Brady also experiences an internal conflict. He is a dynamic character who changes during the course of the play due to his experiences. When the play begins, Brady is self-confident and arrogant. He is leader of the common people, and he basks in his popularity. He is sure that fundamentalism is right and evolutionism is wrong. As the trial progresses and Brady takes the witness stand to be cross-examined by Drummond, his character changes. He experiences inner conflict because he is forced to admit that he doesn't interpret the Bible literally, a major fundamentalist tenet. His once loyal followers laugh at him and then ignore him as they turn their backs and walk away. Brady is transformed from a confident leader to a tragic character who, because of his ordeal, dies.
Rachel's internal conflict between fundamentalism and modernism enables the authors to convey their belief in freedom of thought and the value of ideas. Raised a fundamentalist, Rachel loves her father (Reverend Brown) and only knows one way to think. She also loves Cates, a modernist who believes in thinking and in wondering about the world. Rachel's conflict involves her love for her father and her lifelong fundamentalist beliefs and her love for Cates and his different thoughts on life and religion. After reading Darwin's On the Origin of Species, Rachel is enlightened. She chooses to think and recognizes the value of ideas — good or bad. As she tells Cates and Drummond, "I was always afraid of what I might think — so it seemed safer not to think at all . . . But now I know . . . A thought . . . has to be born . . . ideas have to come out. . . . ." Rachel makes the choice to leave Hillsboro and her father with Cates.
