Henry Drummond symbolizes the devil to the people of Hillsboro because he is accepting of change that is different from the Bible. The people of Hillsboro believe Henry Drummond is the devil. In the movie, Inherit the Wind, Henry Drummond arrives in town to defend Bertram Cates, the defendant, in a court case. The court case involves Cates who is accused of breaking the law of a public teacher teaching any theory that denies the creation of man, as taught in the Bible. Before court a woman yells at Drummond, “we’ll chase him back to hell”. The townspeople believe that because Drummond is going against what the Bible says, that makes him the devil. To them, not believing in God’s ways make him deserve to be in hell because he is accepting
Tom Walker’s devil is a dark-skinned man with red eyes, red sash, and an axe. Tom was a malicious, greedy person who dealt with the devil in order to gain some wealth. He and his wife would fight constantly day after day. Tom was not a wealthy person
Perhaps in both stories the role of the devil, whether truly present in the plot or only mentioned as figure of evil, is very central to portraying the Puritans. In “The Devil and Tom Walker,” the devil is simply a large man covered in soot. Irving describes him as, “a great black man” and “his face was neither black nor copper color, but swarthy and dingy, and begrimed in soot (Irving, 179).” Most Puritans would believe the devil is a fiery, red, horned man with a pointed tell and trident, but this is not the case. The devil is further established when he himself states, “I amuse myself by presiding at the persecutions of Quakers and Anabaptists; I am the great patron and prompter of slave dealers…(Irving, 180).
(p. 44); "Who came to you with the devil?" and ".perhaps another person in the village?" (p. 45). A few of his faults are that he judges too much by appearances, ".you look as such a good soul should" (p. 37); ".a claim so weighty cannot be argued by a farmer," (p. 99); and he uses people to question other people.
Both the Devil and the Dwarf Henrick Hudson share the same stereotypes, they are tricksters and deceivers. The Devil tricks Tom by getting him to sign his soul over to make him rich. The Devil deceives Tom by appearing when he says the wrong thing and taking his soul. In Rip Van Winkle the Dwarf shared the same stereotypes as the Devil. Rip liked to kill time and play games; the ghosts knew that he liked to play games, and were playing when he arrived and had him join in. The ghosts also knew that Rip liked to drink and so, provided him with a good tasting beverage. The drink they gave him the drink caused him to sleep twenty years of his life away. Irving probably chose these mystic character stereotypes to show how the British tricked colonists into providing them with the things they needed in exchange for rum and other idle
Good and Evil in The Devil and Tom Walker The concept of evil in the short story "The Devil and Tom Walker" can be shown in many ways, by Irvings' symbolism. In the short story, Tom Walker symbolizes all of mankind by portraying him as being "sinful" and evil. When there is an intent to destroy, then we get a different level of hatred.
The devil's speech asks the people to awaken to the reality that virtue isn't possible, that Evil is man's true nature. By welcoming them to the "communion of your race" he emphasizes that people are unified under the fact that everyone is evil. The devil figure is like a puritan minister trying to tell everyone that they are evil, but he tells them to accept it, that "Evil must be your only happiness." People can live happily if they only realize that evil is the way we are meant to be, trying to fight it is futile. The congregation accepts his welcome "in one cry of despair and triumph.
Puritans, for example, believed strongly in God and the Devil. These views may have led them to believe that the Devil was what was causing all of the hysteria and witchcraft in Salem. Document C is an expert from Cotton Mather which states “go tell mankind that there are devils and witches...New England has had examples of their existence” which shows he believes there are witches in Salem that may have been brought upon by the Devil. Mather was thought of very highly in Salem and much of his beliefs and ideas are what everyone followed. He was a Puritan and had very strong beliefs in God and the Devil. Since his word was thought of so highly it may have caused people to help him in spreading false rumors about what was happening due to how they felt about God and the Devil. “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (A) displays another point of witchcraft being a religious matter. This quote appears in Exodus 22:18 within King James version of the bible as part of the first 10 commandments. Since at this point there was no separation between church and state, this Exodus may have translated into society and caused the finger pointing to begin, which only lead to continued
Since all of these people fled to the Salem Village, the Salem people blamed several of them for everything that happened in Salem. They believed that all of those people brought the Devil to the Salem village (Blumberg, par. 3-4)
In her book, Elizabeth Reis proposes the argument that “New England Culture as a whole regarded women as more likely to be damned then men”. (1) Reis supports her claim by exploring the differences between men and women in Puritan New England and those accused of witchcraft. Reis explains that women viewed their sins as a connection to the devil and from there it was easy to convince themselves that they were becoming witches. Puritans also held a belief that “the devil could reach women’s souls more easily...” (93) In contrast, the majority of Puritan men focused on reforming from their sins.
Brown begins the journey believing that his forefathers are innocent, good men, but the devil tells Brown that he has been, "…well acquainted with your family as with ever a one among the Puritans; and that’s no trifle to say" (Kelly, 192). Brown's forefathers become equated with the devil. The people of the town are also displaced as the devil. The devil tells Brown, "I have a very general acquaintance here in New England. The deacons of many a church have drunk the communion wince with me; the selectmen of divers towns make me their chairman; and a majority of the Great and General Court are firm supporters of my interest, The governor and I, too----But these are state secrets" (Kelly, 192-93).
Puritan societies usually don’t trust the world outside their own and back then they were quick to denounce the most imperceptibly different actions as being evil or having to deal with the Devil. Characters in “ The Crucible” showcase just how easy it is for a misunderstanding to spiral out of control, and how a person’s paranoia can be the undoing of a whole
Reverend Hale had said “The Devil is alive in Salem, and we dare not quall to follow wherever the accusing finger points”(Miller 68). The people were living in fear of the unknown not the fear of the devil. People including Reverend Hale incited mass hysteria when he pushed the idea that the devil was at work. Reverend Hale had no proof of the devil or his works so why did everyone believe him? People in the 1700s were very dedicated to their religion and they believed that if people were falling sick, it was because the devil was at work. If the crops did not grow the devil was at work. If a well ran dry it meant the devil was at work. All in all if something negative impacted the community the devil was at work. People had dedicated their lives to God and were required to consistently attend church. There were jobs as Arthur Miller had mentioned that would require two people to go throughout Salem and to see who was and was not in
The Salem witch trials was a very big thing back in the 1600’s. At that time Puritans believed in witchcraft and that the devil could conjure your spirit. They were scared of these things happening in their village so they would do anything to prevent it from happening,. This included killing anyone suspected to be with the devil or to be a witch. It turned out to be a big problem when a group of girls were supposedly seeing spirits sent out at them and the devil would come to them telling them to sign his book.
In the book, the main conflict derives from the fact that the society is incredibly strict and loyal to their faith; not allowing people to dance, sing, or even read books. In the beginning of the book, we find that Abigail and her friends went against many of these laws by dancing in the woods and “Trying to summon the Devil”. They get caught, and in order to protect themselves from punishment, the create a story about seeing numerous people's spirits with the Devil, and that they wish to “give” themselves to God. The townsfolk believe this as they really have no reason not to, because to them, doubting the girls would be like doubting their faith. The townsfolk show their extreme loyalty to their faith by blindly believing the girls' story to be true, this would not be inherently bad – If it weren't for the numerous people that died.
... Dead.”), Hawthorne’s story provides the atmosphere in which such paranoia and delusion could take place. As Alan Simpson states, “The Puritan was always obsessed by his sense of sin. Taught to expect it everywhere, and to magnify it where he found it, he easily fell into the habit of inventing it” (Simpson). This allegorical story shows the destructive force of Puritan belief. Though the story makes no mention of witchcraft trials, it is easy to imagine Goodman Brown as an accuser and prosecutor of his neighbors because of his suspicion of evil in everyone except himself. By looking into the historical setting of Young Goodman Brown, the beliefs of the Puritans were one of the main causes for the communal hysteria of the Salem Witch Trials. The journey that Brown took into the forest led him to see evil in the people of the village where there might have been none.