The Crucible: The Deterioration Of Salem During The Witch Trials Essay, Research Paper

The Crucible: The Deterioration of Salem During the Witch Trials

John Hudson

Mrs. Phillips

The deterioration of Salem’s social structure precipitated the murders

of many innocent people. Arthur Miller’s depiction of the Salem witch trials,

The Crucible, deals with a community that starts out looking like it is tightly

knit and church loving. It turns out that once Tituba starts pointing her

finger at the witches, the community starts pointing their fingers at each

other. Hysteria and hidden agendas break down the social structure and then

everyone must protect themselves from the people that they thought were their

friends. The church, legal system and the togetherness of the community died so

that children could protect their families’ social status.

Being isolated from any other group of people with different beliefs

created a church led Puritan society that was not able to accept a lot of

change. The church was against the devil, at the same time it was against such

things as dancing and other premature acts. The reputation of the family was

very important to the members of the community. When the girls were caught

dancing in the woods, they lied to protect not just themselves but the

reputation of their families. They claimed that the devil took them over and

influenced them to dance. The girls also said that they saw members of the town

standing with the devil. A community living in a puritan society like Salem

could easily go into a chaotic state and have a difficult time dealing with

what they consider to be the largest form of evil.

Salem’s hysteria made the community lose faith in the spiritual beliefs

that they were trying to strictly enforce. The church lost many of its

parishioners because the interest of the town was now on Abigail because people

wanted to know who was going to be named next. When the church was trying to

excommunicate John Proctor, there were not enough people at church to do it.

The people were getting misled so far as to leave a dagger stuck in the door of

their minister’s house: ?Tonight, when I open my door to leave my house–a

dagger clattered to the ground…There is danger for me.?(128) were Parris’

exact words. With the conveyer of God fearing for his life there was no longer

anyone but Abigail to lead the community.

The justice system is designed to protect the people that it serves but

during the trials the accused witch had two choices, death or imprisonment. The

punishment of death was given to all people that pleaded not guilty; the other

punishment was to plead guilty and go to jail. John Proctor gave his view of

the justice system when he said ?I like not the smell of this ?authority’ ?(29).

?And do you know that near to four hundred are in the jails from Marblehead to

Lynn, and upon my signature??(85) said Danforth, describing the number of

people that were in jail on charges of witchcraft. There were so many people

executed that Hale commented ?there are orphans wandering from house to house;

abandoned cattle bellow on the highroads, the stink of rotting crops hangs

everywhere…?(130) Salem was turning into a ghost town. With Abigail

controlling the community, the church no longer getting the whole town to

prayer, and an unjust legal system, it is natural that the people were in a

state of total chaos.

The unexplained was caused by the devil, so some members of Salem used

the unexplained to their advantage. Mrs. Putnam told the truth when she said, ?

There are wheels within wheels in this village, and fires within fires!?(26)

Mrs. Putnam did her share of spreading rumors after she heard that the girls

were flying, so she asked Parris ?How high did she (Abigail) fly, how high??

(11). These rumors happened because people did not want any blame put on to

themselves. This ?passing the buck’ made people start fighting with one another

such as Corey charging Putnam of having his daughter accuse a resident of

witchcraft in order to get Corey’s land. Abigail used her power of getting

people to listen to her to her advantage when she charged Proctor’s spouse with

being a witch so Abigail could live with John. This again proves that Abigail

had control of the town and the unexplained turned neighbor against neighbor.

The social breakdown in Salem was the major factor in the tragedy that

took the lives of many innocent people. There was more than one tragedy in The

Crucible. The first was the murdering of many innocent people, and the second

was that a community that was once very close had been broken apart. It

appeared that the people of Salem were like a family but isolation actually

made them unable to adapt to a troublesome situation. If the community could

have had a greater influence from another group of people then the social

structure would have been able to adapt.

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