Who Is John Proctor Telling In The Crucible

John Proctor, a farmer from the Seventeenth Century town of Salem, Massachusetts, disbelieves the idea that the Devil can have any influence on the minds of the girls dancing in the woods. His belief that the children’s sickness had nothing to do with witchcraft does nothing to stop the court system from prosecuting and executing those accused of performing witchcraft. Although John Proctor provides clean-cut evidence to the court that witchcraft did not impact Abigail and her followers, the members of the court did nothing to stop the witch trials.
One evening at the Proctor household, Reverend John Hale visits John and his wife, Elizabeth. He asks them a plethora of questions in an attempt to see if the Proctors could possibly have the Devil’s influence present in the house. After a short while of questioning, Ezekiel Cheever, a clerk of the court, has come to arrest Elizabeth upon

Proctor reveals his affair with Abigail to Danforth and the rest of the court to prove Abigail is not the perfect saint she wants everyone to believe. He says, “She thinks to dance with me on my wife’s grave! And well she might, for I thought of her softly. God help me, I lusted, and there is a promise in such sweat. But it is a whore’s vengeance, and you must see it now” (Miller 220-221) in an attempt to diminish Abigail’s reputation in the court system. Hearing this, Danforth requests for Elizabeth to come and testify that what he says it truthful. Elizabeth has no idea that John already confessed, so she lies to save her husband’s reputation. Danforth immediately determines that the story of an affair is a lie, and imprisons John until further notice. John Proctor is eventually hanged for lying to the court about the affair and for performing witchcraft. Nothing John tells the court is able to change their minds about the trials, so more and more people are hanged each day for