The overwhelming
pressure of preternatural agency urges on the tide of human passion
with redoubled force. Macbeth himself appears driven along by the
violence of his fate like a vessel drifting before a storm: he reels
to and fro like a drunken man; he staggers under the weight of his
own purposes and the suggestions of others; he stands at bay with
his situation; and from the superstitious awe and breathless
suspense into which the communications of the Weird Sisters throw
him, is hurried on with daring impatience to verify their
predictions, and with impious and bloody hand to tear aside the veil
which hides the uncertainty of the future. He is not equal to the
struggle with fate and conscience. He now 'bends up each corporal
instrument to the terrible feat'; at other times his heart misgives
him, and he is cowed and abashed by his success. 'The deed, no less
than the attempt, confounds him.' His mind is assailed by the stings
of remorse, and full of 'preternatural solicitings'. His speeches
and soliloquies are dark riddles on human life, baffling solution,
and entangling him in their labyrinths. In thought he is absent and
perplexed, sudden and desperate in act, from a distrust of his own
resolution. His energy springs from the anxiety and agitation of his
mind. His blindly rushing forward on the objects of his ambition and
revenge, or his recoiling from them, equally betrays the harassed
state of his feelings.
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