john hale
...s story, and also not judge John Proctor, for shredding Elizabeth’s arrest warrant and showing his anger towards Cheever. Reverend Hale also tells the court how he feels about people who are being sentenced without proper evidence: “Excellency, I have signed seventy-two death warrants, I am a minister of the Lord, and I dare not take a life without there be a proof so immaculate no slightest qualm of conscience may doubt it.” (215) At this point Mr. Hale is upset and wants fairness for everyone. He soon decides he cannot argue with the Court, and backs off, as if defeated. Reverend Hale backs off but does not quit fighting for what he feels is right. When Deputy Governor Danforth brought in the girls to find out more about the truth in Mary Warren’s statement of no witchcraft taking place, and at about the same time John Proctor’s affair was brought out in the open, Reverend Hale defends both John and Mary because he knows they are being honest with the court: “Excellency, it is a natural lie to tell, I beg you, stop now before another is condemned! I may shut my shut my conscience to it no more. Private vengeance is working through this testimony! From the beginning this man has struck me true. By my oath to Heaven, I believe him now and I pray you call back his wife before we.... “ (223) “I believe him! This girl (Abigail) has always struck me false! (223) “You cannot believe these girls!” (225) Reverend Hale obviously sees this plot unfolding, he sees what these girls are doing, and it’s making him sick. Yet what disgusts him more is that the court cannot see through these lies. In the beginning he was proud to be in Salem as a young doctor. He felt pride as a witchcraft specialist. He now feels ignorant and anger at himself for believing these girls when he first arrived, and also for interrogating Tituba about witchcraft. “Tituba, I want you to wake this child!...You most certainly do, and you will free her from it now! When did you compact with the devil? (188) His focus is not if Tituba ever did compact with the devil, but when she did. Therefore he believed the girls when he first arrived, he didn’t take time to examine the whole situation and fi...