Of noble having, and of royal hope,.
That he seems rapt withal. To me you speak not" (Act 1 Scene 3 lines 54-57).
He is more down to Earth than Macbeth, and takes the whole thing in his stride, which shows how ambitious Macbeth is compared to others.
When we first meet Lady Macbeth she is reading Macbeth's letter about how close he is to being king. She is saying about how he does not have what it takes to mercilessly commit a murder, that he does not have "the illness"- the evil inside making you capable of murder. She goes on to say that she would-.
"Chastise him with the valour of my tongue.
All that impedes the from the golden round." (Act 1 Scene 5 lines 54-57).
-Which means that she would tell him that she would tell him that he couldn't commit the murder of the king, and she would tell him his weaknesses which prevent him from getting the crown, therefore making him angry and driving him into killing the king.
The superstitious opening of the play immediately implies doom and tragedy, and the audience would associate the witches with evil, as I said in the last paragraph. There would always be an undertone of evil beneath Macbeth following this association. I think that as they continuously pump ideas into his head, regularly giving him visions of power and building his confidence, making him seem invincible, he is less responsible for his actions, as they keep him interested in the whole thing. They found the butcher inside Macbeth and "Turned it on", keeping it turned on by flicking his switch regularly (the visions etc). He believes the witches blindly, and if they told him anything he would have probably believed them. They showed him what he could achieve, and he knew he would have to butcher people to get there quickly. They showed him the door, but only he could open it. However, they did tell him that he did not have to kill anyone, which he ignored, as he was too impatient. This could imply that he wanted to kill.
