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Inspector Goole interrupts the harmony of the family circle and starts to interrogate each person. "One line of inquiry at a time. Otherwise we`ll be talking at once and won`t know where we are." After all these interrogations he disappears and it turns out that he`s not a real police inspector.
Inspector Goole is a mysterious person. He doesn`t work for the police, but he knows everything about family Birling. What are his intentions and what does he stand for ?
I think Goole can be seen as the personified moral. He wants to make the family including Gerald aware of their faults.
He wants to find out why Eva Smith committed suicide. "And that`s why I`m here, and why I`m not going until I know all that happened".
He criticises the superficial behaviour of the upper-class against the working-class. He defends Eva`s demand for a raise:
"But after all it`s better to ask for the earth than to take it."
So his personality can also stand as the average of the poor.
The last statement of Inspector Goole are including the message and the warning which Priestley wants to make aware of:
"[...] We don`t live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other. And I tell you that the time will soon come when, if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguis. Good night."
The prediction made by Inspector Goole became reality in World War First and in World War Second. Of course, it was easy for Priestley who lived through both wars to make such a prediction. But it`s his way to underline how faults can end.
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