The Snake in the Grass

Everyone has their own weaknesses when it comes to pleasurable desires they know aren't at all beneficial to their well-being. In turn, they devote so much effort to become the person they desire to be, into their own personal hero. However, the human resolve is still so fragile that even the strongest or the most reputable people in the world cannot even resist the strongest of their temptations, whatever they might be. Be it sweets, arrogance, showing that occasional irritant who's boss, everyone has a certain weakness that they put effort into avoiding. But one's will can only go so far before it becomes completely drawn into the snake's coils, and that is the moment when it becomes the point of no return.

"Young Goodman Brown" shows this within a man, an ordinary resident of a Puritan society, well respected by his neighbors, hence his title. And yet, his companion with the snake staff draws him into a forest of shadows, ultimately leading to his shocking revelation that everyone he had known, the priests, the governor, his ancestors, carried an evil within them all. That in itself is temptation that leads to the commitment of evil. Because temptation lies in the heart of every soul, it becomes the evidence that everyone has evil somewhere in their hearts, something that not even the greatest saints could escape.

That evil is never going to leave, and neither will people have the power to banish it from their own hearts. All they can do is continue to build their own resolve, and hope that their faith is stronger than the snake's coils, because just because we are bound to make mistakes on account of temptation doesn't mean we do not have the power to oppose it. Stay true to oneself, and people may find that the heroic image they've been looking for was just right around a corridor in their heart.