Rebecca Nurse Quotes

It was Edward and Jonathan Putnam who signed the first complaint against Rebecca; and Thomas Putnam’s little daughter was the one who fell into a fit at the hearing and pointed to Rebecca as her attacker. To top it all, Mrs. Putnam – who is now staring at the bewitched child on the bed – soon accused Rebecca’s spirit of "tempting her to iniquity," a charge that had more truth in it than Mrs. Putnam could know.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. The author tells us something of the history of the Nurses and Putnams. Rebecca Nurse became the target of vengeful neighbors, the Putnams, because they harbored a dislike for her and her husband. It was the Putnams’ daughter Ruth who pointed out Rebecca in the courtroom as her attacker. It becomes clear in the play that Rebecca, a virtuous and respected elderly woman, is accused of being a witch not because of the need to save Salem from the Devil, but to satisfy a desire for personal vengeance.

I think she’ll wake in time. Pray calm yourselves. I have eleven children, and I am twenty-six times a grandma, and I have seen them all through their silly seasons, and when it come on them they will run the Devil bowlegged keeping up with their mischief. I think she’ll wake when she tires of it. A child’s spirit is like a child, you can never catch it by running after it; you must stand still, and, for love, it will soon itself come back.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Rebecca Nurse reassures Thomas Putnam about his daughter Ruth, when he asks Rebecca to go and see if she can wake the child. The sensible, saintly and experienced mother and grandmother is the voice of calm amid the growing hysteria in Salem. The respected 72-year-old is not buying the talk of witches and the Devil’s work. She believes that Ruth and Betty Parris are just acting silly and faking illness, and will snap out of it when they tire of their mischief.

REBECCA: Goody Ann! You sent a child to conjure up the dead?
MRS. PUTNAM: Let God blame me, not you, not you, Rebecca! I’ll not have you judging me any more! Is it a natural work to lose seven children before they live a day?

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 1. Rebecca is horrified to hear Ann Putnam confess that she sent her daughter Ruth into the woods to practice witchcraft with the slave Tituba. Mrs. Putnam admits doing this to learn who "murdered" her babies. She snaps back at Rebecca, attacking her for being judgemental and referring to her seven dead babies. The tension and conflict between these two women is palpable. This is foreshadowing of worse things to come, when Rebecca is falsely accused and executed for the "supernatural murder" of the Putnam babies. It is implied in the play that Mrs. Putnam is behind the accusations against Rebecca. Ann Putnam, married to the wealthy and powerful Thomas Putnam, is herself never punished or brought to trial for her involvement in witchcraft.

If Rebecca Nurse be tainted, then nothing’s left to stop the whole green world from burning.

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 2. Reverend Hale uses hyperbole and a metaphor of the world burning to express disbelief that a woman of Rebecca Nurse’s integrity could be capable of murder. After her arrest, Hale assures her husband Francis that the court will send his wife back home. He tells him to trust the justice of the court. This appears to be the moment Hale realizes that innocent people are being accused and hauled before the witch trials court. However, his confidence that the court will recognize Rebecca’s innocence turns out to be misplaced.

Let you fear nothing! Another judgment waits us all!

– Arthur Miller

The Crucible, Act 4. The condemned Rebecca Nurse speaks these words of comfort to John Proctor before he is led out to be hanged. Telling him not to fear the sentence of earthly judges, she says that judgment in the afterlife is more important and faces everybody. In her final words before being hanged, Rebecca shows herself to be a woman of integrity and faith even to the end. A symbol of purity, she would rather hang than lie.
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