In Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story "Young Goodman Brown," how does the setting affect the characters and theme?

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “Young Goodman
Brown,” setting is relevant to character and theme in a number of ways, including the
following:

• The reference to “sunset” in the
  opening sentence of the story is an example of foreshadowing.  Brown is about to enter a
  period of his life that will be both literally and figuratively darker than his
  past.


• The opening sentence also refers to “Salem village”
  – the community from which Brown will later feel cut off as a result of his experiences
  in the forest.


• Brown’s journey into the forest is a
  journey into both literal and symbolic darkness – darkness that is both moral and
  psychological.


• Brown worries that there “may be a
  devilish Indian behind every tree” in the forest – not stopping to consider the
  possibility that evil impulses may reside within his own
  soul.


• At one point, the mysterious stranger whom Brown
  meets in the forest says of Brown’s father and
  grandfather,

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They were my good friends, both; and many a
pleasant walk have we had along this path, and returned merrily after
midnight.

The “path”
mentioned here is not only the literal path through the forest but the metaphorical path
of life itself.

• Later, in the midst of the dark
  forest, Brown perceives flames rising from a rock that seems to be serving as a kind of
  altar or pulpit.  The narrator then
  notes:

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As the red light arose and fell, a numerous
congregation alternately shone forth, then disappeared in shadow, and again grew, as it
were, out of the darkness, peopling the heart of the solitary woods at
once.

Brown perceives this
setting as a kind of symbolic parody of the church and church services he is accustomed
to attending in the village. He begins to believe that all the other residents of his
town are evil. In one sense, he is right: standard Christian doctrine teaches that all
people are innately corrupted by sin.  Brown, however, now sees figurative darkness
everywhere, and presumes to judge it, especially after he returns to the literal and
figurative light of the village. In a metaphorical sense, however, he thus never really
returns from his journey into the darkness. The rest of his life is darkened by his dark
perceptions of everyone else around him, including his wife, Faith. Little wonder, then,
that the story ends literally in a graveyard, symbolic of the death of Brown’s
figurative and spiritual death:

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they carved no hopeful verse upon his tombstone,
for his dying hour was gloom.