Examples Of Hypocrisy In The Crucible

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Arthur Millers, The Crucible is set in an era of deceit and pretense. Through the cracks in the illusion of the ‘perfect society’ based around morals of Christianity and a strong religious agenda_ greed, hypocrisy and a struggle for power slip through. This society harboured the perfect conditions for the witchtrials to fester and become bloodier than ever imagined. A major player in the outcome of this tragedy is greed for land. In the days of the Salem puritans, the more land you had, the more respected and wealthy you were. According to the law in Salem, if you were convicted of witchcraft, you forfeited your property and anyone could buy it from the town. Thus enters Thomas Putnam; a great example of how land greed affected the trials. Putnam, through his daughter Ruth, accused several townsfolk in order to be able to buy their land. He had his neighbors killed in order to expand his property, gaining more respect and power in the …show more content…

Based solely on this definition, one can clearly see that hypocrisy runs rampant in puritan Salem. The most glaring example of a hypocrite in this town is Abigail Williams. She, along with the other accusers, walked around as if they were saints, and the people believed it. Abigail is ruthless, in that she will go to any length to accomplish her goal; which is to get rid of Elizabeth Proctor in order to be with John. When Abby yells: “I want the light of God, I want the sweet love of Jesus...I go back to Jesus,” she is only using the community’s respect and fear of God to further herself and fool others into fighting for her cause (Act I, p. 45). By appealing to the community’s strong sense of faith, she effectively intimidates the people by saying, in essence, that if they don’t believe her, they are essentially denouncing the word of God; as He supposedly speaks through her to get rid of the devil in

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