John Proctor, the main character is accused of witchcraft by Mary Warren. However in actuality, Abigail and the other girls had pretended that Mary was bewitching them in the court. This caused Mary to eventually break down and wrongly accuse John Proctor of witchcraft. This one act of accusation brings upon John’s ultimate condemnation by confession. This can be noticed through Mary’s hysterical confession on page 118 where she points at Proctor and says, “You’re the Devil’s man!” and then later on page 119 says, “My name, he want my name. “I’ll murder you,” he says, “if my wife hangs! We must go and overthrow the court,” he says!” One can quite obviously notice how forced Mary’s confession was as she says this all the while sobbing. Abigail …show more content…
After speaking to Elizabeth, John agrees to confess to witchcraft to save his life and raise his sons. John is eventually condemned by the law when he refuses to confess by society’s standards. He writes his name on the confession list but tears the sheet immediately afterwards. On page 142 he says, “I have confessed myself! Is there no good penitence but it be public? God does not need my name nailed upon the church! God sees my name; God knows how black my sins are! It is enough!” John feels that confession should be private between a man and God. On the other hand, the public believes that there should be strong evidence confirming one’s confession. This is evidently ironic as one would need absolutely no evidence in the accusation itself, exemplifying McCarthyism. Regardless, Abigail, through Mary, was able to accuse John of witchcraft with little to no evidence and as a result of this, he is condemned to hanging. John’s confession should have been enough evidence however; life in Salem, at that time, went along with the concept of “hearsay.” Illustrated on page 94 when Judge Danforth says, “But you must understand, sir, that a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road