Rather, they were seen as obstacles to the colonists" need for land. The Puritans did not respect the farms of Native Americans. They sought "legal" ways to get their land just as they did among themselves. They even went as far as charging each other with witchcraft in order to obtain land just as Giles Corey accused Thomas Putnam of making his daughter do to him in Arthur Miller"s The Crucible. These things all led to the ruin of a society built on Christian values.

             The deterioration of the social structure not only hurt the authority of the church but it also cost the lives of hundreds of innocent people. The community in The Crucible starts out to be very tightly knit and church loving. However, once the girls start pointing fingers at who they saw standing with the devil the entire community starts to point fingers at each other. Hysteria takes over the town and soon people have to protect themselves from the people that they thought were their friends and whom they could trust.

             Being isolated from any other group of people with different beliefs created a church led Puritan society that was not willing to accept change. The church was against the devil, but at the same time also against dancing and other innocent acts. The reputation of the family was also very important to the members of the community. It is what helped hold everyone together along with the church. When the girls were caught dancing in the woods, they lied to protect themselves and also the reputation of their families. They claimed that the devil took them over and influenced them to dance. The girls also said that they saw members of the town standing with the devil on the same night. A community living in a puritan society like Salem could easily go into a chaotic state and have a difficult time dealing with what they consider to be the largest form of evil. However, what some would later realize was that the way they dealt with the problem would be considered much more evil than any kind of dancing in the woods.