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1 " Pleasant is a rainy winter's day, within doors! The best study for such a day, or the best amusement,—call it which you will,—is a book of travels, describing scenes the most unlike that sombre one "
― Nathaniel Hawthorne , Twice-Told Tales
2 " Thus from beneath the black veil there rolled a cloud into the sunshine, an ambiguity of sin or sorrow, which enveloped the poor minister, so that love or sympathy could never reach him. "
3 " Yet perhaps the pale-faced congregation was almost as fearful a sight to the minister as his black veil to them. "
4 " 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. "
5 " I wonder he is not afraid to be alone with himself." "Men sometimes are so," said her husband. "
6 " All through life that piece of crape had hung between him and the world; it had separated him from cheerful brotherhood and woman's love and kept him in that saddest of all prisons his own heart; "
7 " I look around me, and, lo! on every visage a black veil! "
8 " Pleasant is a rainy winter's day, within doors! The best study for such a day, or the best amusement,---call it which you will,--- is a book... "
9 " I know what to think when a young girl shivers by a warm hearth and complains of lonesomeness at her mother's side. Shall I put these feelings into words? "
10 " Perhaps a germ of love was springing in their hearts so pure that it might blossom in Paradise, since it could not be matured on earth; "
11 " If it be a sign of mourning," replied Mr. Hooper, "I, perhaps, like most other mortals, have sorrows dark enough to be typified by a black veil. "
12 " When men seek only to be trampled upon, it were a pity to deny them a favor so easily granted - and so well deserved! "
13 " She seeks to place herself above the sympathies of our common nature, which envelopes all human souls. See if that nature do not assert its claim over her in some mode that shall bring her level with the lowest! "
