The first act presents Macbeth with an ethical dilemma: how should he respond to the prophecy that he will be king? His decision hinges on his concept of sanctions.
- The witches begin the play by talking about “when the battle’s lost and won.” The witches are agents of confusion, and part of their confusion will be to substitute temporal blessings for eternal damnation. They make the foul appear fair and the fair appear foul.
- Scotland has rebels (Macdonwald and the Thane of Cawdor) and attackers (Norway). While on the surface, the two sides appear to be equal, Macbeth and his Scottish comrades ultimately prevail. Macbeth has heaps of praise lavished on him; he is “valiant,” “worthy,” and “noble.” We’ve now heard his name in each of the first two scenes without seeing him.
- Macbeth’s first line echoes the witches’ statement in the first scene: “So foul and fair a day I have not seen.”
- The witches prophesy that Macbeth will be the Thane of Cawdor and king but that Banquo’s children shall be kings. In an aside, Macbeth grapples with whether or not this “supernatural soliciting” is good or bad. On the one hand, it promises good things. On the other hand, it tempts Macbeth to do something evil. Macbeth does not overtly mention killing Duncan, but he mentions a “horrid image” and “murder.” Macbeth already feels guilt for something he hasn’t done.
- The Thane of Cawdor repents of his sin before his execution. While his life was lived in deception, his death is marked by open confession.
- Macbeth’s wish that his “eye” would “wink at the hand” is a perversion of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount admonition that, in giving, “do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” Macbeth wants to hide his own dark desires from himself.
- Lady Macbeth articulates the delusion of evil: erasing its curse. “Thy letters have transported me beyond / This ignorant present, and I feel now / The future in an instant.” If this were really true, Lady Macbeth would not go through with their plan. She too has hidden the reality of her desires from herself.
- Macbeth’s soliloquy in scene 7 contemplates two judgments: one on earth and one in the life to come. Macbeth says that if he could handle earthly judgment, he would risk eternal judgment. However, he knows that earthly judgment is no joke. Duncan is saintly, and Macbeth fears what will happen when his own “blood instructions…return / to plague th’inventor.” If he decides not to kill Duncan, he does so because the ministers of eternal judgment will sanction his deeds in this world.
- Lady Macbeth chooses to imagine the blessings their murder will occasion. Macbeth has seen the punishment. Lady Macbeth’s rhetoric prevails.
Experiments in Criticism 