Mary Warren's testimony is destroyed in the end because she cannot do something. What? How does she explain the problem in Act 3?finally proctor...

In "The Crucible", the climax of the story comes when John Proctor confesses to having an affair with Abigail, thereby trying to discredit her and the girls' claims. One would think this would bring the end to the "witch hunt", however this is not the case. One reason is that the courts are not very willing to admit they listened to a bunch of girls who could have very well have other motives to their claims. The courts did not want to lose their power so they wanted to believe the girls no matter what to justify their actions. The other reason this does not end the witch hunt is because when Elizabeth is brought in from the jail to verify whether John's claims of the affair are true, she does not admit that John had an affair with Abigail. Elizabeth clearly wants to save her husband's name, and since she is not able to confer with him before she answers, she lies to the courts and says that although John was tempted, he never actually strayed from her. John claims Elizabeth would never tell a lie and then they use his words against him when she claims there never was an affair.