468 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England 1.A Genealogy of New England Morals [Man is]also the generator of the greatest and most disastrous of maladies,of which humanity has not to this day been cured:his sickness of himself,brought on by the violent severance from his animal past,by his sudden leap and fall into new layers and con- ditions of existence,led by his declaration of war against the old instincts that had hitherto been the foundation of his power,his joy,and his awesomeness. Nietzsche,The Genealogy of Morals "The May-Pole of Merry Mount"is anthropologist Hawthorne's myth of New England origins.On one level the tale is about"jollity and gloom"struggling for dominance in the emer- ging New England (IX:54);on another (that of the nuptial pair Edith and Edgar),about the growth of the soul;and on a third, about the inception of civilization in the passage from the pleasure principle to the reality principle.The tale fictionalizes the idea that Freud and others would later theorize about:that culturally,as bio- logically,ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny,as the development of the individual replicates that of the race.But the levels of the tale are not neatly parallel;they interpenetrate one another,and in doing so they problematize an allegory already complicated by ambiguity,ambivalence,density of allusion,and a rhetoric of entrapment that invites readers to cast their lot with the sunshine and flowers of Merry Mount only to have them snatched away almost immediately as childish and delusive.Between the maypole and the whipping-post,moreover,the story offers no middle ground.The“grisly saints'”bid to“darken all the clime,and make it a land of clouded visages,of hard toil,and sermon and psalm forever";the "gay sinners"bid to trivialize it (IX:62). The narrative shift from Merry Mount as community to Edith and Edgar seems,if not to evade the problem of history,then at least to redistribute the allegorical weight of the tale from the sociocultural to the moral and psychological.Through the fable of the lovers,the story links itself with other Hawthornean narratives of the soul's journey from an innocence that is ignorance to a sober awareness of life's difficulties.Morally and spiritually,Edith and Edgar's lapse from paradise gives hope of being a fortunate one; like Adam and Eve in Paradise Lost (12.648-49),they leave their Eden to go "heavenward,supporting each other along the difficult path which it was their lot to tread,and never wasted one regretful thought on the vanities of Merry Mount"(IX:67).Within the tale This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri,10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
468 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England 1. A Genealogy of New England Morals [Man is] also the generator of the greatest and most disastrous of maladies, of which humanity has not to this day been cured: his sickness of himself, brought on by the violent severance from his animal past, by his sudden leap and fall into new layers and con ditions of existence, led by his declaration of war against the old instincts that had hitherto been the foundation of his power, his joy, and his awesomeness. Nietzsche, The Genealogy of Morals "The May-Pole of Merry Mount" is anthropologist Hawthorne's myth of New England origins. On one level the tale is about "jollity and gloom" struggling for dominance in the emer ging New England (IX: 54); on another (that of the nuptial pair Edith and Edgar), about the growth of the soul; and on a third, about the inception of civilization in the passage from the pleasure principle to the reality principle. The tale fictionalizes the idea that Freud and others would later theorize about: that culturally, as bio logically, ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, as the development of the individual replicates that of the race. But the levels of the tale are not neatly parallel; they interpenetrate one another, and in doing so they problematize an allegory already complicated by ambiguity, ambivalence, density of allusion, and a rhetoric of entrapment that invites readers to cast their lot with the sunshine and flowers of Merry Mount only to have them snatched away almost immediately as childish and delusive. Between the maypole and the whipping-post, moreover, the story offers no middle ground. The "grisly saints" bid to "darken all the clime, and make it a land of clouded visages, of hard toil, and sermon and psalm, forever"; the "gay sinners" bid to trivialize it (IX: 62). The narrative shift from Merry Mount as community to Edith and Edgar seems, if not to evade the problem of history, then at least to redistribute the allegorical weight of the tale from the sociocultural to the moral and psychological. Through the fable of the lovers, the story links itself with other Hawthornean narratives of the soul's journey from an innocence that is ignorance to a sober awareness of life's difficulties. Morally and spiritually, Edith and Edgar's lapse from paradise gives hope of being a fortunate one; like Adam and Eve in Paradise Lost (12.648-49), they leave their Eden to go "heavenward, supporting each other along the difficult path which it was their lot to tread, and never wasted one regretful thought on the vanities of Merry Mount" (IX: 67). Within the tale This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri, 10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
American Literary History 469 as moral apologue,history recedes,the "dark Puritans"stand as emblems of "the sternest cares of life"(IX:65),and the ethos of Puritanism itself,as Lawrence Buell remarks,is "associated with something like adult reality,and Merry Mountism"with"a childish indulgence that the mature person has outgrown"(211). But the historical dimension of the tale is too prominent to be allegorized away,and we can never forget that Edith and Edgar will pass their temporal lives in a world presided over by John Endicott,"the severest Puritan of all who laid the rock- foundation of New England"(IX:66).The levels of the plot-his- torical,moral and spiritual,anthropological-thus confound one another.Endicott's conquest of Merry Mount reenacts the mythic originary moment of all civilization,but the event is not an auspi- cious or even a typical one:this civilization will be exceptionally marked by discontents.A communal neurosis-hostile to pleasure, to the senses,and to art-has been implanted in New England life at the very outset,so that the archetypal growth of the soul is forced to occur within culture-specific conditions deeply inhospi- table to it. This con-founding of New England is Hawthorne's unifying theme in "Merry Mount."Yet while he stages the conflict symboli- cally and indicates its consequences,Hawthorne cannot escape its confining terms,the neither/nor of"a wild philosophy of pleasure" (IX:203)and a morbid denial of it.He seems to be hovering around,but unable productively to grasp,two ideas advanced by Herbert Marcuse in his critique of Freud in Eros and Civilization (1955):(l)“surplus-repression,”or the“additional controls'”that a particular society institutes "over and above those indispensable for civilized human association,"and (2)the "performance prin- ciple,"or the dominant form that the reality principle assumes at a given historical moment (32).Inclining,from native skepticism, toward the pole of restraint over that of irresponsible freedom, Hawthorne is forced by the logic of his binary opposition to acquiesce in the Puritan triumph even as he bridles at it.On one side,he portrays the Puritans as "most dismal wretches"who divest the New World of even the lawful "hereditary pastimes of old England"and who scourge and mutilate social offenders (IX: 60);on the other,he presents them as embodiments of the reality principle who live closer to "the sober truths of life"than the gay Merry Mounters (IX:66,60,66).His Puritans thus symbolize both necessary and ultimately desirable social and psychological repression and unnecessary and undesirable surplus repression- the latter imposed on behalf of a historically constructed vision of "reality"that will be transmitted to their descendants as a matrix of cultural being. This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri,10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
American Literary History 469 as moral apologue, history recedes, the "dark Puritans" stand as emblems of "the sternest cares of life" (IX: 65), and the ethos of Puritanism itself, as Lawrence Buell remarks, is "associated with something like adult reality, and Merry Mountism" with "a childish indulgence that the mature person has outgrown" (211). But the historical dimension of the tale is too prominent to be allegorized away, and we can never forget that Edith and Edgar will pass their temporal lives in a world presided over by John Endicott, "the severest Puritan of all who laid the rock foundation of New England" (IX: 66). The levels of the plot?his torical, moral and spiritual, anthropological?thus confound one another. Endicott's conquest of Merry Mount reenacts the mythic originary moment of all civilization, but the event is not an auspi cious or even a typical one: this civilization will be exceptionally marked by discontents. A communal neurosis?hostile to pleasure, to the senses, and to art?has been implanted in New England life at the very outset, so that the archetypal growth of the soul is forced to occur within culture-specific conditions deeply inhospi table to it. This con-founding of New England is Hawthorne's unifying theme in "Merry Mount." Yet while he stages the conflict symboli cally and indicates its consequences, Hawthorne cannot escape its confining terms, the neither/nor of "a wild philosophy of pleasure" (IX: 203) and a morbid denial of it. He seems to be hovering around, but unable productively to grasp, two ideas advanced by Herbert Marcuse in his critique of Freud in Eros and Civilization (1955): (1) "surplus-repression" or the "additional controls" that a particular society institutes "over and above those indispensable for civilized human association," and (2) the "performance prin ciple" or the dominant form that the reality principle assumes at a given historical moment (32). Inclining, from native skepticism, toward the pole of restraint over that of irresponsible freedom, Hawthorne is forced by the logic of his binary opposition to acquiesce in the Puritan triumph even as he bridles at it. On one side, he portrays the Puritans as "most dismal wretches" who divest the New World of even the lawful "hereditary pastimes of old England" and who scourge and mutilate social offenders (IX: 60); on the other, he presents them as embodiments of the reality principle who live closer to "the sober truths of life" than the gay Merry Mounters (IX: 66, 60, 66). His Puritans thus symbolize both necessary and ultimately desirable social and psychological repression and wraiecessary and undesirable surplus repression? the latter imposed on behalf of a historically constructed vision of "reality" that will be transmitted to their descendants as a matrix of cultural being. This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri, 10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
470 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England In going beyond his historical sources to emphasize Puritan severity-"Further penalties,such as branding and the cropping of ears,shall be thought of hereafter"(IX:64),Endicott tells his lieutenant-Hawthorne shows how surplus repression leads to a rechanneling of erotic energies into sadism.In "Main-street"the constable who flogs the bare-breasted Quaker woman dragged through town (at the behest of Major Hawthorne)has "a smile upon his lips.He loves his business"(XI:70);and in The Scarlet Letter the Puritan women who chide Hester in the marketplace are punitive in proportion to their ugliness and inferably their sexual frustration.The paradox of repression in "Merry Mount"is that while the curtailment of natural instincts "provides the soil for the growth of what is later called man's soul,"as Nietzsche argues in The Genealogy of Morals,it also generates a"sublimated cruelty resulting from the cooping up of his animal nature"(225).A simple act like Endicott's cropping of Edgar's "love-lock and long glossy curls"(IX:66)is a token of the fury turned against beauty and pleasure,the fury becoming the substitute pleasure. To suggest that Hawthorne understood these things is not to say that he escaped their hold..“Man,”Nietzsche remarked,“has looked for so long with an evil eye upon his natural inclinations that they have finally become inseparable from 'bad conscience'" (228).n“Merry Mount,.”“bad conscience'”-Hawthorne's residual distrust of pleasure and the senses even as he is power- fully drawn toward them-shows itself in the animal imagery he adapts from"Comus"to disparage the revels of the community as descents into bestiality.The Merry Mounters are not genuine inno- cents,they are adults corruptly playing at innocence;but since the story includes no pleasures that are not childish (sanctified courtship-to-marital love excepted),Hawthorne's portrayal has the effect of banishing most "natural inclinations"-"the old mirth of Merry England"as well as "the wilder glee of this fresh forest" (IX:57)from the future New England.Q.D.Leavis finds Hawthorne "subtler and wiser than Milton"in recognizing the disaster"that follows from the unmediated clash of "two partial truths or qualified goods"(35),yet Hawthorne may be more Miltonic than Leavis allows.By accepting "the moral gloom of the world"as an incontestable fact (IX:68),Hawthorne goes far towards conflating a historically bequeathed "performance principle"-the Puritan measure of reality as fallen,somber,toil- some,and care-ridden-with "reality"itself.He has not introjected Puritan beliefs as such;rather,he has imbibed "New England"and naturalized its coordinates of experience even as he rejects the theology that shaped them and the social practices and demeanors they produce. This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri,10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
470 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England In going beyond his historical sources to emphasize Puritan severity?"Further penalties, such as branding and the cropping of ears, shall be thought of hereafter" (IX: 64), Endicott tells his lieutenant?Hawthorne shows how surplus repression leads to a rechanneling of erotic energies into sadism. In "Main-street" the constable who flogs the bare-breasted Quaker woman dragged through town (at the behest of Major Hawthorne) has "a smile upon his lips. He loves his business" (XI: 70); and in The Scarlet Letter the Puritan women who chide Hester in the marketplace are punitive in proportion to their ugliness and inferably their sexual frustration. The paradox of repression in "Merry Mount" is that while the curtailment of natural instincts "provides the soil for the growth of what is later called man's soul, " as Nietzsche argues in The Genealogy of Morals, it also generates a "sublimated cruelty resulting from the cooping up of his animal nature" (225). A simple act like Endicott's cropping of Edgar's "love-lock and long glossy curls" (IX: 66) is a token of the fury turned against beauty and pleasure, the fury becoming the substitute pleasure. To suggest that Hawthorne understood these things is not to say that he escaped their hold. "Man," Nietzsche remarked, "has looked for so long with an evil eye upon his natural inclinations that they have finally become inseparable from 'bad conscience'" (228). In "Merry Mount," "bad conscience"?Hawthorne's residual distrust of pleasure and the senses even as he is power fully drawn toward them?shows itself in the animal imagery he adapts from "Comus" to disparage the revels of the community as descents into bestiality. The Merry Mounters are not genuine inno cents, they are adults corruptly playing at innocence; but since the story includes no pleasures that are not childish (sanctified courtship-to-marital love excepted), Hawthorne's portrayal has the effect of banishing most "natural inclinations"?"the old mirth of Merry England" as well as "the wilder glee of this fresh forest" (IX: 57)?from the future New England. Q. D. Leavis finds Hawthorne "subtler and wiser than Milton" in recognizing the "disaster" that follows from the unmediated clash of "two partial truths or qualified goods" (35), yet Hawthorne may be more Miltonic than Leavis allows. By accepting "the moral gloom of the world" as an incontestable fact (IX: 68), Hawthorne goes far towards conflating a historically bequeathed "performance principle"?the Puritan measure of reality as fallen, somber, toil some, and care-ridden?with "reality" itself. He has not introjected Puritan beliefs as such; rather, he has imbibed "New England" and naturalized its coordinates of experience even as he rejects the theology that shaped them and the social practices and demeanors they produce. This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri, 10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
American Literary History 471 "The May-pole of Merry Mount"is a relatively early work, accomplished as art yet lacking what Giles Gunn calls"a norma- tive perspective outside of culture from which and by means of which to criticize the products created within it"(23).Although Hawthorne can "think across culture"to the extent that he deplores its repressive "valuations"(Gunn 1),past and present,he is still enmeshed within culture in his core assumptions about human life. Without a vocabulary for cultural analysis or a broad comparativist view of history,he can feel the desirability but not conceive the possibility of a minimally repressive society in which the life of the senses would be shorn of culturally rooted guilt.Beneath the overt levels of the tale-those on which the writer is in command of his materials-the "problem of New England"in "The May-pole of Merry Mount"is the problem of Hawthorne's con- finement in thinking about New England. 2.Recentering the New England Past So stern was the energy of his aspect,that the whole man, visage,frame,and soul,seemed wrought of iron,gifted with life and thought,yet all of one substance with his head-piece and breast-plate.It was the Puritan of Puritans;It was Endicott himself! Hawthorne,"The May-pole of Merry Mount" In an 1833 oration delivered in Salem,"The Importance of Illustrating New-England History By a Series of Romances like the Waverley Novels,"Rufus Choate argued for the power of fiction to animate the barebones "facts,the lessons,of history"and infuse them into consciousness of the people.Choate warned, however,that as "no age is heroic of which the whole truth is recorded,"the wise romancer will cultivate only "the useful truth" and allow the rest "to putrefy or be burned"(338,340).The larger question for Choate,as Lawrence Buell observed of ante-bellum historical writers generally,was what to do with a Puritan ancestry, a fount of regional pride and proclaimed national pre-eminence insofar as the Puritan resistance to tyranny was taken to prefigure the American Revolution,but a source,too,of embarrassment, even of shame,since these ardent champions of liberty were also vigorous persecutors themselves (see Buell 193-213). The campaign to purge the New England legacy of Puritan punitiveness began much earlier,in 1769,with the chauvinism of This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri,10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
American Literary History "The May-pole of Merry Mount" is a relatively early work, accomplished as art yet lacking what Giles Gunn calls "a norma tive perspective outside of culture from which and by means of which to criticize the products created within it" (23). Although Hawthorne can "think across culture" to the extent that he deplores its repressive "valuations" (Gunn 1), past and present, he is still enmeshed within culture in his core assumptions about human life. Without a vocabulary for cultural analysis or a broad comparativist view of history, he can feel the desirability but not conceive the possibility of a minimally repressive society in which the life of the senses would be shorn of culturally rooted guilt. Beneath the overt levels of the tale?those on which the writer is in command of his materials?the "problem of New England" in "The May-pole of Merry Mount" is the problem of Hawthorne's con finement in thinking about New England. 2. Recentering the New England Past So stern was the energy of his aspect, that the whole man, visage, frame, and soul, seemed wrought of iron, gifted with life and thought, yet all of one substance with his head-piece and breast-plate. It was the Puritan of Puritans; It was Endicott himself! Hawthorne, "The May-pole of Merry Mount" In an 1833 oration delivered in Salem, "The Importance of Illustrating New-England History By a Series of Romances like the Waverley Novels," Rufus Choate argued for the power of fiction to animate the barebones "facts, the lessons, of history" and infuse them into consciousness of the people. Choate warned, however, that as "no age is heroic of which the whole truth is recorded," the wise romancer will cultivate only "the useful truth" and allow the rest "to putrefy or be burned" (338, 340). The larger question for Choate, as Lawrence Buell observed of ante-bellum historical writers generally, was what to do with a Puritan ancestry, a fount of regional pride and proclaimed national pre-eminence insofar as the Puritan resistance to tyranny was taken to prefigure the American Revolution, but a source, too, of embarrassment, even of shame, since these ardent champions of liberty were also vigorous persecutors themselves (see Buell 193-213). The campaign to purge the New England legacy of Puritan punitiveness began much earlier, in 1769, with the chauvinism of This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri, 10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
472 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England Plymouth elders trying to raise the fortunes of a town that social, economic,and political history had made a regional backwater.In Imagining New England (2001),Joseph A.Conforti shows how, accelerating in the 1790s with Jeremy Belknap's American Biography,or An Historical Account of Those Persons who Have Been Distinguished in America (1794,1798)and again in 1820 with Daniel Webster's bicentennial address in Plymouth,New Englanders seized on the historical neologism "Pilgrims"and glori- fied the legacy of Plymouth in order to create"a narrative of repub- lican beginnings unencumbered by the Puritan record of intolerance"(182).As Plymouth waxed in New England's and later in America's mythmaking,Massachusetts Bay waned,or at least was subsumed to "a powerful discourse of Plymouth-republican origins"that served,in Conforti's phrase,"to Pilgrimize the Puritans”(l89)and,in Choate's,to disseminate a“useful truth.” In dramatizing the story of Merry Mount,Hawthorne reverses the thrust of contemporary historiography on both counts;he Puritanizes the Pilgrims and excavates the kind of matter Choate sought to bury.Far from being a cradle of American liberty, Plymouth is alluded to only as a nearby "settlement of Puritans" (IX:60),and its agent in routing the Merry Mounters is the Salemite John Endicott,whose community Edith and Edgar(representatives of the future New England)will presumably join.The identic locus of New England has been reclaimed for Massachusetts Bay and its founding village,Salem,an "anti-Plymouth"associated with liberty (the Puritans fled from King and Church)but also,definingly,with intolerance and repression. Hawthorne portrays this double legacy in another tale, "Endicott and the Red Cross,"which Michael Davitt Bell rightly calls an account of"the symbolic birth of the American character" (57).In a moment of New England crisis,John Endicott ("for ever honored be"his name!)steps forth to cut the symbol of England, and of Royal tyranny,"from New England's banner,the first omen of the deliverance which our fathers consummated"nearly a century and a half later (IX:441).The story begins and ends with filiopietist orthodoxy;much of the rest is open heterodoxy-a litany of Puritan persecutions and punishments,among them a scarlet A affixed to the gown of a beautiful young adulteress. "Was it not for liberty to worship God according to our con- science"that we came to this land,Endicott proclaims to the crowd.“Call you this liberty of conscience?”replies a“Wanton Gospeller,"whose offense is to read scripture other than as the ministers and magistrates see fit (IX:439,435). Bell takes the story as a judicious historical representation of the two faces of Endicott (liberator and persecutor)as they This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri,10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
472 Hawthorne and the Problem of New England Plymouth elders trying to raise the fortunes of a town that social, economic, and political history had made a regional backwater. In Imagining New England (2001), Joseph A. Conforti shows how, accelerating in the 1790s with Jeremy Belknap's American Biography y or An Historical Account of Those Persons who Have Been Distinguished in America (1794, 1798) and again in 1820 with Daniel Webster's bicentennial address in Plymouth, New Englanders seized on the historical neologism "Pilgrims" and glori fied the legacy of Plymouth in order to create "a narrative of repub lican beginnings unencumbered by the Puritan record of intolerance" (182). As Plymouth waxed in New England's and later in America's mythmaking, Massachusetts Bay waned, or at least was subsumed to "a powerful discourse of Plymouth-republican origins" that served, in Conforti's phrase, "to Pilgrimize the Puritans" (189) and, in Choate's, to disseminate a "useful truth." In dramatizing the story of Merry Mount, Hawthorne reverses the thrust of contemporary historiography on both counts; he Puritanizes the Pilgrims and excavates the kind of matter Choate sought to bury. Far from being a cradle of American liberty, Plymouth is alluded to only as a nearby "settlement of Puritans" (DC: 60), and its agent in routing the Merry Mounters is the Salemite John Endicott, whose community Edith and Edgar (representatives of the future New England) will presumably join. The identic locus of New England has been reclaimed for Massachusetts Bay and its founding village, Salem, an "anti-Plymouth" associated with liberty (the Puritans fled from King and Church) but also, definingly, with intolerance and repression. Hawthorne portrays this double legacy in another tale, "Endicott and the Red Cross," which Michael Davitt Bell rightly calls an account of "the symbolic birth of the American character" (57). In a moment of New England crisis, John Endicott ("for ever honored be" his name!) steps forth to cut the symbol of England, and of Royal tyranny, "from New England's banner, the first omen of the deliverance which our fathers consummated" nearly a century and a half later (IX: 441). The story begins and ends with filiopietist orthodoxy; much of the rest is open heterodoxy?a litany of Puritan persecutions and punishments, among them a scarlet A affixed to the gown of a beautiful young adulteress. "Was it not for liberty to worship God according to our con science" that we came to this land, Endicott proclaims to the crowd. "Call you this liberty of conscience?" replies a "Wanton Gospeller," whose offense is to read scripture other than as the ministers and magistrates see fit (IX: 439, 435). Bell takes the story as a judicious historical representation of the two faces of Endicott (liberator and persecutor) as they This content downloaded from 202.120.14.172 on Fri, 10 Nov 2017 17:39:07 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms