How Does Act 1 Manipulate Macbeth

Lady Macbeth uses the persuasive techniques word choice, name-calling, and urgency to manipulate Macbeth into murdering King Duncan. She uses word choice many times throughout Act 1 to manipulate him. Lines 54-59a in Scene 7 is a great example of her word choice. These lines read, “I have given suck, and know how tender ‘tis to love the babe that milks me. I would, while it was smiling in my face, have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums and dashed the brains out had I so sworn as you have done this.” Here she is saying that if she promised to murder her own child as Macbeth has promised her to murder King Duncan, she would do it without second thoughts. The word choice she uses evokes emotion from Macbeth. She told him she knows how much she would love the child, and even if it was smiling up at her she would still kill it to keep her promise to him. He starts to feel guilty because if she would make and keep such a promise for him, then why wouldn’t he keep the one he made her and kill the king like he said he would?

When she is first introduced in Scene 5, she states, “yet do I fear thy nature - it is too full o’th milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great, art not without ambition, but without the illness should attend it.”. In this quote she is voicing her belief that Macbeth is a coward, saying that he doesn’t have the guts to do what needs to be done. In Scene 7 she says “Like the poor cat i’ the adage?”. Here she is comparing him to a cat in an old adage, where the cat wants to eat fish, but is too scared to get its feet wet. She is calling him a coward to his face, and telling him that he isn’t brave enough to do what is necessary to achieve the throne. She belittles him by calling him names multiple times, making him think that if he doesn’t kill the king then he really is a