The Young Goodman Brown byHawthorne - Essay Example

Young Goodman Brown Nathanial Hawthorne wrote from a deep immersion in the Puritan world, having had ancestors that landed on North American soil with a Bible in one hand and a sword in the other, ready to tame the wilderness. His hometown of Salem, Massachusetts was the setting for the most brutal witch trials documented in this country and his education reinforced the beliefs espoused by such trials. These influences figured strongly in his writings, often forming the basis of his tales and revealed a deep questioning of the validity of the beliefs to which he’d been raised to adhere. In “Young Goodman Brown”, Hawthorne presents the idea that the Puritan religion, because of these beliefs, has lost all sense of meaning to the younger generations. In his journey through the dark woods and the events he witnesses there, Goodman Brown’s steps symbolize Hawthorne’s own doubts and observations about his religion based on his knowledge of what has gone before and the inevitable result of the Puritanical teachings he’s been part of. As Young Goodman Brown sets off on his dark journey, his young wife Faith implores him not to go, sensing some kind of immediate peril. The emphasis on young here indicates the journey Goodman Brown is proposing to undertake is a journey to find the necessary conversion experience deemed important in the Puritan religion of Hawthorne’s time. Without having gone through such a transformation, individual members were not considered to be full-fledged members of the congregation. As a newly married man, it would be among Goodman Brown’s chief concerns to establish himself as a member of the community and take his proper role as the head of a household. Yet, the fear expressed by Faith indicates there is a hidden peril in undertaking such a journey. Her warning, “may you find all well when you come back” (293), seems to indicate the peril does not apply strictly to Goodman Brown as he sets off on his journey, but for Faith as well in being left behind, alone in the darkness. The sense of foreboding in testing his own faith is further emphasized as Goodman Brown enters the forest “on his present evil purpose. He had taken a dreary road, darkened by all the gloomiest trees of the forest, which barely stood aside to let the narrow path creep through, and closed immediately behind” (294). In this solitary journey, Hawthorne indicates that the doctrine of purposefully seeking challenges to a faith already weakened by church dictates is a highly dangerous proposition with the capability of leading many men and women to their dooms rather than their salvation. This concept of a conversion experience as leading to doom rather than salvation is only further defined as the story progresses and Goodman Brown penetrates deeper into the darkness of the forest. He first meets with a character that resembles him so much in shape and form that “they might have been taken for father and son” (294). The most blatant indication of the danger of Brown’s journey so far comes with Goodman Brown’s response to the older gentleman when he is admonished for being late: “Faith kept me back a while” (294). Although the reader knows the younger man is referring to his wife, the name of the lady also serves to warn the reader that a pure faith such as Goodman Brown possessed prior to entering the wood would have been better off had he simply trusted to its council and remained home for the night. Through this early interaction, Hawthorne is working to show that a complete conversion to the tenets of the Puritan religion leads not to salvation as is supposed, but to an utter loss of faith as the belief in a forgiving God is incompatible with a belief in a human soul that is beyond redemption. The people that Young Goodman Brown sees and hears as he makes his way to the heart of the forest further illustrate the concept that the human soul is beyond redemption, regardless of their good works performed in the light of day. First, he is told of the acquaintance his father and grandfather have had with the wily fellow met in the woods as well as given reason to doubt the goodness of the men and women Young Goodman Brown looks up to in his village life. Then the two men come upon an elderly woman walking through the woods, presumably to the same destination: “a female figure on the path, in whom Goodman Brown recognized a very pious and exemplary dame, who had taught him his catechism in youth, and was still his moral and spiritual adviser, jointly with the minister and Deacon Gookin” (295). It is his meeting, or rather the witnessing of the meeting between the good woman and his companion, that first opens Young Goodman Brown’s eyes to the idea that the people he has considered so good in his lifetime are as full of the sin and corruption that his religion professes exists in all men at the time of their birth. Despite her many good deeds in the town and her close association with everything good and honorable, Young Goodman Brown sees Goody Cloyse as a well-versed witch, the most evil creature in creation, as she associates herself with the stranger and unhesitatingly makes use of his serpentine walking stick. At almost every step along the way, it seems Young Goodman Brown is about to defy the devil’s wishes and refuse to follow along the path to his conversion experience, but each time he tries, another familiar voice, shape or sign spurs him to continue on. Sitting on a stump, catching his strength to return to his Faith, Goodman Brown fancies he hears the voices of his Reverend and Deacon Gookin, both of whom he has looked up to as both pillars of the community and faithful leaders of the church. In pursuit of his conversion to become a full member of the church, Goodman Brown knows it is important that he follow in the footsteps of these men, but where they are going does not seem to be the salvation and wholesome life he is supposed to find in his religious life. Although he cannot see them, he is sure of what he hears. He loses some heart, but determines to hold fast to his Faith, once again thwarting the conversion experience that reveals the controversy buried in the heart of Puritanism. However, when he hears the voices of the villagers in a passing cloud, along with the sound of his own Faith being carried along with them, he gives in altogether and determines to find out what lies at the end of the path. Crying “my Faith is gone!”, Goodman Brown suddenly realizes the teachings of his religion allow for no redemption following a good life than that afforded to the bad. “There is no good on earth; and sin is but a name. Come, devil; for to thee is this world given” (298). Understanding the teaching of the Puritans that no man may ever escape the evil to which they’re born, regardless of their intentions or daily activities, Goodman Brown loses his faith in a good and forgiving God, giving in entirely at that moment to the despair that must follow such revelations. Despite Young Goodman Brown’s last second decision to turn to God before being consecrated in the Devil’s congregation, the fact that he is able to find no peace in his future life emphasizes Hawthorne’s viewpoint regarding his religion. Although his Faith has been tested, Goodman Brown is no longer able to believe in her. His experience has taught him that all people contain evil in their souls and that no one can be trusted. Even his own thoughts are subject to questioning and at no point in time does he ever return to the easy lifestyle with his neighbors he once knew. Regardless of appearances, his life is now one full of evil at every turn where the slightest evil counteracts even the greatest good and no hope remains that a Godly life might eventually lead one to heaven. References Hawthorne, Nathaniel. (Date of publication). “The Young Goodman Brown.” Name of Anthology. Name of Editor (Ed.). Place of publication: Name of Publisher, Date of anthology publication. Read More