Describe Macbeth's vision at the end of Act II Scene 1 in Macbeth.

In this important soliloquy, we are presented with Macbeth, who
is waiting for the signal from his wife to go and kill Duncan. He imagines a dagger which he
cannot grasp, which leads him to contemplate what he is about to do and helps him prepare
himself:

Thou
marshall'st me the way that I was goin;

And such an instrument I was
to use--

The dagger therefore can be
seen to be moving towards Duncan's room, richly suggestive of the violence that Macbeth is just
about to engage in. In sharp contrast with Banquo, Macbeth allies himself with the forces of
witchcraft and evil:

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Now o'er the one
half-world

Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams
abuse

The curtain'd sleep; Witchcraft
celebrates

Pale Hacate's off'rings; and wither'd
Murther,

Alarum'd by his sentinel, the
wolf,

Whose holw's his watch, thus with his stealthy
pace,

With Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his
design

Moves like a
ghost.

Note how the "summons to sleep"
that Banquo feels has actually become a "summons to hell" for Duncan according to Macbeth in the
last line of this powerful soliloquy. Thus in this soliloquy we are presented with a Macbeth
whose subconscious creates a dagger that he sees covered in blood, that moves towards the chamber
where Duncan is sleeping. Macbeth uses this dagger to discuss his perceptions of reality, and
then, based on these musings, firmly allies himself with the forces of evil just as Lady Macbeth
did in Act I scene 5. The scene is set for the horrendous crime of regicide that is to
follow.