The Minister's Black Veil

“On a nearer view it seemed to consist of two folds of crape, which entirely concealed his features, except the mouth and chin, but probably did not intercept his sight, further than to give a darkened aspect to all living and inanimate things.” 

When Parson Hooper first emerges wearing the black veil, the residents of Milford are stunned by his change in appearance. In this passage, the narrator speculates that the veil, which covers Mr. Hooper’s eyes, must make the world and all people appear dark to Mr. Hooper. Though the narrator likely means this in a literal sense, because the veil represents the secret sin that is in all people, the “darkened aspect” has a figurative meaning as well. The word “probably” suggests that the narrator is not fully omniscient, for they can only speculate on how Mr. Hooper views the world outside the veil. This suggestion foreshadows how no one will know the true meaning of the black veil. The black veil will separate Mr. Hooper from all people, even from the reader.

“It was tinged, rather more darkly than usual, with the gentle gloom of Mr. Hooper’s temperament. The subject had reference to secret sin, and those sad mysteries which we hide from our nearest and dearest, and would fain conceal from our own consciousness, even forgetting that the Omniscient can detect them. A subtle power was breathed into his words.”

On the first day he wears the veil, Mr. Hooper’s sermon laments that people hide their sin from each other when God sees it all. The people see the sermon as exceptionally powerful, and their appreciation suggests they recognize their own secret sin; however, their shunning him socially afterward suggests they refuse to face it. The people’s belief that Mr.