ABSTRACT
Political and moral principles voiced in Jefferson's manifesto are simultaneously efficient causes of the way of life Hawthorne depicts as well as indicative of the final cause Hawthorne consults in order to assess characters and to judge the American polity as it shapes up in the various historical eras upon which he has chosen to focus much of his fiction. Americans' dedication to equality was a feature of the national character frequently commented upon by Hawthorne's contemporaries, and among the most perceptive of these were Cooper and Tocqueville. Edith and Edgar must make a new home because they have become householders rather than merely sexual partners. The Puritan foster parents depicted in "The Gentle Boy", although sufficiently devoted to their adoptive son to brave disapproval from neighbours, refuse, however, to go the length of renouncing their religious beliefs. The two Endicott stories connect the founding of Massachusetts with acts of civic definition established by military force.
