The Character Of MacBeth Essays (1688 words) - Characters In Macbeth

The Character of MacBeth Macbeth is presented as a mature man of definitelyestablished character, successful in certain fields of activity and enjoying an enviable reputation. We must not conclude, there, that all his volitions and actions are predictable; Macbeth's character, like any other man's at a given moment, is what is being made out of potentialities plus environment, and no one, not even Macbeth himself, can know all his inordinate self-love whose actions are discovered to be-and no doubt have been for a long time- determined mainly by an inordinate desire for some temporal or mutable good. Macbeth is actuated in his conduct mainly by an inordinate desire for worldly honors; his delight lies primarily in buying golden opinions from all sorts of people. But we must not, therefore, deny him an entirely human complexity of motives. For example, his fighting in Duncan's service is magnificent and courageous, and his evident joy in it is traceable in art to the natural pleasure which accompanies the explosive expenditure of prodigious physical energy and the euphoria which follows. He also rejoices no doubt in the success which crowns his efforts in battle - and so on. He may even conceived of the proper motive which should energize back of his great deed: The service and the loyalty I owe, In doing it, pays itself. But while he destroys the king's enemies, such motives work but dimly at best and are obscured in his consciousness by more vigorous urges. In the main, as we have said, his nature violently demands rewards: he fights valiantly in order that he may be reported in such terms a "valour's minion" and "Bellona's bridegroom"' he values success because it brings spectacular fame and new titles and royal favor heaped upon him in public. Now so long as these mutable goods are at all commensurate with his inordinate desires - and such is the case, up until he covets the kingship - Macbeth remains an honorable gentleman. He is not a criminal; he has no criminal tendencies. But once permit his self-love to demand a satisfaction which cannot be honorably attained, and he is likely to grasp any dishonorable means to that end which may be safely employed. In other words, Macbeth has much of natural good in him unimpaired; environment has conspired with his nature to make him upright in all his dealings with those about him. But moral goodness in him is undeveloped and indeed still rudimentary, for his voluntary acts are scarcely brought into harmony with ultimate end. As he returns from victorious battle, puffed up with self-love which demands ever-increasing recognition of his greatness, the demonic forces of evil-symbolized by the Weird Sisters-suggest to his inordinate imagination the splendid prospect of attaining now the greatest mutable good he has ever desired. These demons in the guise of witches cannot read his inmost thoughts, but from observation of facial expression and other bodily manifestations they surmise with comparative accuracy what passions drive him and what dark desires await their fostering. Realizing that he wishes the kingdom, they prophesy that he shall be king. They cannot thus compel his will to evil; but they do arouse his passions and stir up a vehement and inordinate apprehension of the imagination, which so perverts the judgment of reason that it leads his will toward choosing means to the desired temporal good. Indeed his imagination and passions are so vivid under this evil impulse from without that "nothing is but what is not"; and his reason is so impeded that he judges, "These solicitings cannot be evil, cannot be good." Still, he is provided with so much natural good that he is able to control the apprehensions of his inordinate imagination and decides to take no step involving crime. His autonomous decision not to commit murder, however, is not in any sense based upon moral grounds. No doubt he normally shrinks from the unnaturalness of regicide; but he so far ignores ultimate ends that, if he could perform the deed and escape its consequences here upon this bank and shoal of time, he'ld jump the life to come. Without denying him still a complexity of motives - as kinsman and subject he may possibly experience some slight shade of unmixed loyalty to the King under his roof-we may even say that the consequences which he fears are not at all inward and spiritual, It is to be doubted whether he has ever so far considered the possible effects of crime and evil upon the human soul-his later discovery of horrible ravages produced by evil in his own spirit constitutes part of the tragedy. Hi is

Why My College TASC Sample Essay Got Thrown Away?

Why My College TASC Sample Essay Got Thrown Away?I'm trying to find out why my college TASC sample essay got thrown in the trash. I worked hard on it and felt pretty good about it but I just can't seem to figure out why it was tossed.We all know that the college entrance exam is one of the most important things to a student. It really determines whether or not you get in and will also determine what school you attend. No one wants to go to a mediocre college for the rest of your life because the atmosphere is one of stress.The TASC sample essay that I've been working on seems to be pretty standard, but I wanted to find out what was wrong with it. I went back to look at the whole thing and checked my spelling and grammar, but when I was done, I couldn't find anything that was suspicious.Before I left the college TASC, I took a look at it again to make sure there wasn't anything that had changed or something I hadn't heard about before. It wasn't until I went back to check the answers to my questions that I noticed there were a few things that weren't there.The first was the word test. I couldn't see any references to 'test' anywhere. I don't know why it's still there but it seems to have crept into the essay and it makes me suspicious.Also, when I took a look at the college TASC sample essay, I noticed that they didn't show the person's name anywhere. This is kind of strange to me since I thought they should show it somewhere so that people could see it, but they didn't.Finally, even though they showed the person's name, it wasn't there when I looked itup after I wrote this. So far, this isn't something that's changing or showing up somewhere else.I've tried looking at other college TASC sample essays and the ones I've looked at have the same problems as the first one did. It seems like nothing is being changed.