The dark forces in the play that allowed all these accusations were greed, lying, Abigail’s want for Elizabeth Proctor dead so she could have her husband, John Proctor, and trust. These were evil forces in the village that caused absolute and total mayhem. It astounds me that these traits could cause corruption. Such corruption could cause death. That one person could be so evil...
For instance the greed allowed this because of Thomas Putnam. Thomas Putnam wanted to buy everyone’s land. Him wanting to buy the lands made him a good suspect. With everyone being accused of witchcraft that’s good for him because they get hanged and he could buy their land. Therefore making it look like he was behind all of this nonsense.
Lying was another dark
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force. Abigail was constantly lying to the court and falsely accusing people of witchcraft. She accused Elizabeth because she was John’s wife.
She saw Mary Warren making a poppet for Elizabeth and when Mary stuck her needle in the the poppet Abigail watched her. Later Abigail stabbed herself the same place Mary stuck the needle in the poppet and accused Elizabeth of witchcraft. The witchcraft at work would have been voodoo. After that Mary confessed to making the doll and giving it to Elizabeth and said that Abigail must have watched her put the needle in the poppet and stabbed herself to accuse Elizabeth. After Mary admitted it she was then accused by Abigail of witchcraft. She was put on the stands. Abigail and the girls accused Mary Warren of sending her spirit out to get them in the shape of a yellow bird. They said it was up in the rafters and started to scream. Abigail talked to the alleged bird and started to scream more. All of this was a lie. Deputy Governor Danforth grabbed Mary and said to her what are you doing to them. After that Abigail and the girls started to mimic Mary Warren, they mimicked every word she said. Deputy Governor Danforth questioned her as to why she sent her spirit out to get them. She explained that she hadn’t and that i was all a lie. Abigail and the girls ran outside to lake and ran
into it. Finally Mary gave in to the pressure and said how John Proctor came to her every night making her sign her name for if she didn’t he would kill her. The court turned on him. They accused him of compacting with the Devil. Deputy Governor Danforth said that if he accused Rebecca Nurse he could go free, all he had to do was sign his name. He ended up signing his name but right after ripped it from the hands of another guy and explained how they saw him do it and why do they need the paper. They said to hang it on the door of the Church showing he confessed. He said how he didn’t want to ruin his name. He ended up not giving it to them and getting hanged with Rebecca Nurse. All of this happened because Abigail lied. Another force in the play is trust. Everyone over trusted the people who accused people of witchcraft. This stuff was made possible because no one questioned them or if they did majority didn’t. This was a tragedy that trust could lead to such devastation. This is troublesome that a good thing to have can cause death. In the end these were the forces that made all of this corruption and evil happen. The fact that Thomas was greedy. How Abigail could be so evil by lying and trying to get Elizabeth Proctor hanged. That everyone in town over trusted the lies of Abigail. Had this stuff not have happened, had they not had greed, had they not lied, had they not misplaced their trust and overtrusted, this all could’ve been avoided.
As both events took place, the authority took action towards the accused instead of letting them go because they felt like it would result in loss of power. To keep social unity intact, the authority of leaders has to be strictly enforced. Both had similar traditions of defense, investigative routines, and prosecution against alleged members of a disloyal group. Accused witches would have to claim that they had worked with the devil to be safe.
Mary Warren started out in a manner reminiscent to that of Peter Pettigrew from the famous “Harry Potter,” series; she was a timid follower of a popular group, and admired the bravery and kindness she lacked. After Mary and her so-called ‘friends’ are found dancing naked around a fire in their conservative town, they know they will likely be accused of a crime that could punish them with death; witchcraft. Mary’s friend Abigail, tells the girls to stick to their story that they were dancing in the woods and threatens to kill the girls if they reveal the truth; that Abigail was practicing witchcraft and drank blood in order to take the life of the wife of a man she had had an affair with; Elizabeth Proctor, the boss and friend of Mary Warren.
The Crucible by Arthur Miller shows how authority is a characteristic that can easily become a problem throughout a society. Many subjects were addressed in The Crucible such as guilt, hypocrisy, justice, hysteria, and courage. However, the most important subject throughout the play would be the nature of authority. There is a fine line between the concept of having authority and having power. In the book, the authority weakened and led to the antagonist Abigail Williams leading the law as opposed to the law leading Abigail Williams. At the instant that Abigail was granted authority over the townspeople she acted on it in order to have power. Not only is there power that comes with authority, but there is also responsibility which was demonstrated
Most of the accusations were made against innocent people for reasons of economic conditions, teenage boredom, and personal jealousies. Of course there was also the fact that people weren’t aware of the certain mental illnesses caused by their environment. For example the one of the first people to be accused of witchcraft was a young girl named Betty Paris who one day became very ill with convulsive erogtism. Ergot is a fungus that invades growing kernels of rye, so it is very likely that she got sick from simply eating bread. Since people were scientifically unable to explain her sudden seizures and hallucinations she was accused of witchcraft.
?What is left when honor is lost?? Publilius Syrus' quote, though dating from 100 B.C., still seems pertinent to our era (Quotations). Many people still feel that once integrity is lost they are nothing and many are willing to stand up to keep their integrity. Without integrity, we are nothing. During the time that Arthur Miller wrote his most famous play, The Crucible, innocent men and women are accused of having Communist leanings. Their whole lives are ruined in a short amount of time because they refuse to compromise themselves by selling out their friends. Miller tries to make a statement about these unfair trials by comparing them to the Salem witch-hunts and trials of 1692. The main protagonist of his play is a man named John Proctor who is accused of witchcraft but stands up to maintain his name and his honor, even though he is hanged for it. During the H.U.A.C. trials some took stands for their beliefs with the knowledge of possibly being shunned by society. Knowing this, instead of taking the cowards' way and giving the names of their friends, they refuse to tell the committee anything in the same way that John Proctor stands up against a court that is ruining the lives of innocent people.
Power and fear can affect people´s sense of what's wrong and what's right. In “the Crucible” by Miller, we can see how the trials affected every individual in a negative aspect. people suffered because of such power and unfairness the authority had. The witch trials affected a lot of individuals from an emotional aspect to a psychological trauma.
Greed and envy are two of the seven deadly sins in the Christian world that adherents must dispel from their lives. This fact makes it all the more ironic when many Christians during the Salem witch trials display these two offenses in The Crucible by Arthur Miller. One reason explaining the prevalence of sin in a society that thinks of itself as pure is that leaders demonstrate that they care more about actions rather than pureness of thought. For example, clergymen who feature themselves in the play, like Parris and Hale, often measure a person’s connection with the divine through the number of times he or she attends church. In actuality, according to many prominent officials of the Christian Church, that connection can only be achieved
Hysteria took over the town and caused them to believe that their neighbors were practicing witchcraft. If there was a wind storm and a fence was knocked down, people believed that their neighbors used witchcraft to do it. Everyone from ordinary people to the governor’s wife was accused of witchcraft. Even a pregnant woman and the most perfect puritan woman were accused. No one in the small town was safe.
Mary Warren is in court admitting to the lies she tells earlier in the play, but is very unsure of herself. Furthermore the judge makes it worse by repeatedly asking “ Has he ever threatened you?” (Miller 101) after he hears her unsurety. Upon entering the court Abigail notices the weak state Mary is in. Taking advantage of this Abigail begins to pretend that Mary is performing witchcraft in the courtroom. Abigail begins to see a “bird” being controlled by Mary, yelling “ Oh, please, Mary!” Don’t come down.” (Miller 115). Just as Abigail did to Tituba she notices the effect her performance is having and continues the onslaught “Mary, please don’t hurt me!” (Miller 115) which sways the court more. This convinces the judge, Danforth, that he is witnessing witchcraft and he pleads “Mary Warren! Draw back your spirit out of them!” (Miller 116) to try and stop the madness. While this is going on Mary Warren keeps on attempting to defend herself, “They’re sporting!... Stop it!!” (Miller 116) but to no avail. Becoming overwhelmed by the situation Mary falters just as Tituba did and joins Abigail. This leads to Abigail being able to continue her lying and remain in control without opposition.
"All conflict in literature is, in its simplest form, a struggle between good and evil." This means that all conflict in any work is basically just a fight between the forces of good and evil. The Crucible by Arthur Miller and The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne show that this statement is true.
Once the accusations began, many innocent people in the community were taken away. They were then either forced to admit that they were witches, to free themselves from a public hanging, or deny that they were witches, saving their integrity, but subjecting themselves to an unjust public hanging.
Right when he finds them, Betty becomes sick and won't talk or open her eyes, about this time other people's daughters become sick too. Rumors spread that witch craft is involved in Betty's illness and the development of the plot begins. Important to the major development of the plot is the fact that in the forest, Abigail and the others were just playing like witches. But they were following Abigail because she wanted to try to put a curse on a lady named Elizabeth Proctor. Abigail was in love with Mrs. Proctor's husband, John Proctor, and she wanted to some how get rid of Elizabeth.
Religious influence, the manipulation of fear, and the frightening aspects of witchcraft all are very influential to the popular belief of witchcraft during this time period. The popularity of witchcraft in this time period is important because it has shown how in the past when there is no logical explanation they would automatically blame Satan and say it was Satan’s doing. It also shows that history repeats itself because during the Cold War many individuals were accused of being communist even though there was no hard evidence proving this accusation; however, out of fear people will still be convicted, just like during the witch trials. Moreover, witch trials were not only influenced by many things but they have been influential; therefore, showing that they influenced things in our time
Many characters in The Crucible fall under the trap of lying, if not to other people, then to themselves. The Crucible is a fictional retelling of events in history, surrounding the Salem witch trials. It takes place in Salem, Massachusetts during 1692 and 1693. Additionally, Miller wrote the play as an allegory to mccarthyism, which is the practice of making accusations without evidence. In the play, Arthur Miller develops the theme of lies and deceit by showing Abigail lying for her own benefit, John Proctor committing adultery, and Elizabeth lying to protect her husband.
The play contained many scenarios of good versus evil, and the characters that generally possessed these feelings and intentions. But it must be understood that there were the intentions, the incentives, and then the actions taken out on a person or a group of people. Every character could either be placed in the intentions under good or bad intentions. After that, almost every character has mixed feelings of evil or good actions. The fight between the center of evil and the center of good is the foremost important of the points. Abigail Williams is the nucleus of all evil in the story. She is the one who triggers off this sense of hate in the play. She tempts Proctor into lechery, and commits unlawful acts which all are against the Puritan religion. To escape punishment for dancing, she deflects the actions and blames them on someone else, and does not care how many lives she ruins. Later when she grows into power and influence, she seems to enjoy sending these innocent people to their deaths. She takes pleasure in her lies, and thrives on the attention and power that they bring her. All these are the aspects of being the evil character, power, attention, and acts of wrongful doing. Therefore she can...