Forgetting for a moment the immense spiritual meaning of this noble quartet of romances, and regarding them as works of art in the straiter sense, they are felt to be practically blameless examples of the principle of adapting means to a desired end.  As befits the nature of the themes, the movement in each case is slow, pregnant with significance, cumulative in effect, the tempo of each in exquisite accord with the particular motive:  compared with “The Scarlet Letter,” “The House of The Seven Gables” moves somewhat more quickly, a slight increase to suit the action:  it is swiftest of all in “The Blithedale Romance,” with its greater objectivity of action and interest, its more mundane air:  while there is a cunning unevenness in the two parts of “The Marble Faun,” as is right for a romance which first presents a tragic situation (as external climax) and then shows in retarded progress that inward drama of the soul more momentous than any outer scene or situation can possibly be.  After Donatello’s deed of death, because what follows is psychologically the most important part of the book, the speed slackens accordingly.  Quiet, too, and unsensational as Hawthorne seems, he possessed a marked dramatic power.  His denouements are overwhelming in grip and scenic value:  the stage effect of the scaffold scene in “The Scarlet Letter,” the murder scene in the “Marble Faun,” the tragic close of Zenobia’s career in “The Blithedale Romance,” such scenes are never arbitrary and detached; they are tonal, led up to by all that goes before.  The remark applies equally to that awful picture in “The House of The Seven Gables,” where the Judge sits dead in his chair and the minutes are ticked off by a seemingly sentient clock.  An element in this tonality is naturally Hawthorne’s style:  it is the best illustration American literature affords of excellence of pattern in contrast with the “purple patch” manner of writing so popular in modern diction.

Congruity, the subjection of the parts to the whole, and to the end in view—­the doctrine of key—­Hawthorne illustrates all this.  If we do not mark passages and delectate over phrases, we receive an exquisite sense of harmony—­and harmony is the last word of style.  It is this power which helps to make him a great man-of-letters, as well as a master of romance.  One can imagine him neither making haste to furnish “copy” nor pausing by the way for ornament’s sake.  He knew that the only proper decoration was an integral efflorescence of structure.  He looked beyond to the fabric’s design:  a man decently poor in this world’s gear, he was more concerned with good work than with gain.  Of such are art’s kingdom of heaven.