Crucible
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In Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible, the perceived evils of witchcraft and compacting with the Devil contrast sharply with the real evils of intolerance, vengeance, reputation and hysteria. Though the saintly separatist-Puritans had found Plymouth less than fifty years before, their descendants occupying Salem had somehow manipulated holy values into latent desires that would manifest into evil purposes. Many of the former dangers that burdened the society in its early years had lessened, while interpersonal disputes over property, religious officials, and suspicion of sins and accusations over supernatural events had begun to seethe beneath Salem's theocratic facade. The Crucible introduces a community full of underlying personal grudges that are dying to reveal themselves. While Puritan religion pervades every aspect of life, it lacks a mechanism for managing emotions. Because of this absence that denies essential human liberties, Salem citizens discover ways to voice their resentments, anger and jealousy in other ways. From what the mob of people claims to be the will of the devil and his witches, evil manifests itself through vengeance against empowerment and relationships, the hysteria in which they are able to act out their anger over unexplainable events and exhibit their intolerance, and, finally, their desires in which to keep their reputations unblemishedand their determination to stop at nothing to ensure their purity.
Perhaps the most critical theme in The Crucible is the role that hysteria and intolerance can play in tearing apart a community. It is an important point to reiterate that The Crucible is set in a theocratic society: a government by a person or persons claiming to rule with divine authority. Because of this administration, any issues regarding one's personal status were made public, as moral laws often overruled state regulations...