Now it occurs to me that almost all of us have heard of the crucible as the title of Arthur Miller's play, and when we hear it, we instantly think of the Salem Witch Trials. However, our attention seems to slide past the meaning of the title in a way that almost seems to make "The Salem Witch Trials" the title of the play. What is a crucible? It's odd that after years of hearing about it, I never asked that simple question of myself.
     A crucible is defined as the following in Merriam Webster's Dictionary:
1: a vessel of a very refractory material (as porcelain) used for melting and calcining a substance that requires a high degree of heat
2: a severe test
3: a place or situation in which concentrated forces interact to cause or influence change or development <conditioned by having grown up within the crucible of Chinatown — Tom Wolfe>

Now I think that the most accurate application to this story is definitely the first definition, right? The crucible is nothing more than an allegory for a melting pot. Never mind. Now definition 3 has merit. It could pertain to the role of the courts and their interactions with, and attempts to improve, the situation in Salem. I however, am inclined not to agree with either of these definitions.
      The last remaining definition is simply "a severe test". To begin, it has a dramatic negative connotation; a kind of grim sense of hardship. More to the point however, the Salem Witch Trials were a test of peoples' characters. A test at which the town of Salem failed horribly. The town lost itself to hysteria over the tomfoolery of a group of girls, and hung many innocent and good people. They were even more-so at fault when their convictions were made under the assumption that they were doing God's work. I happen not to believe in god, and this is an extreme form of one of my reasons for that, but I imagine that for those who do believe in god, they'll interpret this as "befouling god's name", or something. The most important point though is that the Salem Witch Trials gave egotistical men the opportunity to ignore society's rules and to commit murder for greed and anger, and they took this opportunity. I can't imagine a worse failure of human character in society that. Well, maybe the Third Reich.



Why is the word "blog" not recognized by the blogger spell check?! That has to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard, ha!