Shall harm Macbeth.’, ‘Macbeth shall never be vanquished be, until
Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
Shall come against him.’ they are telling him
Another other character that plays a role in convincing Macbeth to kill Duncan is, but the thoughts of murder where already in Macbeths head, his wife only gave him a nudge just like the witches did, they showed him the door, he had to open it and step through. In the end he killed Duncan no one else did. Lady Macbeth was able to do this with her ‘witch like powers’, this is seen when see does a monolog ‘That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty! Make thick my blood,’
She almost turns evil to ‘That I may pour my spirits in thine ear,’ poison Macbeth. So we see that Macbeth isn’t a weak character that her ‘magic allows her to convince him to kill Duncan.
Macbeth also recognises that Duncan was a good king who was loved by all, and this love did not stop Macbeth in achieving his goal. At this point Macbeth ‘hath murdered sleep’ no longer does Macbeth need to sleep, his true feelings cannot manifest and it seems that Macbeth cannot turn back. But his murderous ways do not stop there, to hide the fact that he killed the king, he kills two guards, there is not much need for this but he does take the advice of his wife and blames the murder on them. But the killing continues further, Macbeth with a mind ‘full of scorpions’ feels threatened by Banquo (his best friend) and his son. To remove these scorpions he hires men to kill both Banquo and Fleance, but these men fail to kill Fleance and he escapes. Banquo is his dear friend. It seems that Macbeth’s conscience has disappeared, as he easily gets men to kill his friend. Macbeth now tells his wife,
“I am in Blood
Stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more
Returning were as tedious as go o’er.”
He realises that he has reached a turning point that to go back is as long a journey as continuing forth. But instead of stopping or turning back he continues. This is only after a visit to the witches again. Here he is given what he asked for the so called ‘future’. He is told to beware of Macduff. This is a partial truth because Macduff eventually kills Macbeth, but this becomes true because of what the witches then tell him,
‘The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.’
‘Macbeth shall never be vanquished be, until
Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
Shall come against him.’
They are telling him half truths and in the way they are told to Macbeth they give him false confidence. So here Macbeth is again not manipulated but tricked, his own actions lead him to his own demise. Then immediately after the witches talk to Macbeth a guard enters as the witched disappear, but Macbeth thinks that the man must have seen the witches, when he didn’t. This makes us wonder if this sighting of the witches is just Macbeth’s mind playing tricks on him. Then Macbeth chooses yet again to go further through the blood by killing everyone in Macduff’s castle. He does this because Macduff has left to England. The family is warned by a messenger, but is unable to escape in time. Macduff’s wife and son are killed. So, why did Macbeth do this? He had no motive in killing these innocent people; they were not a threat to him. Macbeth was so overconfident from the witches’ prophesies that he found himself invincible. It seems that Macbeth has lost his conscience completely; nothing can harm him. He has no reason to worry. Macbeth has now gone so far into the blood that he has only one way of turning back and that is through death. For through death God will give him redemption.
Of course in the period this was written, people would have blamed the whole problem on the witches, they would have said it was their entire fault. And there is a reason for this. This play was written when King James 1st was ruling and he was a notorious witch hunter so King James 1st and Elizabethan audiences would have a great hate for witches already and they would not have liked to accept that it could have been all Macbeths fault so they blame the witches. There is a scene in the play (Act 1 Scene 3) that tells about how a lady refused to give the witch some chestnuts and the witches decide to torture her husband who is a sailor and a similar occurrence happens to James 1st. This play portrays witches as pure evil that pray on the good. Not only does this make the kings actions just look, but boosts the kings ego and gets Shakespeare into the kings good books. But Shakespeare doesn’t stop there, he brushes over the subject of the ‘Kings Healing Hands’ (in act 4 scene 3) making other kings look wonderful. Their healing hands are a gift from God so they further make kings look holy and uncorrupted which is the opposite of Macbeth. He then creates a vision in which Banquo’s children go on to ascend the throne. As we remember the witches also promised good things to Banquo’s children but Banquo doesn’t do anything to make sure these come true showing that he has pure righteous blood in him. The vision then shows a long line of kings and then James 1st holding three golden balls and two spectres, this implies that King James has Banquo’s blood in him and there fore cannot be corrupted by the witches evil and on top of that it shows him joining England and Scotland.
Both Macbeth and Banquo where told their futures, but Macbeth was the one who chose to take action towards getting his prize. In his haste he also helped a part in giving Banquo his prize, this may seem like Macbeth had the ambition to go out and achieve his goals but both futures come true in the end. So Macbeth, just to make sure he got what he wanted, killed and slaughtered whereas Banquo waited and his children got their prize. Banquo also chose not to tell his children that they would go on to be kings, maybe he did this because he knew that the witches were evil (Praise to James 1st again) and thought it was best to take it to his grave. This reflects very badly on Macbeth in that some who was also given their future got their future without the same killing and slaughter. I think this is undoubtedly the biggest piece of evidence that it was all Macbeth, that though he was shown the door he opened it.
So, I can conclude that Macbeth was not a hopeless victim of manipulation. He was guided by the supernatural, but they did not tell him everything to do nor controlled every aspect of his life. Though the supernatural might play a part in Macbeth’s life, he had choices that he made and he must take the consequences of these choices. Macbeth was simply shown the door out of his own choice did he open it.
