"The Crucible" - Key Moments - Act 4

The Decision to Die

When told he must sign his confession, Proctor at first refuses, then he signs it and snatches it away from Danforth. Proctor says that he has signed the confession, they ahve seen him sign it and that they have no need to take the paper away with them. His sense of honour means that he does not want his friedns and family to know he has been weak on the day when others will have been hanged. proctor tears the confession and seals his fate. Proctor helps Rebecca Nurse to walk to the scaffold. Parris and Hale try one time try one last time to get Elizabeth to reason with her husband. She refuses and, from the cell window, watches him die, saying finally: "He have his goodness now. God forbid I take it from him".

After the events of the play and the executions

* Parris was voted out of office and never heard of again.

* Abigail is said to have turned up as a prostitute in Boston.

* Twenty years after the executions, surviving victims were awarded compensation.

* Some people still refused to admit their guilt.

* The excommunications were overturned in 1712

* Farms belonging to th victims remained unoccupied for up to a hundred years.