Examples Of Guilt In The Crucible

Everyone knows the feeling. The nagging in the pit of your stomach that makes you rethink your actions. The feeling that makes you nervous, sweaty and scared. Guilt, an emotion that occurs when a person believes that they have violated a moral standard. Imagine a world without guilt. People would feel no remorse in anything they did, no conscience that monitored their actions. It is a powerful feeling that can both hold people back and push them towards action. This strong emotion is portrayed in several very popular pieces of literature. In the novel Macbeth, William Shakespeare shows how Macbeth’s guilt motivates him to make fatal decisions to try and hide his culpability, such as killing the king, killing Banquo and killing Macduff’s family.

In contrast, in The Crucible by Arthur Miller, John proctor, the protagonist, committed lechery and adultery with the Reverend’s niece, which made him consumed in guilt forcing him to give away his life for his family’s dignity. While almost 350 years separate these two novels, they both explore the theme of guilt and its effects on one’s conscious; both protagonists, Macbeth from Macbeth and John Proctor from The Crucible, struggle with guilt throughout the novel which leads to their eventual downfall.

At the beginning of both novels, Macbeth and John Proctor suffer from their guilty conscious, which foreshadow the subsequent negative outcomes. At the end of Act 1 in Macbeth, Lady Macbeth is trying to convince Macbeth to kill the king so he can have the throne all to himself to fulfil the witches’ prophecy. Macbeth, driven by ambition and the need for power is not yet fully convinced of killing the king. Before even committing the crime, he feels guilty and does not want to commit the offense. However, with the help of Lady Macbeth’s motivation and corruptive mindset, Macbeth eventually gets over his guilt and kills the king, foreshadowing the sorrow and grief to come. “Stars hide your fires! Let not light see my black and deep desires.” (1.4.15) This quote entails that Macbeth has morbid and power hungry desires that no one should know about; killing the king to become king himself.
In the Crucible, Act 1, we learn that Proctor is an honourable and a respectable man. He has, however, one regret: having an affair with Abigail, the Reverend Parris’ niece. Although he still has feelings for her, he tries to avoid getting tempted when Abigail ‘flirts’ with him. For example in act 1 he says: “No, No, Abby, That’s done with” (1.17). Later on we notice that Abby is insulting Mrs. Proctor because of how envious she is of their marriage, saying: “She is blackening my name in the village! She is telling lies about me! She is a cold, sniveling woman, and you bend to her!” (1.22). Abigail’s hatred towards Mrs. Proctor foreshadows the eventual evil acts she will commit against the Proctor family. As a result, this leads to Proctor’s downfall.

In both novels, the protagonists encounter internal conflicts day in and day out. Macbeth’s internal conflict starts at the beginning of Act 2, when Macbeth kills King Duncan and feels guilty about it. He begins hearing things as soon as the murder is completed. He can’t even pray because he is so guilt-ridden over his crime. The conflict continues in Act 3, he sees Banquo's ghost at the banquet table and this unnerves him. His guilty conscience is projecting visions of Banquo because he is responsible for the man's murder. In Act 4, he goes to see the witches once more. This demonstrates that they are beginning to grab hold of his mind. He visits them and says “I conjure you, by that which you profess, Howe'er you come to know it, answer me.” (4.1.64). It is proof of mental instability, that he is so obsessed with the witches’ prophecies, and believes that they can tell him the future. He then acts on what they tell him. His guilt, and the apparitions that it causes, leads him to use any source of consolation and certainty. In the last act, Macbeth completely loses his mind when he takes on a whole army thinking he can’t be defeated by anyone who is born of a woman and that the castle is fortified unless Birnam wood is brought into the castle. To his surprise, the soldiers all took a chunk of wood from the forest, which means the castle is no longer safe and, when he meets Macduff, he realizes that Macduff was “from his mother's womb untimely ripp'd” (5.3.88). Macbeth now realizes that he lost the battle against Macduff, as well as the battle against himself.
Proctor from The Crucible likewise has internal struggle, but is troubled more by the outside world.

In act 5, before being hanged, Reverend Hale urges him to confess about performing witchcraft. However, he is strong minded and does not confess, because he would rather die being honest than live being a liar. He would rather have his good name and for people to think of him as a good man instead of ruining his family’s reputation. “Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!” Act 4. Therefore, he dies peacefully, while winning the battle between him and himself and the battle between him and the society of Salem. His ability to face his guilt and stay strong mentally allowed him to overcome the trials and tribulations of the town and himself. Although both these characters face internal conflicts dealing with guilt, one comes out a hero and the other a

villain.

Macbeth and John Proctor, at the beginning of the novel, were both very liked and respected men. Their guiltiness however, leads them into having a bad relationship with everyone around them, including their wives. For example, in the novel Macbeth, after Macbeth had killed the 2 king’s servants, he and his wife aren’t as interactive as they were before. He makes decisions without asking her such as killing Banquo, and killing the Macduff family, which negatively affected their relationship. When he receives new about his wife’s death he does not care and does not ask how or why she died. In a show of callousness, he says he doesn't have time for her: “she should have died hereafter; there would have been a time for such a word” (5.5.17-18). Also, his relationship with the rest of the nation is destroyed as they now hate him because of what he did. He’s not the hero everyone thought he was and he’s certainly not the trustworthy man the king assumed he was. As a result, the whole nation turns against him and a war begins.
In the crucible, Proctor’s affair with Abigail also affected his relationship with his wife, Elizabeth as she can’t seem to forgive him for committing adultery. We see this subtly when the narrator says: “It is as though she would speak but cannot. Instead, now, she takes up his plate and glass and fork and goes with them to the basin. Her back is turned toward him. He turns to her and watches her. A sense of their separation rises”. This signifies that there is still conflict in their relationship because of John’s offence. In addition to his relationship being strained, his connection with the village of Salem is also in danger, as they all presume he is an adulterer and a witch. Furthermore, his reputation of being a noble and honest man is at stake because of his confession of being an adulterer in court. He thought this would be a valid argument to go against Abigail’s accusation but it backfired. The whole town thought badly of him even if his wife neglected that argument in court. As a result, Proctor did not win the argument in court and is now sought of as the cheating adulterer.

Overall, both novels portray characters who struggle through a guilty conscience and the different outcomes that can come from such. Guilt can push to two extremes; one to relieve it and the other to conceal it. Both novels describe the effects of these feelings and how it can drastically impact one’s life; Macbeth experienced guilt that unhinged him while the Proctor experienced guilt that motivated him to stay true and embrace a downfall that was fitting to his crimes. Guilt can do many things, but without it things cannot change. As Gretchen Rubin once said, “Negative emotions like loneliness, envy, and guilt have an important role to play in a happy life; they're big, flashing signs that something needs to change.” So that leaves one questions; will you accept your guilt like Macbeth and let it ruin you, or go as Proctor and learn from it and embrace it?