Brooks states, “it was John Gordon’s fear that led him upon the queerest path”. He subjects his body to cruel punishment, whipping himself with “plaited leather” . Through self-punishment, he hopes to purge himself of infection and “allay God’s wrath”;
Together with his wife Urith and Lib Hancock, John Gordon becomes part of the surging “mob” that hysterically labels Anys a ‘whore, and ‘fornicator’. Just like Abigail who accuses Goody Proctor of evil deeds, Urith Gordon claims that “she (Anys) witched my husband into lying with her”.
Mompellion indignantly accuses them of using “their own ugly thoughts and evil doubting of one another”. Echoing the author’s message, he further explains: “There have been times when, in mobs, they have laid blame for the Plague on the sins of others – Jews, many times.” “I have read of how in foreign cities they put hundreds of such innocents to death by fire.” Mompellion alludes to the radical puritans who, during the Black Death, preyed upon “troubled souls”.
Mompellion replaces Stanley, a puritan leader of the congregation and reinstates the Book of Common Prayer which reflects the Restoration period’s views towards religion under Charles II in England. It is a challenge to traditional puritan power in Eyam.
Mompellion believed that the true test of the plague was to, Christ-like, to return God’s love rather than to see it as a “punishment for our sins” (103) . If his Son had endured sufferings “for our sake”, then “were we not bound to return this love to our fellow humans”. Even to lay down our own lives, if that was what God asked of us?”
He challenges those who would flee, and perhaps spread the plague, to stay and endure, and “accept this Cross”. “Let us carry it in God’s Holy Name!”
Rather than wallowing in the pit of despair, and rather than seeing the plague as part of a “grand celestial design”, Anna Frith believes that it is preferable to focus on things that will help to “save our lives” (215)
Unlike the Puritans, Anna does not believe that the plague is “God’s punishment for sin”, nor is it part of his “grand celestial design”. Instead, she sees it as more of an occurrence of nature that must be resolved through finding cures. Anna becomes increasingly skeptical of God’s role in the plague as she witnesses Maggie Cantwell’s death, wondering “Why…. Was God so much prodigal with his creation?”
As a true sceptic, during this time of flux, Anna cannot say that “I have faith anymore”.
Using the symbolism of sunlight as a sign of knowledge and reason, she realises that “I had been brought to this sunlit city so that I might learn more of the craft that had become my vocation”. (300)
Realising that it was unfair to request higher levels of virtue for Elinor than other villagers such as Jane Martin, Mompellion concludes that he was “falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus”. He realises that he used Elinor for his own self-serving purposes, that is, as a shield from his own lustful desires. He was wrong, he suggests, in taking this “leaf from the Papist’s book”.
Exploiting Elinor’s sin and subsequent chastity allowed him to “[turn his] lust into holy fire”, which denied her conjugal comfort.
Return to Year of Wonders/Crucible summaries