The Crucible Animal Imagery Quotes

I saw Tituba waving her arms over the fire when I came on you. Why was she doing that? And I heard a screeching and gibberish coming from her mouth. She were swaying like a dumb beast over that fire!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Reverend Parris describes to Abigail the scene he witnessed in the woods, leading him to infer that the girls were engaging in witchcraft. Parris dehumanizes Tituba, his black slave from Barbados, by describing her in a racist animal simile as "swaying like a dumb beast."

I know how you clutched my back behind your house and sweated like a stallion whenever I come near! Or did I dream that? It’s she put me out, you cannot pretend it were you. I saw your face when she put me out, and you loved me then and you do now!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. When John Proctor rejects Abigail’s advances, she refers to the torrid sexual affair she had with him. She uses an animal simile to compare him to a stallion during their illicit love making. John’s deceived wife Elizabeth sacked Abby as their servant when she discovered the affair. But Abby believes that John still loves her.

PROCTOR: Abby, that’s a wild thing to say.
ABIGAIL: A wild thing may say wild things. But not so wild, I think. I have seen you since she put me out; I have seen you nights.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Abigail’s animal nature and passionate and rebellious spirit is referred to when John Proctor calls her a "wild thing." This distinguishes Abby from Salem’s other more tame and compliant Puritan women. It was likely a part of Abby that originally attracted the married Proctor to her. Abby in her response to John makes clear that she wants to renew her affair with him, but he is not yet aware of the lengths she will go to realize this.

ABIGAIL: I have a sense for heat, John, and yours has drawn me to my window, and I have seen you looking up, burning in your loneliness. Do you tell me you’ve never looked up at my window?
PROCTOR: I may have looked up.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Abigail tells John Proctor that she believes he is still romantically attracted to her, because she has seen him at her house looking into her window. She uses the word "heat" for his sexual desire. This also echoes the phrase "in heat," used to describe a female animal ready to have sex and able to become pregnant. John, seven months after their affair ended but still dissatisfied with his marriage to Elizabeth, admits to being outside Abby’s bedroom window looking up.

Take courage, you must give us all their names. How can you bear to see this child suffering? Look at her, Tituba. Look at her God-given innocence; her soul is so tender; we must protect her, Tituba; the Devil is out and preying on her like a beast upon the flesh of the pure lamb. God will bless you for your help.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Hale, pointing to Betty on the bed, uses emotional and intimidatory tactics to pressurize Tituba into giving up the names of other "witches." For good measure he uses a vivid animal simile to compare the Devil’s possession of Betty to a beast preying on an innocent lamb. He bribes Tituba with the promise of God’s blessing and forgiveness if she gives up names. Characterizing this as a battle between good and evil, Hale appears to throw objectivity to the wind. As he buys into the idea of the Devil running loose in Salem, he only adds to the panic and hysteria. Those who fell foul of the McCarthy witch hunt for communists in 1950s America had similar pressures applied to them to name names of others.

It is a mouse no more. I forbid her go, and she raises up her chin like the daughter of a prince and lays to me, "I must go to Salem, Goody Proctor; I am an official of the court!"

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. Elizabeth Proctor is talking about the transformation in her servant Mary Warren. Her husband John has questioned why a mouse like Mary would frighten his wife. Elizabeth uses a "mouse" metaphor and "like the daughter of a prince" simile to describe how the once submissive Mary has become more assertive after working with Abigail and the other girls in the witch trials. This speaks to the theme of power, something the teenage Mary has now acquired because of her new status in court.

That bloody mongrel Walcott charge her. Y’see, he buy a pig of my wife four or five year ago, and the pig died soon after. So he come dancin’ in for his money back. So my Martha, she says to him, "Walcott, if you haven’t the wit to feed a pig properly, you’ll not live to own many," she says. Now he goes to court and claims that from that day to this he cannot keep a pig alive for more than four weeks because my Martha bewitch them with her books!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. Giles Corey explains how his wife Martha was charged with witchcraft because an unhappy pig buyer accused her out of a desire to seek revenge. When she refused to give Mr. Walcott his money back for a pig that died from his poor care, he claimed that she was a witch.

The girl, the Williams girl, Abigail Williams, sir. She sat to dinner in Reverend Parris’s house tonight, and without word nor warnin’ she falls to the floor. Like a struck beast, he says, and screamed a scream that a bull would weep to hear. And he goes to save her, and, stuck two inches in the flesh of her belly, he draw a needle out. And demandin’ of her how she come to be so stabbed, she testify it were your wife’s familiar spirit pushed it in.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. Abigail launches her diabolical plan to get vengeance on Elizabeth for putting her out on the street. Ezekiel Cheever gives a graphic account of how Abby is stabbed in the belly with a needle while at dinner in Parris’s house. Abby blames Elizabeth Proctor’s spirit for pushing the needle in. Cheever uses a vivid animal simile to describe the horror of the attack, comparing Abby to a struck beast. Of course Abigail is lying, having stabbed herself so she could accuse Elizabeth of witchcraft. Earlier that day in court Abby saw Mary Warren make a poppet doll and stick a needle in it, and the poppet is now in Elizabeth’s house. Abigail seizes the opportunity provided by the poppet to frame Elizabeth.

ABIGAIL: You will not! Begone! Begone, I say!
…MERCY LEWIS: It’s on the beam! Behind the rafter!
DANFORTH: Where!
ABIGAIL: Why – ? Why do you come, yellow bird?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. Abigail screams up to the ceiling of the courtroom, pretending to see a demonic bird on the rafters. The other girls follow her head. Abby blames the bird on Mary Warren. This is a ruse to whip up hysteria and undermine Mary’s deposition stating that she and the girls lied when they claimed they saw the Devil. Abby is demonstrating her power over the girls by using the satanic bird to psychologically control them.

She and all the girls run to one wall, shielding their eyes. And now, as though cornered, they let out a gigantic scream, and Mary, as though infected, opens her mouth and screams with them. Gradually Abigail and the girls leave off, until only Mary is left there, staring up at the "bird," screaming madly. All watch her, horrified by this evident fit.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. The stage directions give a graphic portrayal of how Abigail Williams provokes mass hysteria and sets up a chain reaction in the witch trials courtroom. She is pretending to see an imaginary demonic bird in the rafters.

SARAH GOOD (rising in her rags): Oh, Majesty! Comin’, comin’! Tituba, he’s here, His Majesty’s come!…Oh, is it you, Marshal! I thought sure you be the Devil comin’ for us. Could I have a sip of cider for me goin’- away?
HERRICK (handing her the flask): And where are you off to, Sarah?
TITUBA (as Sarah drinks): We goin’ to Barbados, soon the Devil gits here with the feathers and the wings.
HERRICK: Oh? A happy voyage to you.
SARAH GOOD: A pair of bluebirds wingin’ southerly, the two of us! Oh, it be a grand transformation, Marshal! (She raises her flask to drink again.)

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. When Marshal Herrick arrives to the prison to move some prisoners, a delusional Sarah Good and Tituba mistake him for the Devil. They believe that Satan is coming to fly them to freedom and Tituba’s homeland of Barbados. Sarah uses an animal metaphor to compare the two of them to bluebirds. The good-natured Herrick, somewhat inebriated, gives Sarah a sip of cider from his flask. Miller includes this humorous episode at the beginning of the final act to provide comic relief in what is an intense and deadly serious play. But it shows too how there is no justice for disadvantaged people like the slave Tituba and the beggar Sarah Good, who provide easy targets to frame for witchcraft. Among the first women to be arrested, they have spent the longest time in jail and have now gone crazy and believe they are witches.

SARAH GOOD: I’m here, Majesty! (They hurriedly pick up their rags as Hopkins, a guard, enters.)
HOPKINS: The Deputy Governor’s arrived.
TITUBA (resisting him): No, he comin for me. I goin’ home!
HERRICK (pulling her to the door): That’s not Satan, just a poor old cow with a hatful of milk. Come along now, out with you.
TITUBA (calling to the window): Take me home, Devil! Take me home.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. A cow is heard lowing in the distance as Deputy Governor Danforth arrives to the prison. Prisoners Sarah Good and Tituba mistakingly think it’s the Devil come to whisk them off to Barbados. In this tragically funny scene in the play’s last act, Marshal Herrick is moving the women to another cell. Languishing in jail for months and awaiting execution, they have gone mad at this stage and are beginning to believe they are witches. The scene provides a shocking portrayal of the toll, both mental and physical, that the Salem witch hunts have taken on innocent people, especially the marginalized. It’s Salem “justice” at its ugliest.

There be so many cows wanderin’ the highroads, now their masters are in the jails, and much disagreement who they will belong to now. I know Mr. Parris be arguin’ with farmers all yesterday – there is great contention, sir, about the cows. Contention make him weep, sir; it were always a man that weep for contention.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. The turmoil in the community and breakdown in social order caused by the witch trials is graphically illustrated by Ezekiel Cheever’s comments to the judges about the abandoned cattle. The many cows wandering the town’s roads, their owners in jail, are symbolic of the chaos and hysteria that have destroyed Salem.

Excellency, there are orphans wandering from house to house; abandoned cattle bellow on the highroads, the stink of rotting crops hangs everywhere, and no man knows when the harlots’ cry will end his life – and you wonder yet if rebellion’s spoke? Better you should marvel how they do not burn your province.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. Returned to Salem after a spiritual reawakening, Reverend Hale has undergone a radical change from accuser to sympathizer and fighter on behalf of the accused. He wants Danforth to put a stay on the hangings. He draws a graphic picture of Salem’s despair, devastation and disintegration of society, caused by the witch hunt hysteria. Abandoned orphans, wandering cattle, the stench of rotting crops, people in fear of the accusing finger – Salem is a community in ruins. Hale warns that continuing the hangings could provoke rebellion.

Woman, before the laws of God we are as swine! We cannot read His will!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. Reverend John Hale wants Elizabeth Proctor to persuade husband John to make a false confession to witchcraft, to save him from hanging. Hale is a very changed clergyman who has lost confidence in the Salem court and believes Proctor to be innocent. In trying to explain to Elizabeth why one can lie to save life, he uses an animal simile. People are like swine before God’s laws, he says, and we cannot read God’s will.

Be there no wifely tenderness within you? He will die with the sunrise. Your husband. Do you understand it? What say you? Will you contend with him? Are you stone? I tell you true, woman, had I no other proof of your unnatural life, your dry eyes now would be sufficient evidence that you delivered up your soul to Hell! A very ape would weep at such calamity! Have the Devil dried up any tear of pity in you? (She is silent.) Take her out. It profit nothing she should speak to him!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. Danforth is angry at what he claims to be Elizabeth Proctor’s unconcerned reaction to her husband being hanged at sunrise. He and other members of the court want her to talk with her husband and get him to confess to save his life. In a metaphor Danforth compares Elizabeth’s hardness to "stone." He uses animal imagery to say that even an ape would be weeping in such calamitous circumstances. Danforth is desperate to extract a confession from Proctor in order to justify the witch trials and the hangings that have taken place so far. At this stage the trials have come under pressure, with rumors of rebellion and the main accuser Abigail having fled Salem. Danforth’s speech also shows how little understanding he has of people like the Proctors.

PARRIS: Proctor, Proctor!
HALE: Man, you will hang! You cannot!
PROCTOR: I can. And there’s your first marvel, that I can. You have made your magic now, for now I do think I see some shred of goodness in John Proctor. Not enough to weave a banner with, but white enough to keep it from such dogs.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. John Proctor goes to the gallows refusing to falsely confess to witchcraft. In doing so he preserves his integrity and finds his "shred of goodness." He chooses not to live a lie. Instead he decides to die with honor with the other good people who will not make a false confession to save their lives. Having initially signed the confession, he tears it up before a horrified Hale and Parris. They cannot believe his refusal to permit it to be publicly posted on the church door as "proof." John’s last speech before being hanged shows that, having been racked with guilt over his lechery, he has at last forgiven himself for his sins. The animal metaphor "dogs" are the figures of authority in the court trying to get John to confess to the bogus charge of witchcraft. Proctor also uses a weaving metaphor in his final dramatic speech.

Woman! It is pride, it is vanity. Be his helper! What profit him to bleed? Shall the dust praise him? Shall the worms declare his truth? Go to him, take his shame away!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. Hale pleads with Elizabeth to persuade John to confess and save himself from the gallows. He says that Proctor’s pride and vanity are what keep him from doing so. However, John’s reason for not confessing to a lie has more to do with honor than pride. Dust and worms are personified in this passage, having the ability to praise and to speak the truth.
Close