In this scene of Macbeth, his ambition starts to make him become more demanding and selfish, we see his second nature start to become stronger. When he firsts meets the witches, Macbeth is frightened because they know so much about him. Upon greeting him they mention his name and hail him "Thane of Glamis".
Their predictions arouse his fear:
"Why do you…fear things that….sound so fair"
What the witches predict is that he will become thane of Cawdor and become king. What makes Macbeth wary is that the present king has not proclaimed him his successor. Therefore in order for Macbeth to claim the throne he must murder Duncan, the present king. A picture of Macbeth is emerging portraying him as an ambitious character capable of contemplating murder. We can tell Macbeth is contemplating murder because after he’s been told he is Thane of Cawdor, he is thinking about being king and says:
"Whose murder yet is but fantastical".
So the witches’ predictions scare Macbeth because he doesn’t know weather he will react to them rationally. Before the witches are about to leave, Macbeth's ambition makes him eager to hear more from them and he demands to hear more:
"Stay you imperfect speakers…speak, I charge you".
Macbeth's conscience tells him not to think about the murder but his ambition tells him otherwise. So he thinks that as he became Thane of Cawdor by doing nothing, then perhaps if he did nothing again he would become king, he tells himself this because he does not want to think that he has to commit murder to achieve his goal:
"Chance will have me king".
This scene is very important because it is a major step towards Macbeth changing into a more ruthless character. The witches have already implanted the thought of becoming king into Macbeth so he now has been reminded about the idea and could easily become obsessed with it.
There is an ironic contrast in what the king say’s because he points out that you can’t trust someone because they act honourably and look like worthy gentlemen:
"There’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face".
He is referring to the previous Thane of Cawdor and this is relevant to Macbeth because he is the new Thane of Cawdor and he to will betray the king who has great trust in Macbeth. When Macbeth meets the king you see how conniving he is because he flatters the king so that he can use him to his advantage:
"Your highness part is to receive your duties and our duties are to your throne and state".
This quote suggests that it is for Duncan to accept duties and the people’s duties are to serve him. Upon Macbeth hearing from the king that Malcolm is the successor to the throne, we find Macbeth is capable of hiding his devastation to deceive the king:
"Stars hide your fires let not light see my black and deep desires".
We notice how Macbeth is becoming more and more obsessed with the idea of becoming king that he feels anger towards anyone who is an obstacle in his way. This is a dangerous sign that he is on the turning point of loosing his morals.
Lady Macbeth wants her husband to be king but she feels that he is not ruthless enough:
"art not without the ambition, but without the illness should attend it".
Lady Macbeth wants Macbeth to be as malicious as her so she say’s she will "Pour…spirits in thine ear". This means that she will try to convince Macbeth to be evil like her. The fact that Lady Macbeth wants her husband to be capable of murder is very important because she acts as a catalyst in changing her husband’s limits when it comes to killing.
When Macbeth is thinking about why he shouldn't kill the king he thinks that Duncan has been a good king and there will be an uproar after his death:
"Hath born his faculties so meek….his virtues will plead like angels".
We can see that at this point Macbeth’s conscience is stronger than his ambition and he is weak in that he cannot control his ambition but at the same time his emotions are taking over the way he acts. When Macbeth tries to make a stand up to his wife he say’s:
"We shall proceed no further in this business".
Lady Macbeth uses his desire to be king against him:
"was the hope drunk".
We notice from this that Lady Macbeth is the main reason why her husband kills the king because she attacks his manhood and destroys his ambition to become king without killing someone:
"to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man".
Here she is saying that Macbeth was a man before but to kill the king now would make him manlier than ever before. You can see how Macbeth is weak because he allows himself to be easily manipulated. When he does agree to do it, you can see how unsure he is of the plan because he questions it:
"If we should fail?"
At this point in the play we should see that Lady Macbeth is the one who is doing all the plotting and she is the character with more status.
After the murder Macbeth feels regret and remorse for what he has done, so he looks at the blood on his hands and say’s:
"this is a sorry sight".
Macbeth clearly feels regret for what he has done and believes that when he was murdering Duncan and he could not say amen, it was a sign that God had forsaken him:
"amen stuck in my throat".
You see that Macbeth is feeling guilt when he said:
"voices cry in the house that he shall sleep no more".
This quote means that Macbeth won’t be able to sleep after what he has done. Macbeth is broken up because of what he has done and whilst he is still suffering from the shock his wife tells him to go and smear blood on the "sleepy grooms" to make it look as though they murdered the king, but he replies:
"I’ll go no more, I am afraid to think of what I have done".
You can tell from this quote that Macbeth is feeling so much remorse that he is unable to do anything, even if it will benefit himself. Macbeth is unable to contemplate what he has done, so he looks at his hands in disbelief:
"hands…pluck out mine eyes".
Lady Macbeth is not feeling the same regret as she treats the blood on her hands not as a mark of something evil but something that will come off with the aid of water. Macbeth will always have the vision of the blood on his hands reminding him of his crime:
"not even great Neptune’s ocean will wash the blood away".
If we compare Macbeth to his former self then we will see that before he was loyal, brave and would only kill someone face to face. However, now he has killed the king while he was sleeping, which means that he has become a coward. This section of the play was very significant because in this section Macbeth has reduced in worth as a character because of one woman who was capable manipulating him into killing someone.
Now Macbeth has killed the king, he starts to become paranoid that he will loose the throne because he remembers that Banquo's children will grow up to be kings so he kills Banquo and Banquo´s only son. Macbeth also wants to kill Fleance as well to make sure that he becomes king:
"we have scorched the snake not killed it".
We start to notice now that Macbeth has become more ruthless and he is able to kill without much thought involved. In the play Macbeth actually becomes jealous of Duncan:
"He sleeps well, nothing can touch him".
Macbeth feels jealous because Duncan is dead and now he does not have to deal with the difficulties of life where nothing can harm him. However, Macbeth has to deal with "terrible dreams" that were guaranteed by the voices he heard when he killed Duncan. There is a reversal between Macbeth and his wife which at this stage is quite clear because before it was Lady Macbeth who was the stronger character and she came across as the more devious person, Macbeth was doing what she told him to even though his conscience told him not to:
"faces visors to our hearts".
Now Macbeth´s head is filled with maliciousness and evil plots which he describes as scorpions:
"Full of scorpions is my mind".
Now it is Macbeth who is hiding his plans away from his wife from fear of hurting her. She has become weak minded and can not take any more horror so Macbeth keeps her:
"innocent of the knowledge".
Macbeth believes that the more evil tasks you perform, the easier they become to do:
"Bad begun, make strong themselves by ill".
Macbeth visits the witches to find out what he should do next and they tell him to beware of Macduff, so when he finds out that he has fled from England he kills his entire family:
"The castle of Macduff I will surprise".
Throughout the play, we find Macbeth´s character changes. At first he appears to be a brave and honourable soldier. However, his character proves to be more complex. There is a darker side to him; his weakness, his greed and ambition leads him to murder the king. The weak side of his nature lays him open to manipulation and emotional blackmail by his wife. His thirst for power drives him on. However, the remorse he primarily feels upon murdering the king is short lived. Indeed the darker side of his nature overtakes his fears of God forsaking him: "amen stuck in his throat". He is eclipsed by the ruthless side of his nature and is driven to commit more atrocious murders to further his ambitions. We have learnt that Macbeth was not a person who was predictable or to be underestimated. He was a Villain in his own mind.
“Fair is foul and foul is fair”