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his 'madness' appears. Being one of several miserable seekers of the
Great Carbuncle, a miraculous and holy Indian gem hidden in the moun-
tains, the chemist confesses that he is eager to take this holy gem apart
by chemical means in order to learn its elemental composition by de-
struction. From destroying one's own health to destroying holy things is
only the first step in the transformation of the 'mad alchemist'. The next
step of 'madness', the step towards moral perversion, is hurting or killing
other people as a result of one's scientific obsession and hubris, on which
Hawthorne later wrote at least two stories.
The Birth-mark (1843) 46 features an 'al-chemist' of the late eight-
eenth or early nineteenth century. 47 Alluding to contemporary Romantic
philosophies of nature, Hawthorne let this 'al-chemist' temporarily ex-
change his love for alchemy with the love for his new wife, who is de-
scribed as the ideal of beauty, save for a small birthmark on her cheek.
After a while, the birthmark, in the view of the 'al-chemist', grows to an
intolerable symbol of material imperfection. Eventually, he revives his
old chemical laboratory and brews a remedy to remove the spot. How-
ever, at the end of the story, it turns out that his wife's birthmark is the
only bond of her “angelic spirit” with the “mortal frame” of her body,
such that the successful removal results in her death. The moral of this
fable is easy to grasp: material perfectionism by chemical means, i.e . the
hubris of improving the divine creation, results in destruction and death.
As with other 'mad scientist' stories, in order to make the moral plausi-
ble, Hawthorne requires surreal elements (here, the bond of her angelic
spirit with her mortal frame) such that the story turns into a fable at the
very end.
In Rappaccini's Daughter (1844), 48 Hawthorne introduced a new
component that changed the 'mad alchemist' into the full-fledged 'mad
46 First published in Pioneer , I (March, 1843): 113-19; repr. in Mosses from an Old
Manse (New York, 1846), vol. I, 32-51.
47 Hawthorne wrote, “when the comparatively recent discovery of electricity, and other
kindred mysteries of nature, seemed to open paths into the region of miracle.” Since
'amber electricity' was already known in antiquity, I suppose that he referred to ei-
ther Galvani's experiments (1786) or Volta's pile (1799).
48 First published in United States Magazine and Democratic Review , XV (December,
1844): 545-60, as 'Writings of Aubépine'; repr. in Mosses from an Old Manse , 85-
118.
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