Ghosts seem to take most different appearances, appear in most different places and haunt houses of most different people. Who are they and why do they show themselves?
Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of "The scarlet letter" before writing his book and becoming known, used to lived in Boston. In 1830, everyday, he used to go to the library to do research work and write for some hours. Reverend Harris, a clergyman in his
eighties was also familiar to the library. Since some years back, he made it a daily habit to sit on "his" chair, near the chimney and read the "Boston Post."
Nathaniel Hawthorne had never talked to Reverend Harris, as it was strictly forbidden to talk in the reading room but he was sure that he would have felt a great loss if the old man was absent.
This is why the novelist was surprised the evening when a friend told him that Reverent Harris was dead. He was even more astonished when the following day he saw the clergyman on the same chair reading the newspaper. For some more weeks, Hawthorne saw Harris faithful to the post and
apparently in good health.
Hawthorne felt embarrassed. Why were the other persons present not seeing Harris? Or did they see him? If they did, were they as
embarrassed as Hawthorne to admit his "presence"? Hawthorne could not just talk to "Harris" as it was forbidden to talk. And even if he did, it was impossible to do so without catching the attention of the other persons around him.
How would he look by talking to, what seemed to others, an empty chair? And Hawthorne was never introced to Harris.
Some months later, the novelist went to the library and found the haunted chair empty, Hawthorne never saw Harris again.
We may say that Hawthorne saw the ghost of Harris, or what Hawthorne thought to be Harris was only an image created by his mind. Researches carried in psychic suggest that the person supposed to be solid, near the fire, was sort of captured by the mind and the thought that received Hawthorne was similar to to an image received on the TV from a station.
One thing is sure, Nathaniel Hawthorne is not the only person to see a "ghost." Since all times, all civilizations have noted any of the two. Either a simple and banal one or one that happened under specific circumstances.