Analysis Of Macbeth's Atrocious Act With 'The Great Chain Of Being'

Macbeth

No matter what culture a person is from killing someone is an atrocious act to mankind. In William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Macbeth kills the king while hes in a deep slumber. This is considered regicide, the action of killing a king. Most Elizabethans during that time period would have considered this regicide so unnatural that nature was appalled by it. Shakespeare portrays the effects of the atrocious act with “The Great Chain of Being”, Elizabethan World Order was a theory that Shakespeare uses in many of his plays to create and develop events. ( resources.mhs.vic.edu.au) On Earth society’s order was king, churchman, nobles, merchants, and peasants. Animals of the earth also had an order that the lion was the king and his

Ross says, “And yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp:/ Is’t night’s predominance, or the day’s shame,/That darkness does the face of the earth entomb,/ When living light should kiss it?” (Act II, Scene 4) This describes the sun being blocked and the world being in pure darkness during the time. The weather was reacting to King Duncan’s death by going into Chaos after the death. Another example, is the day Banquo gets murdered. One of Banquo’s last lines were, “It will rain tonight.” (Scene III, Scene 3) This is when the three murderers kill Banquo in the night. He predicts the weather will change because the hierarchy was disputed by the three murderers. The sky starts to rain as natures way of being unnatural because of the murder. The weather plays an important role in “The Great Chain of

Usually on top of the Animal Kingdom are lions and falcons. For instance, Macbeth breaks “The Great Change of Being” by killing King Duncan for him to move up in the social hierarchy. Nature responds to this by creating some chaos through the animal’s chain. In Act 2 Scene 4, the Old Man said. “Even like the deed that’s done. On Tuesday last/ A falcon, tow’ring in her pride of place,/ Was by a mousing owl hawked at and killed.” In this example, An owl, whose class was lower than the falcons, killed a falcon. The owl should have easily mislead the owl, but because the order was corrupted in human society, the same happened to the Animal Kingdom. This shouldn’t be happening in a normal setting, but because Macbeth committed regicide, the whole world was in chaos. A great second example of this, would be the horses eating each other too. According to the Old Man in Act II Scene 4, “ ‘Tis said they eat each other.” This would not have happened if “The Great Chain of Being” was not destroyed by Macbeth committing