Giles Corey Quotes

Think on it now, it’s a deep thing, and dark as a pit.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Giles Corey is talking about how people in Salem are not getting along with one another and suing their neighbors at an alarming rate. He himself confesses to being in court six times that year. Using a simile, he warns how people’s greed and hunger for vengeance are pulling them down into a black pit. This is foreshadowing of how the Salem community will be swallowed up by its own dark pit of destruction and Putitan intolerance, leading to many innocent lives being destroyed in the infamous witch trials.

PROCTOR: My lumber. From out my forest by the riverside.
PUTNAM: Why, we are surely gone wild this year. What anarchy is this? That tract is in my bounds, it’s in my bounds, Mr. Proctor.
PROCTOR: In your bounds! I bought that tract from Goody Nurse’s husband five months ago.
PUTNAM: He had no right to sell it. It stands clear in my grandfather’s will that all the land between the river and – .
PROCTOR: Your grandfather had a habit of willing land that never belonged to him, if I may say it plain.
GILES: That’s God’s truth; he nearly willed away my north pasture but he knew I’d break his fingers before he’d set his name to it.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Here we get an insight into a land dispute between John Proctor and Thomas Putnam. It concerns ownership of a piece of land where Proctor harvests lumber. Proctor says that he bought the land from Francis Nurse, while Putname claims his grandfather willed it to him. But Proctor and Giles Corey say that Putnam’s grandfather had a practice of willing land not belonging to him. We see the theme of greed reflected in this exchange.

What signifies the readin’ of strange books?…It discomfits me! Last night – mark this – I tried and tried and could not say my prayers. And then she close her book and walks out of the house, and suddenly – mark this – I could pray again!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. When the hysteria over witches breaks out, Giles Corey carelessly mentions to Reverend Hale how he often wakes up and night and finds his wife secretly reading strange books. Without thinking of the consequences he complains that this somehow prevents him from saying his prayers. Unwitting Giles helps sentence his wife Martha Corey to death, since she is later executed as a witch. This passage is foreshadowing of Martha being accused of witchcraft.

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.

It’s a pity, Ezekiel, that an honest tailor might have gone to Heaven must burn in Hell. You’ll burn for this, do you know it?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. When Ezekiel Cheever arrives at the Proctors’ home to arrest Elizabeth, Giles Corey tells the once honest tailor that he is destined for Hell instead of Heaven. This is because of his collaboration with the corrupt witch trials. Appointed as clerk of the court for the trials, he aids in the dispensing of false justice and death for the innocent accused.

And yet silent, minister? It is fraud, you know it is fraud! What keeps you, man?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. After Giles Corey’s wife Martha and now Elizabeth are accused of witchcraft, Giles attacks Hale over his silence. He brands the women’s accusers – the group of young girls led by Abigail – as frauds. Hale, according to the stage directions, is said to be "in a fever of guilt and uncertainty" when the marshal arrives to arrest Elizabeth, Martha having been taken away a little earlier.

GILES: They be tellin’ lies about my wife, sir. I – .
DANFORTH: Do you take it upon yourself to determine what this court shall believe and what it shall set aside?
GILES: Your Excellency, we mean no disrespect for – .
DANFORTH: Disrespect indeed! It is disruption, Mister. This is the highest court of the supreme government of this province, do you know it?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. When Giles Corey tries to tell the court that people are lying about his wife Martha being a witch, Judge Danforth immediately shuts him down. Displaying both arrogance and intolerance, he accuses Giles of disrupting the highest court in the province. Danforth refuses to allow Giles make a submission in defense of his accused wife, showing he has already made up his mind. This shows Danforth abusing his powers as a judge.

It is my third wife, sir; I never had no wife that be so taken with books, and I thought to find the cause of it, d’y’see, but it were no witch I blamed her for. I have broke charity with the woman, I have broke charity with her.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. Giles Corey feels terrible guilt for getting caught up in Salem’s witchcraft fear and hysteria and helping have his wife Martha accused of being a witch. He drew attention to her by saying that she had taken to secretly reading strange books at night. Here he make a plea for his wife at Judge Danforth in the witch trials court. He is described in the stage directions as openly weeping and then covering his face ashamed.

PROCTOR: I – I have once or twice plowed on Sunday. I have three children, sir, and until last year my land give little.
GILES: You’ll find other Christians that do plow on Sunday if the truth be known.
HALE: Your Honor, I cannot think you may judge the man on such evidence.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. When Cheever attacks John Proctor for failing to observe the Bible teaching by working on the sabbath day, Proctor admits that he has "once or twice" plowed on Sunday because he had children to feed. Giles Corey and Reverend Hale come to John’s defense, suggesting that this doesn’t prove he isn’t a true Christian. This passage is an allusion to God’s teaching about the sabbath in the Book of Exodus: "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work."

My proof is there! If Jacobs hangs for a witch he forfeit up his property – that’s law! And there is none but Putnam with the coin to buy so great a piece. This man is killing his neighbors for their land!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. Giles Corey interrupts the court proceedings shouting that Thomas Putnam is getting his daughter to accuse neighbors of witchcraft. This is so that the wealthy Putnam can buy their abandoned land, Giles reveals. He hands in a deposition as "proof." This quote shows the greed of landowner and opportunist Putnam who vindictively has people falsely accused in order to gain their property. It also speaks to his desire for power.

The proof is there! I have it from an honest man who heard Putnam say it! The day his daughter cried out on Jacobs, he said she’d given him a fair gift of land.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. Giles Corey tells the court that Thomas Putnam is exploiting the witch trials in order to acquire vacant land of the accused at a good price. Putnam was overheard by an "honest man" saying that his daughter Ruth accused George Jacob of witchery in order to give her father a "fair gift" of land. In his hunger for more land and power, it seems there is little Thomas Putnam won’t stoop to, including having people falsely accused and hanged for witchcraft.

GILES: He’ll lay in jail if I give his name!
HATHORNE: This is contempt of the court, Mr. Danforth!
DANFORTH: You will surely tell us the name.
GILES: I will not give you no name. I mentioned my wife’s name once and I’ll burn in hell long enough for that. I stand mute.
DANFORTH: In that case, I have no choice but to arrest you for contempt of this court, do you know that?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. The court pressures Giles Corey to provide the name of a man who heard Thomas Putnam admit to getting his daughter to accuse neighbors of witchcraft in order to acquire their land. Giles shows his integrity and refuses, saying how he mentioned his wife had read strange books and she was imprisoned for witchcraft. Judge Hawthorne accuses Giles of contempt and Judge Danforth threatens him with arrest. There are parallels with the McCarthyism Red Scare era, when people were similarly accused on the basis of flimsy evidence and pressured to name the names of other communists.

Great stones they lay upon his chest until he plead aye or nay. They say he give them but two words. "More weight," he says. And died…It were a fearsome man, Giles Corey.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. The particularly gruesome and brutal death of Giles Corey is described here by Elizabeth. He was crushed to death by the piling of heavy stones and rocks on top of his chest. Giles was a man of great courage and moral integrity. He had been ordered by Judge Danforth to reveal the name of a man who overheard Thomas Putnam admit to falsely accusing people of witchcraft to get their land. Giles refused in order to protect the man and was tortured to death by Salem’s rough justice.
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