Shakespeare's character of Macbeth certainly illustrates
the tragic waste of nobility and goodness in a character. For, in the beginning of the
play, Macbeth, Macbeth has gained recognition for himself as a
warrior, and is praised by King Duncan as a "valiant cousin" and "Worthy gentleman"
after the Captain describes Macbeth's deeds:
For brave Macbeth--well he deserves that
name--
Disdaining fortune, with his brandished
steel,
Which smoked with bloody
execution,
Like valor's minion carved out his
passage
Till he faced the
slave;
Which nev'r shook hands, nor bade farewell to
him,
Till he unseamed him from the nave to
th'chops,
And fixed his head upon our battlements.
(1.2.18-25)
Tempted by the
witches who call him his new title of Than of Cawdor, but then say he will be "King
hereafter," Macbeth feels himself lured by the phantasmagoric realm. Unsettled by the
temptation of power, on the visit of Duncan to his castle, Macbeth yet reminds himself
of his kinship to Duncan, whose host he is; he considers the goodness and virtue of the
king, who has made humble use of his power. That he should kill this noble king for no
valid reasons Macbeth himself states,
....Besides,
this Duncan
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath
been
So clear in his geat office, that his virtuesWill
plead like angels trumpet-tongued against
The deep
damnation of his taking-off;...
...I have not
spur
To prick the sides of my intent, but
only
Vaulting
ambition...(1.7.16-27)
And,
so, it is this "vaulting ambition," this cupidity of Macbeth, which causes him to
abandon his noble nature and succumb to Lady Macbeth's attacks upon his manhood to make
him slay King Duncan and fulfill the predictions of the preternatural three
sisters, thus giving himself over to the powers of evil.
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