Macbeth - Discuss the ways in which the play presents to us the picture of a man caught between the promptings of his worldly ambition and an acute awareness of moral and religious values.

Hector Guinness 03/05/2007

English Coursework

Discuss the ways in which the play presents to us the picture of a man caught between the promptings of his worldly ambition and an acute awareness of moral and religious values.

The tragedy of Macbeth is that we watch the downfall of a great man because of a flaw in his character. The play begins with the description of the battle between the Scottish forces led by Macbeth and Banquo, and the rebels led by Macdonald and the traitor Cawdor, and the Norwegian forces. The captain says, “brave Macbeth – well he deserves that name”, and describes how he mercilessly beat of the rebels and the Norwegians against the odds. He is a hero among the king’s court, and as he later says, he “hath brought golden opinions from all sorts of people”. However, even at this early stage, we see an undesirable side of the character, as described by the bloody captain; he says that Macbeth and Banquo fought so viciously that they “meant to bathe in reeking wounds, or memorise another Golgotha”. This reference to Golgotha would have had a much greater impact on the deeply Christian audience of the early 17th Century, when everyone would have known that this was the name of the hill on which Jesus was crucified. Therefore, with this reference Shakespeare must be aiming to show that Macbeth is not all good, and that although he is a brilliant general, and the hero of Scotland, he is also ruthless, and bloody.

However, this is not the main flaw that is what brings about Macbeth’s destruction, his greatest flaw is “vaulting ambition which o’erleaps itself, and falls on th’other”, and Shakespeare introduces this in Act 1, scene 3. The witches have already declared in scene 1, that they will next come together

Upon the Heath.

There, to meet Macbeth.

so when they appear in thunder (rather then lightening or rain), on the heath we know that they are there to meet Macbeth. We also know from their conversation that precedes Macbeth’s entrance that they are very malicious; the first witch has vowed to sail to out to a ship called the Tiger to stop its captain from sleeping, and to keep the ship almost wrecked for 567 days, all because the captain’s wife wouldn’t give her a chestnut, while the second witch has been “killing swine”, presumably for fun. This gives a sense of dramatic irony when the witches tell Macbeth of his future, and he assumes that these predictions are going to be to his benefit, but we know that the witches are malicious, and are out to destroy Macbeth. He does not realise this until Act 5 scene 5, when he “begin(s) to doubt th’equivocation of the fiend, that lies like truth”. The ambition that I was talking about is introduced when the witches greet Macbeth first with a title that everyone knows he has, then with a title that the audience knows he has, but he does not, and finally with the greatest title of all. To this, Macbeth “start(s), and seem(s) to fear”, and so shows us that he had a guilty conscience, and suggests that he had long been harbouring a deep desire to become king, even before he met the witches. This means that the predictions have a huge effect on him, and begin to take over his mind.

Therefore, over the next few scenes, we see the conflict in himself between his ambition, and his conscience. His personality becomes divided, and becomes very confused. He is spurred on by his wife, but then he didn’t have to tell her about the witch’s predictions, as he must have known that she would encourage him to do something rash. And the fact that he did shows that much of him wants her to encourage him towards a terrible deed,

Whose horrid image doth unfix (his) hair

And make (his) seated heart knock at his ribs

Against the ...

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Whose horrid image doth unfix (his) hair

And make (his) seated heart knock at his ribs

Against the use of nature

but yet he is “too full o’th’milk of human kindness” to be able to decide for himself whether or not to kill Duncan.

You may note that he says that this image is “against the use of nature” this refers to the idea of there being a natural order of things, which would be totally upset, and turned on its head by regicide.

The aside in Act 1 scene 3 shows how his feelings are in turmoil, and how he has become confused; each line of thought ends with a paradox, such as “nothing is, but what is not”. He then moves on to hope that “chance may crown him without (his) stir”, and concludes that he will let whatever happens happen. However, only a scene after this, moments after declaring his allegiance to Duncan, he hears that Malcolm is to be the heir to the throne, and says that this “is a step on which (he) must fall down, or else o’erleap”.

However he is partly so horrified at his own thoughts, that he asks the stars not to let light see his “black and deep desires”, but he also wants this because he wants to get away with the deed that is lurking at the back of his mind. He obviously realises that his ideas about regicide are very wrong, and he judges himself severely. However, the next scene involves Macbeth and his wife, and in it, we see how with very little persuasion, only a few hints and double meanings, she is able to quickly persuade him to kill Duncan. She tells him to “look like th’innocent flower, but be the serpent under’t”, as if he needed tips in how to deceive and equivocate. I say this because in scene 4, he publicly declared his loyalty to Duncan, and then a few lines later (in an aside) begins to show signs that the idea of murder is building up inside his head. Shakespeare deliberately puts these lines close together to mark the contrast between his outward appearance, and his inner feelings. It is ironic that Macbeth’s appearance, and feelings should be so different, and so treacherous, when Duncan is on stage, and in the same scene as he claimed “there’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face.”

However, his inner conflict is shown in scene 7, when he debates with himself, and identifies what is stopping him, and what is driving him on. This soliloquy has a great dramatic importance, because it shows just how tormented Macbeth is by the predictions of the witches and his ambition, in contrast to the awareness of how wrong the murder would be. He begins by saying that he would skip the afterlife if only it meant that he could succeed in becoming king. This is a measure of just how ambitious he is; he is a man who is always aware of the afterlife, he mentions it so often, yet says here that he would rather be successful in this one act, than live for ever at God’s side. He then begins to state the arguments against murder, beginning with the knowledge that the murderer will have justice eventually. He says that he shouldn’t kill him because he is his relation, king and host. He then uses very vivid and apocalyptic imagery to describe how Duncan’s virtues will “plead like angels against” his own lesser virtues, in heaven, because Duncan is such a saintly king. This implies that Macbeth does not think that highly of himself, because he recognises that Duncan is a far better king than he ever could be, and is a far better person than he. The image of the “naked newborn babe striding the blast” is another example of how vivid Macbeth’s imagination is, while giving another reason not to carry out the murder; the pity that he should feel for the old man. This is the most powerful reason for me, because of the way it is explained, and because I know how the murder will torment Macbeth and his wife for the rest of their lives. Therefore, Macbeth undergoes the change from a larger-than-life general, who is the hero of Scotland, to the guiltily ambitious thane, to the morally self-critical host, and then finally, in the rest of this scene, he turns into a poodle of his wife, and lets all his good sense be knocked down a combination of their ambition, and decides to kill Duncan.

Act 2 sees Macbeth carrying out the murder of Duncan (offstage). This alienates him from the audience, so that whereas in Act 1 we saw everything about him, including all of his inner conflict, he is now distanced from the audience. This idea is also present scene when the murderers come on; he mentions that they have already spoken on the subject of Banquo’s murder, and so that what the audience may have thought was just another dark thought in the back of his mind, suddenly is a reality. Thus, Shakespeare creates a sort of tension between the audience and Macbeth, because they no longer respect him. This process of alienation continues, and worsens as the play continues, and reaches its peak in Act 4, scene 2, in which Macduff’s “castle is surprised, his wife and babes savagely slaughtered. This happens on stage, and the horror of infanticide would shock any audience, and so make them hate and recoil from Macbeth. I think that to a modern day audience, this murder condemns Macbeth, because child killings for their parent’s “crimes” is a terrible thing, and in modern society there is little worse. However, in the early 17th Century, there had been no Civil War, or French Revolution, so people still believed that kings were sacred, and had been put there by God. This meant that regicide was not only murder, but also treason, and an act against God, and the natural order, so was a deeply sacrilegious thing to do.

The relationship between Macbeth and his wife deteriorates in a similar way to the relationship between him and the audience; in Act 1, they were “partners in greatness”, with her spurring him on to further achievements, but by Act 3, scene 2, she asks, “why do you keep alone?” but it is too late, and they continue to drift apart, and do not speak to each other after Act 3, scene 4. This deterioration of all of Macbeth’s relationships characterises his descent form the “most worthy thane” that we see at the beginning of the play, into the “abhorred tyrant” at the end. He cuts himself off from everything worthwhile in life because of his selfishness. In Act 4, scene 1, he seeks out the witches because he longs know what more lies in store for him. Now that all three of their original predictions have come true, he has nothing left to hang on to, and his ambition is restless. We already know how great his ambition is, so this may explain why he is so desperate to know more. However, when he goes to the witches this time, their predictions are not about his future successes, but instead are about his downfall. The speech in which he begs them for answers shows just how low he has sunk:

His first words are “I conjure” this shows that he is using the language of witchcraft, and so is evil. There was another reference of this sort, when he said, “so foul and fair a day I have not seen”, as opposed to the witches, who said “fair is foul, and foul is fair”, but he wasn’t dabbling in witchcraft then, and perhaps that speech was only intended to reinforce the idea that throughout this play, all is not as it seems. He then says that if he gets his way, he is prepared for corn and trees to be blown down, so that there would be famine and destruction in nature. For castles, which were then the definition of stability, and strength, especially for kings, to fall down killing their warders, and for palaces and pyramids, which were more splendid side of being a monarch, to fall down. Finally, he says that the seeds of all life can cease to live, and destruction can continue until it grows tired of destroying, if it means he can find out about his future. This shows that he has completely lost his earlier sense of right and wrong and of his importance in the world, because of his terrible solipsism. In Act 1, he was able to realise that he shouldn’t kill Duncan, because Duncan was a better person than him, and a better king. But by this stage, he has lost all sense of proportion, and is just desperate. He says, “for mine own good all causes shall give way”, and seems to be so much engrossed in solipsism, that he refuses to acknowledge that other people exist. Soon after this, he revisits the witches, and then goes on to murder all Macduff’s children. This is a good example of how he changes through the play, and how his ambition has got the better of his awareness of right and wrong. However, this does not meant that his awareness of moral and spiritual values is dead; we can see that his imagination is still very active, and that is why his murder of Duncan affects him so deeply. In Act 1 Lady Macbeth told him to “consider it not so deeply” after he was terrified by his inability to say “amen”, but yet this is the type of thing that haunts him to the end of his life, and drives him to isolate himself from everything that he holds dear. Once he knows that he has “forsaken the life to come”, he cuts himself off from all moral and spiritual values, and though he is still very aware of these values, he just ignores them. As Macbeth himself said,

I am in blood

Stepped in so far that should I wade no more,

Returning were as tedious as going o’er.

In this horrific and apocalyptic imagery, he conveys that he might as well continue to be bad, rather than admit his mistakes, and try to be forgiven. This idea is repeated, when the doctor says that the patient must help itself to be healed from a disease of the mind, and he basically says that he can’t be bothered with this. He has a deeply troubled mind, but yet his pride stops him from admitting that he ever made a mistake.

By Act 5, scene 3, he knows that it is over, and begins to mourn himself. He says, again with imaginative imagery, that his way of life is slowly dying,

And that which should accompany old age,

As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,

I must not look to have.