Allegorical Message in Young Goodman Brown

             Allegorical Message in Young Goodman Brown
             Many early writers, who had a strong faith in their religion, wrote short stories for their fellow believers in order for them to live their life God's way. In the early Puritan time, not living the righteous way meant the wrongdoers were sinners and unworthy of God's Grace come judgement day. Above all other things, many different writings taught lessons to the people through the mistakes of the character. In Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown", an allegorical message is used throughout the story to show the evils of the devil. This can be seen in Young Goodman Brown's experience in dark, evil forest and Puritan the faith Brown was associated with.
             Throughout the story we see Young Goodman Brown's soul and faith tested by the devil. Brown starts off by leaving his wife "Faith" (this has allegorical meaning that will be discussed later) and heads to the forest. The forest, dark and evil, represented the deceit and darkness of man's heart. Young Goodman Brown's experience in the dark, evil forest correlated and would have been recognized by Puritans as a symbol of mistrust of their own corrupt hearts and faculties. Just as Brown could not trust the shadows and figures he saw hidden in the forest, he could not trust his own desires. Brown tries to not follow the devil into the world of darkness but does so when he hears Faith's voice and sees her pink ribbon. From this point on in the story we see a "a stern, a sad, a darkly meditative, a distrustful, if not a desperate man..." (Norton 198)
             When Brown tries to claim that he is from a family of good men that "never went into the woods on such an errand, nor is father before him" for they were "...a race of honest men and good Christians." (190) The devil replies that all of his ancestors were with him as they tortured women in ...

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Allegorical Message in Young Goodman Brown. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 16:37, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/87718.html