The Crucible Background QUIZ

The Crucible Background Quiz

START

question 1/15

Why did the Puritans leave England for the new world?

They were being persecuted for being Puritans.

They thought they were escaping the Devil.

They wanted the freedom to persecute others.

Well done!

Continue

The Puritans were unhappy with what they believed was the weakening of the Church of England. However, all subjects of the monarchy were ordered to practice the Anglican faith or suffer punishment for not doing so. After years of persecution, the Puritans finally decided to leave for the new world to create their own community.

question 2/15

What is predestination?

the belief that God has determined where your soul will go before your existance.

when Siri provides you with vacation ideas before you ask.

the directions to a place of interest

Well done!

Continue

Despite fervently believing that they could never know God's mind, the Puritans hoped that they could change His if they lived a good, moral life and did everything for His glory.

question 3/15

What is it called when a Puritan works hard in everything they do in order to glorify God?

the Puritan work ethic

the Puritan time commitment

the Puritan way of life

Well done!

Continue

This is one way the Puritans thought they could win God's favor. It is still a part of our culture to this day. Do you know anyone who always does their best work?

question 4/15

Who was Arthur Miller?

One of those who accused others of witchcraft

One of the accused witches in 1692

Marilyn Monroe's playwright husband

Well done!

Born in Harlem, NY, in 1915 into the Jewish faith and educated in Ann Arbor, MI, Miller wrote 36 stage plays before passing away in 2005. Through his lifetime, Miller became a champion of many human rights causes, His plays, essays, and screeplays focus on the human condition, how one's place in the world often directs one's life, and the importance of free will.

Continue

question 5/15

What inspired Arthur Miller to write The Crucible?

Congress was conducting a witchhunt for communists.

He thought people needed to know about the Salem tragedy of 1692.

Marilyn was a witch

Well done!

The House Un-American Activities Committee, formed in 1938 to combat a supposed communist threat in the United States, investigated people in various jobs and careers for communist sympathies. Those who were suspected of having said ties would be tried in a court of law. Even having one's name associated with a communist could get one fired. As a result, many careers were ruined and a political frenzy caused by paranoia ensued.

Continue

question 6/15

What did Senator Joe McCarthy of Wisconsin do that started the era named after him?

He accused 250 "State Department employees" of being communists.

He accused President Truman of being communist.

He created the HUAC.

Well done!

At a speech to a women's group in West Virginia, McCarthy showed the audience a list of supposed communists employed by the U.S. State Department, which is charged with protecting the US from foreign aggressions while maintaining diplomacy throughout the world. After McCarthy put the list away, it was never seen again.

Continue

question 7/15

What is the term for "a condition affecting a group of persons, characterized by excitement or anxiety, irrational behavior or beliefs, or inexplicable symptoms of illness"?

mass hysteria

predestination

COVID-19

Well done!

Mass hysteria is caused when stress or anxiety about something or someone spreads throughout a community (family, school, city, state, country, or world). The dispersion of information--true and false--feeds the stress or anxiety, causing the hysteria to grow. There are many examples of mass hysteria throughout the ages, including in modern times.

Continue

question 8/15

What caused the end of McCarthy's reign of terror?

He accused a member of the US Army.

He died.

He accused President Truman.

Well done!

• Because the Senate hearings into the communist infiltration of the US Army Signal Corps showcased McCarthy’s bullying tactics and after McCarthy charged that the army’s lawyer, Joseph N. Welch, employed a man who had once belonged to a communist front group, the public turned against McCarthy, and the Senate censured him.
• Welch's response, “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?” and journalist Edward R. Morrow's exposé of McCarthy on his news program See It Now helped reveal what McCarthy was doing.

Continue

Joseph N. Welch

question 9/15

When and where did the witch trials portrayed in The Crucible take place?

1776 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

1692 in Salem, Massachussetts

1642 in Plymouth, Massachussetts

Well done!

In early spring of 1692 after a long, cold winter, a group of girls became sick: convulsing, having hallucinations, and so on. The consensus was that they were being bewitched, and the accusations began to fly.

Continue

question 10/15

What is the term for a testimony in which witnesses claimed that the accused--or the spirit of the accused--appeared to them and did them harm in a dream or a vision.

Spectral evidence

Ghostly testimony

Witch's gossip

Well done!

Continue

Spectral evidence was the main testimony that was used during the Salem Witch Trials where 19 people were hanged and one was pressed to death because they had been found guilty of witchcraft or, in the case of the man pressed to death, refused to enter a plea of innocent or guilty.

question 11/15

Why was Mary Warren, one of the accused, an important part of the Salem Witch Trials?

She accused others of witchcraft but confessed to lying.

She fell into fits in the courtroom and never recovered.

She was the first to confess to witchcraft.

Well done!

Mary Warren, the 20-year-old servant of John and Elizabeth Proctor, started out as one of the accusers, falling into fits when an alleged witch was being questioned. Eventually, she admitted to deceiving the court. However, she soon went back to accusing others.

Continue

question 12/15

How does Jonathan Edwards describe sinners in "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"?

"a spider, or ...loathsome insect [God is holding] over a fire"

"a venomous insect hiding in God's plain sight"

"a rabid dog...seeking the flesh of another"

Well done!

Edwards told the listeners, "The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked."

Continue

question 13/15

Despite instilling fear into his listeners, Edwards promises them hope. What does he tell them?

All they have to do to be saved is tithe some of their earnings.

God is ready to have mercy on them, but only today.

If they pray hard enough, God will forgive them.

Continue

Well done!

Edwards' main goal was to win the audience back to the original beliefs of the Puritan church. If they thought they had no way of earning a spot in Heaven, what might ensue? By providing them with hope, he could maybe win them back.

question 14/15

What is the word for a government that is based on the majority's religion?

Dictatorship

Democracy

Theocracy

Well done!

Theocracy is a "government by divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided. In many theocracies, government leaders are members of the clergy, and the state’s legal system is based on religious law."

Continue

question 15/15

Why did Arthur Miller write The Crucible after being called to testify by the Senate regarding possible communist sympathies?

He saw the comparison of innocent people being wrongly accused.

Joseph McCarthy reminded him of the devil.

He needed money, so he wrote the play.

Well done!

When Miller saw his friends being called in front of Congress to testify about communist sympathies and how even those who had no ties were losing their careers and their livelihoods just for having been mentioned by the committee, he immediately recognized the comparison to the Salem Witch Hunts in which all that was needed was for one to accuse another of witchcraft in order for one to be put on trial.

Continue

Home

Congrats!

You are ready to read The Crucible by Arthur Miller.

Badomen!

Back