{"id":"01KG6YH01NNQ6BY4BYT0QPGM8Y","cid":"bafkreidxowpxixqjlglki2uvi5jz4f2ogo6vuztywb32kzk7vdlwfncgry","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":1673,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:45.581Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 12","source_file":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","start_line":1620,"text":"of them, that it would in some degree render them doubtful of their own\r\npowers, did they hear much and vociferous braying concerning them in\r\nthe public pastures. True, I have been braying myself (if you please to\r\nbe witty enough to have it so), but then I claim to be the first that\r\nhas so brayed in this particular matter; and, therefore, while pleading\r\nguilty to the charge, still claim all the merit due to originality.\r\n\r\nBut with whatever motive, playful or profound, Nathaniel Hawthorne has\r\nchosen to entitle his pieces in the manner he has, it is certain that\r\nsome of them are directly calculated to deceive--egregiously deceive,\r\nthe superficial skimmer of pages. To be downright and candid once\r\nmore, let me cheerfully say, that two of these titles did dolefully\r\ndupe no less an eager-eyed reader than myself; and that, too, after\r\nI had been impressed with a sense of the great depth and breadth\r\nof this American man. \"Who in the name of thunder\" (as the country\r\npeople say in this neighborhood), \"who in the name of thunder, would\r\nanticipate any marvel in a piece entitled _Young Goodman Brown_?\" You\r\nwould of course suppose that it was a simple little tale, intended as\r\na supplement to _Goody Two Shoes_. Whereas, it is deep as Dante; nor\r\ncan you finish it, without addressing the author in his own words--\"It\r\nshall be yours to penetrate, in every bosom, the deep mystery of\r\nsin\".... And with Young Goodman, too, in allegorical pursuit of his\r\nPuritan wife, you cry out in your anguish:\r\n\r\n \"Faith!\" shouted Goodman Brown, in a voice of agony and desperation;\r\n and the echoes of the forest mocked him, crying, \"Faith! Faith!\" as if\r\n bewildered wretches were seeking her all through the wilderness.\r\n\r\nNow this same piece entitled _Young Goodman Brown_, is one of the two\r\nthat I had not all read yesterday; and I allude to it now, because it\r\nis, in itself, such a strong positive illustration of the blackness\r\nin Hawthorne, which I had assumed from the mere occasional shadows of\r\nit; as revealed in several of the other sketches. But had I previously\r\nperused _Young Goodman Brown_, I should have been at no pains to draw\r\nthe conclusion, which I came to at a time when I was ignorant that the\r\nbook contained one such direct and unqualified manifestation of it.\r\n\r\nThe other piece of the two referred to, is entitled _A Select Party_,\r\nwhich, in my first simplicity upon originally taking hold of the book,\r\nI fancied must treat of some pumpkin-pie party in old Salem; or some\r\nchowder party on Cape Cod. Whereas, by all the gods of Peedee, it is\r\nthe sweetest and sublimest thing that has been written since Spenser\r\nwrote. Nay, there is nothing in Spenser that surpasses it, perhaps\r\nnothing that equals it. And the test is this. Read any canto in _The\r\nFaerie Queene_ and then read _A Select Party_, and decide which\r\npleases you most,--that is, if you are qualified to judge. Do not be\r\nfrightened at this; for when Spenser was alive, he was thought of\r\nvery much as Hawthorne is now,--was generally accounted just such a\r\n\"gentle\" harmless man. It may be, that to common eyes, the sublimity\r\nof Hawthorne seems lost in his sweetness,--as perhaps in that same\r\n_Select Party_ of his; for whom he has builded so august a dome of\r\nsunset clouds, and served them on richer plate than Belshazzar when he\r\nbanqueted his lords in Babylon.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 12"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6YGBGJFFWM00TFQS297SSV","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG6YCG626JN4FCG8QK17CQCF","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6YH01NQNAV5E2M9QG0PQQK","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6YH01NT8VWCPHNCFRPJ8RA","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:46.933Z","ts":"2026-01-30T07:57:53.090Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}