From the beginning of time until now deceptive individuals will conduct in such a matter that their fears and suspicions will take advantage of their actions causing them to behave in an immoral and irrational manner. In Arthur Miller's The Crucible, Abigail and other characters of the play accused people in the Puritan town of Salem of being witches. With those accusations fear was spread and it ends up dominating the lives of everyone in the town.
The fear of witchcraft in Salem frightened the townspeople, which made them eager to annihilate any signs of it. More and more people were being accused with no tangible evidence to support that they were witches. This is because the people of Salem were all caught up with this witch frenzy that they began to ignore their own conscience. During the trial many were confused of what to believe even Reverend Hale of Beverly wasn't sure what was the truth and what was false. With so many people yelling "witch" it becomes impossible to discern the people that have selfish intent from those who actually believed in witchcraft. The mass hysteria caused the people of the town to assume that the accused was guilty before they were even tried in the court. The accused were essentially left with an ultimatum, to confess having an association with the devil and being a witch or to hang. Either way whatever the accused chose to do the outcome would be considerable the same. If they confessed to being a witch they would have to enter into a society that would no longer accept them because the townspeople would not tolerate anything different from them, such as witches. They thought it was against God
and, therefore, against all they stood for as Puritans. Life would never go back to the way it was before they were accused. The accused that chose to confess would be branded for witchcraft their entire life. It was that or lose your life for something
...