The Crucible Personification Quotes

The edge of the wilderness was close by. The American continent stretched endlessly west, and it was full of mystery for them. It stood, dark and threatening, over their shoulders night and day, for out of it Indian tribes marauded from time to time, and Reverend Parris had parishioners who had lost relatives to these heathen.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Miller uses personification to describe the American wilderness in the new land that the Salem colonists have made home. The narrator compares it to a dangerous and threatening human being.

When the Devil comes to you does he ever come – with another person? Perhaps another person in the village? Someone you know…You are God’s instrument put in our hands to discover the Devil’s agents among us. You are selected, Tituba, you are chosen to help us cleanse our village. So speak utterly, turn your back on him and face God – face God, and he will protect you.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. We see the themes of power, good vs evil and hysteria here, as Reverend Hale attempts to get Tituba give up the names of others in league with the Devil. Having herself confessed, the lowly black slave’s status is suddenly raised up when asked to be an instrument of God to help root out Satan’s agents. The word instrument is personified by Hale. He offers Tituba the power to accuse and condemn others to death. The language of Hale’s questioning of Tituba amplifies further the hysteria among the Salem townspeople. There are also strong echoes of McCarthyism here. During the 1950s Red Scare people were pressed to name names of people with communist affiliations before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Playwright Miller himself was convicted of contempt of court when he refused to name suspected communists to the committee. This was later reversed by the Supreme Court.

Spare me! You forget nothin’ and forgive nothin’. Learn charity, woman. I have not moved from there to there without I think to please you, and still an everlasting funeral marches round your heart. I cannot speak but I am doubted, every moment judged for lies, as though I come into a court when I come into this house!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. John Proctor feels that he is being constantly judged and questioned by his wife Elizabeth over his affair with Abigail. She struggles with forgiving and trusting him. He desperately wants forgiveness and uses personification to describe her continuing coldness towards him – "an everlasting funeral marches round your heart." Whenever he arrives home, he feels like he is stepping into a courtroom and being judged for lies. This is foreshadowing of John’s court appearance in Act 3.

I should have roared you down when first you told me your suspicion. But I wilted, and, like a Christian, I confessed. Confessed! Some dream I had must have mistaken you for God that day. But you’re not, you’re not, and let you remember it! Let you look sometimes for the goodness in me, and judge me not.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. The self-pitying John Proctor is desperate for his wife to forgive him for his affair with Abigail. Here he regrets confessing it to her in the first place, saying that Elizabeth continues to judge him. Anxious to repair their relationship he appeals to her to see past his sin and look for the goodness in him. He uses personification when he says "Some dream I had must have mistaken you for God."

I never knew it before. I never knew anything before. When she come into the court I say to myself, I must not accuse this woman, for she sleep in ditches, and so very old and poor. But then – then she sit there, denying and denying, and I feel a misty coldness climbin’ up my back, and the skin on my skull begin to creep, and I feel a clamp around my neck and I cannot breathe air; and then I hear a voice, a screamin’ voice, and it were my voice – and all at once I remember everything she done to me!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. The ramblings of Mary Warren provide a flavor of the mass hysteria, fear and panic enveloping the town of Salem and the court. Letting her imagination run riot, she vividly describes to the Proctors an episode in court that prompted her to accuse homeless woman Sarah Good. She claims to have been possessed by some force so that she couldn’t breathe. Using personification, she describe a cold sweat climbing up her back and her skin starting to crawl. Then suddenly she claims to recall a forgotten memory of what Sarah Good had done to her. Sarah, said to be old and poor and sleeping in ditches, is an easy target for Mary and the other girls to accuse of witchcraft.

There is a misty plot afoot so subtle we should be criminal to cling to old respects and ancient friendships. I have seen too many frightful proofs in court – the Devil is alive in Salem, and we dare not quail to follow wherever the accusing finger points!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. There had been an expectation that Hale was a reasonable man who would not try to find witchcraft where it doesn’t exist. In his own parish of Beverly he determined that an accused woman was not a witch, but merely a "pest," and the child allegedly afflicted was back to normal after a few days rest and care. However, that now seems a forlorn hope as Hale now succumbs to Salem and the court’s witchcraft hysteria. He claims that there have been "frightful proofs" seen in court of the Devil alive in the town. The rising hysteria is personified in "the accusing finger points." The irrational mob mentality and climate of fear created is frightingly conveyed here by Miller, calling on his own experience of the Red Scare trials of the McCarthy era.

Why do you never wonder if Parris be innocent, or Abigail? Is the accuser always holy now? Were they born this morning as clean as God’s fingers? I’ll tell you what’s walking Salem – vengeance is walking Salem. We are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law! This warrant’s vengeance! I’ll not give my wife to vengeance!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. John Proctor in this speech is the voice of common sense who rails at the injustice of the Puritan church and court system. He speaks out against the perversion of justice and climate of hysteria that exists. He criticizes the unquestioning acceptance of whatever Reverend Parris, Abigail and her band of child accusers say. In a metaphor “jangling the keys of the kingdom” he describes how power is now in the hands of “little crazy children” led by Abby. With Elizabeth arrested, Proctor personifies vengeance to claim that it is walking Salem and writing the law – his wife is being targeted by Abby out of a motive of revenge. The passage also features an example of a simile: “as clean as God’s fingers.”

PROCTOR: Make your peace with it! Now Hell and Heaven grapple on our backs, and all our old pretense is ripped away – make your peace! Peace. It is a providence, and no great change; we are only what we always were, but naked now. Aye, naked! And the wind, God’s icy wind, will blow!
MARY WARREN: I cannot, I cannot, I cannot.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. John Proctor grabs Mary Warren by the throat "as though he would strangle her" and demands that she tell the court about Abigail’s lies. Yelling at her in frustration after Elizabeth is taken to jail, he pleads with Mary to be on the right side of the battle between good and evil. Hell and Heaven are personified, when John compares the struggle between them to a wrestling match. He speaks of Mary and himself are metaphorically naked to the elements with their sins exposed, as they face the "icy wind" of God’s judgment and punishment. He wants Mary to explain to the court that it was she and not Elizabeth who put the needle in the poppet and placed it in the Proctors’ house. But the act ends with Mary sobbing and repeating the words over and over, "I cannot." This is an example of how terrified the girls, and especially Mary, are of Abigail.

The entire contention of the state in these trials is that the voice of Heaven is speaking through the children.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 3. Danforth’s biased handling of the Salem witch trials is a good example of the theme of intolerance. In his statement to John Proctor, he seems to suggest that the court should accept the testimony of the children, because they are the "voice of Heaven." By personifying Heaven in this way, Danforth elevates the importance and credibilty of what they children are alleging. This makes it difficult for any accused person to mount a defense or get a fair hearing.

The rumor here speaks rebellion in Andover…Andover have thrown out the court, they say, and will have no part of witchcraft. There be a faction here, feeding on that news, and I tell you true, sir, I fear there will be riot here.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. With the witch trials destroying so many lives, Salem has descended into chaos and conflict. Parris expresses his worries to Danforth of riots and rebellion breaking out. Using personification, he says that rumor "speaks" of resistance in Andover and the people throwing out the court. In a food metaphor, he describes how a group of dissenters in Salem is "feeding" on those reports.

I will not receive a single plea for pardon or postponement. Them that will not confess will hang. Twelve are already executed; the names of these seven are given out, and the village expects to see them die this morning. Postponement now speaks a floundering on my part; reprieve or pardon must cast doubt upon the guilt of them that died till now. While I speak God’s law, I will not crack its voice with whimpering. If retaliation is your fear, know this – I should hang ten thousand that dared to rise against the law, and an ocean of salt tears could not melt the resolution of all the statues. Now draw yourselves up like men and help me, as you are bound by Heaven to do.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. The unbending presiding Judge Danforth rules out any possibility of pardon or postponement in the witch trials cases. His tone is full of the power and control he exercises over the Salem court. His merciless justice is expressed in the metaphor: "an ocean of salt tears could not melt the resolution of all the statues." Danforth claims to speak for God, has ultimate power of life and death over people and is not shy to use it. After hanging twelve people already, he promises another seven hangings that day, and even boasts of hanging ten thousand if necessary. Pride and ego speak loudly in this speech, as he says postponement would show "floundering" or weakness on his part. He shows unwavering faith in his own infallibility and that of the court. He views himself as the instrument of divine justice, chosen by God to drive the Devil out of Salem and cleanse it of the evils of witchcraft. Postponement is personified in the passage as having the ability to speak.

Whatever you will do, it is a good man does it. I have read my own heart this three month, John. I have sins of my own to count. It needs a cold wife to prompt lechery…I counted myself so plain, so poorly made, no honest love could come to me! Suspicion kissed you when I did; I never knew how I should say my love. It were a cold house I kept!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. As John Proctor agonizes over whether to make falsely confess to witchcraft to save his life, Elizabeth makes her own confession. Describing him as a good man, she admits to being partly to blame for his affair with Abigail by being a cold wife who didn’t know how to love. She uses personification when she describes how "suspicion kissed" her husband when she did. By accepting her owns faults and his goodness, she is finally forgiving John for his infidelity. Elizabeth also uses a metaphor when she decribes how she "read my own heart" like you read a book.

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.
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