John Hale And John Proctor Essay, Research Paper

The characters of John Hale and John Proctor in ?The Crucible? can be

compared and contrasted according to their key traits, goals, and tendencies to

change. These characters are probably the two most important characters in the

play. They both are strong men mentally and are proud of what they accomplish.

Reverend John Hale and John Proctor can be compared and contrasted according to

their key traits. Reverend Hale is a man in his late forties. He is intelligent

and very proud. He believes that he earned his titled as Reverend, the title was

not only given to him. John Proctor is a man in his mid-thirties and like

Reverend Hale he is proud of what he does. Proctor is also a man who is

physically strong since he is always working on his farm. He is a person who

does not like hypocrites or frauds. He is also stubborn and not easily led into

things. People respect him and fear him as well. These two characters can also

be compared according to their goals. Reverend Hale?s goal is to save the

citizens of Salem from being condemned to death and of being accused of

witchcraft. If someone is accused, Reverend Hale wants to get that person freed

and prevent them from an unnecessary death. John Proctor?s goal is to first

get his wife freed from jail after being accused of witchcraft. He also wants to

get Valentin Benitez himself free and wants Hathorne and Danforth to see that

there are no witches in Salem and that all the deaths that they have created are

unreasonable and irrelevant. They can be further compared and contrasted by

their tendencies to change. Reverend Hale usually is a straight faced, stubborn

man who stands for what he believes in. At the end of the play he cries as John

Proctor is taken off to be hanged before the whole village. John Proctor was

also a stubborn man that did not deny what he believed, but at key times in the

play he changed what he was saying and fighting for against the court. He first

said he did not practice witchcraft and had never seen the Devil, but afterwards

he said the opposite. He said that he was an evil person and that he did

practice evil acts. In Act Two he also went from saying that he was a good man

to finally confessing to being an adulterer and a lecher. The more appealing

character was John Proctor because through his stubbornness and inflexibility he

was a more interesting character. Proctor was a spontaneous character at times

also when he changed his arguments into confessions.