Parris to Abigail: "There is a faction that is sworn to drive me from my pulplit...I have foughthere three long years to bend these stiff-necked people to me." Parris feels ostracized and like he has to work really hard to belong. He feels jilted and misjudged. This lack of a feeling of belonging later leads him to accept so many of the accusations.
Abigail to John: "Give me a soft word, John...you loved me then and you do now!" Abby wants so desperately to belong to John again, and when he rejects her, she takes matters into her own hands by accusing Elizabeth of witchcraft. "Why, Abigail Williams charge her." (Cheever in Act 2)
Miller uses dialogue and stage directions to describe the tension between John and Elizabeth too. John wants to make things up to her, to feel like he belongs at her side as her husband: "I mean to please you Elizabeth"...(He gets up, goes to her, kisses her. She receives it. With a certain disappointment, he returns to the table.)"
Mary Warren feels quite proud of her role in the courts, or belonging there, and it has given her new bravado: "I'll be gone every day for some time. I'm-I am an official of the court they say." She also feels belonging with Abby and the girls, which is one reason she hesitates to turn on Abby: "I cannot do it, I cannot!"
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