Macbeth, the cousin of a King mild, just, and beloved, but now too old to lead his army, is introduced to us as a general of extraordinary prowess, who has covered himself with glory in putting down a rebellion and repelling the invasion of a foreign army.  In these conflicts he showed great personal courage, a quality which he continues to display throughout the drama in regard to all plain dangers.  It is difficult to be sure of his customary demeanour, for in the play we see him either in what appears to be an exceptional relation to his wife, or else in the throes of remorse and desperation; but from his behaviour during his journey home after the war, from his later conversations with Lady Macbeth, and from his language to the murderers of Banquo and to others, we imagine him as a great warrior, somewhat masterful, rough, and abrupt, a man to inspire some fear and much admiration.  He was thought ‘honest,’ or honourable; he was trusted, apparently, by everyone; Macduff, a man of the highest integrity, ‘loved him well.’  And there was, in fact, much good in him.  We have no warrant, I think, for describing him, with many writers, as of a ‘noble’ nature, like Hamlet or Othello;[214] but he had a keen sense both of honour and of the worth of a good name.  The phrase, again, ’too much of the milk of human kindness,’ is applied to him in impatience by his wife, who did not fully understand him; but certainly he was far from devoid of humanity and pity.

At the same time he was exceedingly ambitious.  He must have been so by temper.  The tendency must have been greatly strengthened by his marriage.  When we see him, it has been further stimulated by his remarkable success and by the consciousness of exceptional powers and merit.  It becomes a passion.  The course of action suggested by it is extremely perilous:  it sets his good name, his position, and even his life on the hazard.  It is also abhorrent to his better feelings.  Their defeat in the struggle with ambition leaves him utterly wretched, and would have kept him so, however complete had been his outward success and security.  On the other hand, his passion for power and his instinct of self-assertion are so vehement that no inward misery could persuade him to relinquish the fruits of crime, or to advance from remorse to repentance.

In the character as so far sketched there is nothing very peculiar, though the strength of the forces contending in it is unusual.  But there is in Macbeth one marked peculiarity, the true apprehension of which is the key to Shakespeare’s conception.[215] This bold ambitious man of action has, within certain limits, the imagination of a poet,—­an imagination on the one hand extremely sensitive to impressions of a certain kind, and, on the other, productive of violent disturbance both of mind and body.  Through it he is kept in contact with supernatural impressions and is liable to supernatural fears.  And through it, especially, come to him the intimations of conscience