Examples Of Greed In The Crucible

In the play The Crucible, playwright Arthur Miller protests the Red Scare of the early 1900s, a period of public hysteria in which Senator Joseph McCarthy accused many innocent Americans of Communism. Appalled by this tragic period of modern history, Miller suggests a parallel in The Crucible, in which he attempts to convey “‘the essential nature of one of the most awful chapters in human history’--the trials for witchcraft in Salem in 1692” (Background: About Arthur Miller” 3). In both periods of history, Miller warns that mass hysteria often results from people who claim, that principle motivates their actions, while they may actually have other secret incentives such as greed or revenge. In The Crucible greed motivates some characters and revenge motivates others, creating the tragedy of the Salem Witch Trials.

Parris is a greedy preacher who cares more for materialistic gains and his own reputation than he does for his congregational needs. One man in particular who recognizes Parris’s greed is Salem villager John Proctor. Proctor identifies that Parris cares too much for worldly goods, such as golden candlesticks for the altar of the church. Plain pewter candlesticks are already in the church, but Parris demands gold ones. In Act II Proctor complains, “...for twenty week he preach nothin’ but golden candlesticks until he had them…. The man dreams cathedrals, not clapboard meetin’ houses” (Miller 1170). Parris is self-centered. Although he is a Puritan minister, he does not practice what he preaches. He thinks secular thoughts, not Godly ones. His greed prompts the witch hunt and fuels mass hysteria in Salem. It leads him to lie to the community about his children’s conjuring activities in the woods and causes Salem courts to falsely convict many of