His profoundest glances into individual souls are like the
marvels of clairvoyance. It would seem, that, in the production of such
a work as "The Blithedale Romance," his mind had hit accidentally, as
it were, on an idea or fact mysteriously related to some morbid
sentiment in the inmost core of his nature, and connecting itself with
numerous scattered observations of human life, lying unrelated in his
imagination. In a sort of meditative dream, his intellect drifts in the
direction to which the subject points, broods patiently over it, looks
at it, looks into it, and at last looks through it to the law by which
it is governed. Gradually, individual beings, definite in spiritual
quality, but shadowy in substantial form, group themselves around this
central conception, and by degrees assume an outward body and
expression corresponding to their internal nature. On the depth and
intensity of the mental mood, the force of the fascination it exerts
over him, and the length of time it holds him captive, depend the
solidity and substance of the individual characterizations. In this way
Miles Coverdale, Hollingsworth, Westervelt, Zenobia, and Priscilla
become real persons to the mind which has called them into being. He
knows every secret and watches every motion of their souls, yet is, in
a measure, independent of them, and pretends to no authority by which
he can alter the destiny which consigns them to misery or happiness.
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