In Arthur Miller's novel The Crucible there is an evident struggle of the main characters ability to keep his dignity in the unsympathetic society of this time period. The point in this novel is obvious: "if you take a man's conscience out of his own hands, you at once deprive him of identity and of pride (85)." It is imperative that we do not give our souls to society but at the same time, it is impossible to separate ourselves from it either. It is our rights as citizens to be fairly judged and protected against false accusations. The community of Salem, Massachusetts failed in these aspects of human society and responsibility. These failures also occurred during the McCarthy purge. The people of this time period seem to have forgotten their fundamentally strong decencies that they had obtained a few years earlier.
             Miller then goes on to talk about societies guilt as it relates to its religious mania. He also discusses absolute evil. The realization that there are people dedicated to evil, and with out these people as examples, we would not know what is truly good. No one is capable of knowing the innermost thoughts of another human beings mind. " To guess at it in order to do him some good is tricky enough, and presumptuous. To guess at it in order to jail him or to get him hanged is monstrous (85)."
             In The Crucible we are shown the progression and struggle of the human soul. This novel begins by depicting what society in Salem, Massachusetts was like in this time period, and ends with the dehumanization of people and society in general. People never attempted to justify if something was true or not, they just believed the accusation. "A constant and fresh response to other lives is the only way to justify pride in being human (85)."
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