I think she’ll wake in time. Pray calm yourselves. I have eleven children, and I am twenty-six times a grandma, and I have seen them all through their silly seasons, and when it come on them they will run the Devil bowlegged keeping up with their mischief. I think she’ll wake when she tires of it. A child’s spirit is like a child, you can never catch it by running after it; you must stand still, and, for love, it will soon itself come back.
– Arthur Miller
The Crucible, Act 1. Rebecca Nurse reassures Thomas Putnam about his daughter Ruth, when he asks Rebecca to go and see if she can wake the child. The sensible, saintly and experienced mother and grandmother is the voice of calm amid the growing hysteria in Salem. The respected 72-year-old is not buying the talk of witches and the Devil’s work. She believes that Ruth and Betty Parris are just acting silly and faking illness, and will snap out of it when they tire of their mischief.