Knock, Knock, Knockin' on Heaven's Door

American writers in the early nineteenth century often confronted the nature of faith, morality and sin, since the American religious establishment had just undergone forty years of rapid evolution. The original Puritan values that had existed in New England since the first European settlements were being confronted by more tolerant religious viewpoints. It is against this background that works like Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown must be examined. In this piece Hawthorne allegorically puts forward the two blatantly conflicting views of the lifelong religious experience. The older, Puritan, view held that outward demonstrations of piety, austerity, and morality were the most important components of personal religious faith. The reformers held that personal action, the goodness in everyday life, was more important than public prayer or other outward indications of faith. Goodman Brown encounters the most outwardly pious people in his community during his time with the devil, and he finds that despite their public pronouncements during the light of day, they are evil and corrupt inside. The part of themselves they do not let others see is wholly different from their outward persona. Through Goodman Brown’s eyes the reader discovers that the old method of demonstrating one’s faith is worthless as there is no means for a community to evaluate the truth of a person’s pronouncements. If outward expressions of faith are inherently untrustworthy, then faith is best kept a private matter, between one’s self, one’s conscience, and God.

Hawthorne argues that the best measure of morality is not what the community decides, but what each individual knows to be true within. The author, just like Goodman Brown, has become disillusioned with Puritan ideals and has lost his “Faith” in the old ideas of morality. Goodman Brown, however, does not learn his lesson completely. He continues to concern himself with the morality of others and thus “his dying hour was gloom”. Hawthorne offers a path away from this life of misery, accept that you have no control over anyone except for yourself and lead your life as your conscience guides you.