins that rendered the personages of those
times near and real to him. That subtle anal
| yss of spiritual moods, which made him at home
IN the dan kest recesses of the human heart, long
reflection upon motives, moods and processes, in
minds conscious of crime sure intuition of the
laws that govern them; profound and perhaps
| melancholy thoughtfulness upon the problems of
religion of good aud evil, guilt and sorrow, life
| anG death. these are but new growths in later
| times, of those dark v,ined leaves that grew of
| old upon the Puritan stock.
The fair flower of his genius shot up, wild, from
dark and rugged soil. and seemed to love the
shade. 1t was no exotic. Ii may not he quite
true TO say that, with strong perso al and dis
| tnctive traits, he was the Puritan of the 18th,
lourshiug in the air OF the 18th century; but, at
least, his character the old material refined
and cast in new mould. II was the complex re
suit of Puritan descent, exceptional family his
tory, strange pei sonsl experience the discipline of
various reading and study; q most sensitive
| spiritual organization; with q sort of mental
affinity for what is true its guide in Il study
| OF the laws underlying the phenomena of human
| experience and conduct.
| Against Hawthorne. the charge of being morbid
or missnthropic, it was believed, could not Justly
| be preferred. He seems rather 4 man of strong
| and hesthful mind, whose thought turns in large
| degree, upon what is mouruful or mysterious in
human life, and who does not hesitate to peer into
| the gloom, farther than others see, whatever
its depths may hold. while, at the same time, re-
tanning all his own native healthfuness and clear
| ness of sight Whether the surface Of the story
be sparkling or sad. deep moral lies below. The
| range and force of moral law again and again
| his theme. When once the germ of evil is sown,
all else is dark necessity Ii is "sure to bios.