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Fear Jealousy And Greed In The Crucible

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In the play “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller, fear, jealousy and greed play a significant role in the Salem witchcraft hysteria. What possessed so many Salem townspeople to accuse their friends and neighbors of performing unexplainable actions upon innocent lives? Many based their claim on the feelings they had for their neighbors. Those feelings may have been hatred, or even love for them. Individuals then began to fear what so many were pushing to be the truth, they feared for their lives and safety of their family's. Some just pushed it to be true to gain things for themselves. Overall, mortal emotions played into the witchcraft hysteria, people acted on their fear, jealousy and want or greed. The desire for things to go …show more content…

People became all about themselves and their needs, they did not care who it hurt in the process. Abigail and the other girls tried to save themselves from looking bad, so they went along with the idea of witchcraft, throwing names out left and right, even if the accused had nothing to do with anything. They wanted to appear completely innocent, and as though they too had been cursed by the devil. Goody Putnam wanted to find out what happened her babies, so she looks to blame someone,so she sent her daughter and the other girls with tituba, not caring who it hurt, mainly to find out what happened for herself, not caring how it may affect the girls. Lastly Giles talks about how Thomas Putnam is accusing his neighbors to gain land for himself, “My Proof is there! If Jacobs hangs for a witch he forfeit up his property-that's law! And there is none but Putnam with the coin to buy so great a piece. This man is killing his neighbors for their land.” (Miller 1195). People were willing to do anything for their own gain, including take land that is not theirs. Greed can make people do crazy things. Fear, Jealousy and Greed, helped dig salem deeper into a witchcraft Hysteria, people were willing to do whatever it takes to stop being afraid of demonic beings and get rid of them for good, and the jealous and greedy knew this, so they fueled the idea of witchcraft further, to ultimately gain what they wanted in the long

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