What created Goodman Brown? A man so tormented by what even he considered a dream that it changed his life in a profoundly negative way forever. Goodman Brown was a man haunted by his own conscience; he was someone who believed he had committed a grave sin by meeting with the devil and participating in a gathering of witches in his dreams. This spoke of an era when people were overwhelmed by religious guilt and superstition. As a result of Brown’s dream, he suspected that everyone in town was in league with the devil, furthermore, his superstition and self-questioning overwhelmed his ability to trust or believe anyone else. He died a bitter, unhappy and miserable man.

To fully understand the character of Young Goodman Brown, we must first understand the era from which he comes. Although Hawthorne does not directly state whether the plot of this story takes place in Salem in the 17th century, his references to other characters clearly imply that it does. His references to Martha Carrier, Martha Cory, and Sarah Cloyse, all women hanged for witches in 1692; as well as his reference to King William who ruled England from 1650-1702 speaks to this horrible time when people were killing, torturing, burning, executing and suspecting that everyone from their sister to their neighbor might be in contact with the devil. . As a result of this atmosphere of suspicion and paranoia, Goodman might have felt that his dream was actually a lack of faith on his part. He may have felt so guilty about experiencing this dream that he thought he, like the people in his life, were guilty of coercing the devil.

Goodman Brown could have been Hawthorne’s expression of his own struggles with his faith in humanity and in himself. Hawthorne was a guilty person and I think he had many instances where his faith was tested. Brown is Hawthorne to a lesser extent. Goodman Brown begins as a good, happy, decent man; he seems very happy. All this changes when he decides against the advice of his wife (the symbolism is obvious here) that he must go on a journey into the woods to meet the devil. I think the path in the woods is his continual descent into darkness both metaphorically and literally. As he progresses through the forest, he reaches the pinnacle of his journey when he comes across the gathering of witches. Once Brown gets to this point, he loses faith despite his last ditch effort to save his wife. He never knows if he was able to save her. This doubt is what destroyed him.

Brown’s motivation for meeting with the devil is never fully clarified and can only be speculated upon by the devil’s references to others who have entered his fold. He talks about the king, Goodman’s father and grandfather, deacon, minister and mayor. The devil makes it appear that everyone who has any power, success, or anyone who means anything to Goodman is in fact in league with Satan. Although Goodman resists the devil’s temptations at first; as more and more people come to his attention as followers of the dark one, the idea becomes more acceptable. I think Brown’s motivation for meeting the devil was power; he wanted an advantage over others to achieve his goals. This may have contributed to his last effort to save the faith when he cried out “Look to the sky and resist the Evil One”. When he arrived at the witches’ meeting he discovered that they all already had the advantage of being on the side of the wicked and had already sold souls there for money, power or prestige. He could see that nothing would put him ahead of others in going forward with his original task. He had nothing to gain and everything to lose by making an alliance with the devil. Unfortunately for Young Goodman Brown, it was too late to save his soul. He reached the point of no return and not only did he get no benefit from his ordeal, but he lost all the happiness that he previously possessed.

Goodman Brown was a man destroyed by his own obsession. He lived a miserable life as a result of the guilt he felt for undertaking a dark journey in his dreams; which resulted in his suspicion of everyone and a lack of trust for individuals in the community of him, himself and humanity. The only way Goodman Brown could have saved his faith would have been to never have started down the dark path.

by John Schlisman