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The Salem Witch Trials In The Crucible By Arthur Miller

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The Crucible by Arthur Miller follows the story of Salem as they battle the devil and witchcraft. This story goes through the many unfortunate deaths and sacrifices that occurred in the 1690s. Murderers follow these deaths.Many people in the town are wrongfully accused and convicted without any evidence.Those innocent people who were murdered died because of the lies of their peers, so now the liars have become the murderers. Although many characters are involved with the continuation of the Salem witch trials, nevertheless, Reverend Parris and Abigail Williams have the most responsibility for never stopping the trials because they allowed Abigail’s lies to spread and avoided telling the truth for their own personal gain. Many …show more content…

She is a self-revolving character who does not notice her own wrongdoings. She puts herself first when she is risking the lives of her family and close friends. This is evident when Abigail says, "Let either of you breathe a word, or the edge of a word, about the other things, and I will come to you in the black of some terrible night with a pointy reckoning that will shudder you..."I can make you wish you had never seen the sun go down!" (Miller 1.2.160) Instead of admitting everything that had been done and receiving minimal punishment, she continued to lie. which forces everyone to hide the truth. When she forced people to stay silent, it caused more issues down the road because they had to stack lies on lies until they could get away with the crime of witchcraft. This was one of the first times that the Salem Witch Trials could have ended. A different time when she could have stopped the trials from continuing is when she says, "But God made my face; you cannot want to tear my face." "Envy is a deadly sin, Mary." (Miller, 3.1.440) When Abigail screamed this in the courtroom, she was being "attacked" by a bird that Mary Warren had apparently sent. She took her power in the court and used it to silence Mary. At the time, Mary felt like she no longer had a choice but to accept the fact that Abigail was too deeply involved. But Abigail could have stopped it if she had admitted to all the accusations that Mary was sending her way. Instead of admitting it, she lies more and continues to dig a deeper hole of

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During the Salem Witch Trials a lot of people were accused of using witchcraft. As a result many people died for other people’s lies, rumors, and selfishness. There is one person that really caused and is most to blame for all the chaos, her name is Abigail. Abigail is to blame for all that has happened in the Witch Trials, the reason for that is because of all the accusing and lying she has done. In addition, it all leads up to her for instance, she used a doll to accuse people of witchcraft.

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293 Words | 2 Pages

I believe Abigail Williams is responsible for the hysteria in salem. She lies and manipulates people and causes the histeria to worsen. She lies to the court and to Mr. Paris. She also manipulates the girls into lying as well. Abigail also wants to keep a good reputation in the town and will do whatever it takes.

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Abigail’s mischievous behavior molded the start of salem witch trials. In Act 1 Abigail lie’s about what happened to Parris and threatening the girls to say what she want’s. Abigail tells the girls to say something or they wish they had never seen the sun go down. Abigail's type of behavior lying and threatening to cover her own self so she does not get in trouble.

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320 Words | 2 Pages

For example, she lied to her uncle about dancing in the woods claiming it was only sport. She also lied about her name stating it be clear as ever although she slept with John Proctor. During court, she lied about Mary Warren being a bird. Her lies often caused events to escalate quickly. Thus showing her lies contributed to the witchcraft hysteria.

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1183 Words | 5 Pages

Instead, she had abused that power and rather did the opposite; somewhat encouraging them to join her. All Abigail had to do was claim that “a cold wind has come” for the other girls to echo that they “freeze”[d] (Miller 3). Only through her actions and words did Abigail manage to sweep up the other girls in the courtroom to join in on her accusing Mary Warren of sending a spirit onto them. It is obvious Mary had not done such a thing, but to get out of a tough situation for herself, Abigail had acted as if she had, making the other girls follow her lead into the mass hysteria, merely making the situation worse for Mary and Mr. Proctor. The act of doing so represents the impression that her actions had on the other girls and how it affected other

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878 Words | 4 Pages

She was the reason why witchcraft broke out in Salem. As stated in the first paragraph, she tells the court who has committed witchcraft so she will not get in trouble. Why does the court believe her? The court believes her because she was the first one to say she “saw the devil”, and if she can see the devil, then she can see who is with him. In the beginning, Abigail blamed people who were not really influential in the community.

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354 Words | 2 Pages

To start, Abigail was the reason for the Salem Witch Trials since she faulted numerous natives of Salem to ensure her own particular notoriety.

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1417 Words | 6 Pages

But God made my face; you cannot want to tear my face. Envy is a deadly sin, Mary,” (Miller 3. 999-1002). Hectically, Abigail claimed this because she recognized that if she didn’t make a scene to convince the court of Mary’s bewitched spirit, all of her lies would’ve been figured out. In doing this, Abigail effectively intensified the people of Salem’s tenacious confidence that witchcraft existed in their village, which in turn acted as propaganda to fuel the fire of

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582 Words | 3 Pages

When people don’t want to get in trouble for something they normally blame it on someone else. Now most of the time it doesn't end out that bad, or they find out the person was not telling the truth, but that is not the same for the people of Salem. The main cause of the Salem Witch Trials is Abigail Williams, in Arthur Miller’s Crucible, because of her calling people witches, 20 people got killed there was a lot of fear and no trust for anyone. It’s the fear and people not trusting others that made the witch trials bad, and she seemed to create this hysteria because she feared getting in trouble, she wanted to get revenge, and because once she started she couldn’t stop without getting very punished.

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576 Words | 3 Pages

She would also cast spells in the forest which caused people to believe that she was practicing witchcraft. She was the first person to ever be accused and convicted of dealing with the supernatural and because of that, the whole town was not on her side. She told everyone that “the devil came to [her] and bid [her] serve him” (crucible, Miller) which basically meant that she was controlled by the devil and she had no say in any of it. People of Salem went as far as to say that they saw her dancing with the devil and they could tell that she was doing it on purpose. She was also told that her spell casting in the forest was witchcraft and that was added to the list of reasons for her to be shunned.

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811 Words | 4 Pages

By examining the characters of the play, I believe that the three major characters who should be blamed the most for the witch trials are Abigail Williams,

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1097 Words | 5 Pages

There is—Suddenly, from an accusatory attitude, her face turns, looking into the air above—it is frilly frightened.”(Miller,1307). At this time, she is given an opportunity to come clean about her actions but instead threatens the judge and accuses Mary Warren of witchcraft for going against her because she wants to keep her power for as long as possible. Even if she had already decided to wrongly accuse people to gain power in her community, she should’ve come clean when given the chance. This is what makes her a

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728 Words | 3 Pages

Abigail knew she was in the wrong from the very beginning, she used her power by being one of the older girls to manipulate the younger ones to go with her and put all of the blame onto the people in the town that she knew had the power to get rid of her. At the end of Elizabeth's court case, they asked Abigail if she was lying about seeing things or hearing things and that she wouldn’t be in any trouble and they would forgive, but she went on with her act putting the blame on Elizabeth saying shes working with the devil. The people that would accuse Abigail of lying would look at them and say “There shall be no blush on my name.” When the first hanging went through the director had the camera on her face and this scene shows that she started to get a thrill of seeing how much power she had over the town. There was a point where she knew her plan of ending up with John was going downhill when he called her a whore or when Mary Warren started to claim John of the devil's work and he told everyone in the town that “the devil is alive in

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538 Words | 3 Pages

The Crucible is a play written by Arthur Miller. It takes place during the Salem witch trials. Salem is an isolated town in the Boston area that is set up perfectly for witchcraft accusations. Abigail is being accused of witchcraft and she is a manipulative girl. Abigail has been accused of committing witchcraft in the woods and she plans to bring other people down with her.

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751 Words | 4 Pages

After continuous pressuring Mary Warren replies with ‘I cannot, they’ll turn on me— “showing us the mob has driven fear into people and how Marry is afraid to tell the truth in the case everyone will turn on her and blame her. Mary’s feeble attempt to recompense backfires, so when Abigail uses the poppet to blame it on Elizabeth, making Mary feel even worse thus she agrees to go with proctor to testify against Abigail in court. Later after agreeing to go to court to support Proctor Mary is asked who is at fault and in fear replies pointing to proctor “You’re the devil’s man!” (act three, page 119). This demonstrates how the fear of the mob and the overwhelming pressure from the Abigail makes her turn from the truth.

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