Macbeth endeavours to escape from reflection on his crimes by
repelling their consequences, and banishes remorse for the past by
the meditation of future mischief. This is not the principle of
Richard's cruelty, which resembles the wanton malice of a fiend as
much as the frailty of human passion. Macbeth is goaded on to acts
of violence and retaliation by necessity; to Richard, blood is a
pastime.--There are other decisive differences inherent in the two
characters. Richard may be regarded as a man of the world, a
plotting, hardened knave, wholly regardless of everything but his
own ends, and the means to secure them.--Not so Macbeth. The
superstitions of the age, the rude state of society, the local
scenery and customs, all give a wildness and imaginary grandeur to
his character. From the strangeness of the events that surround him,
he is full of amazement and fear; and stands in doubt between the
world of reality and the world of fancy. He sees sights not shown to
mortal eye, and hears unearthly music. All is tumult and disorder
within and without his mind; his purposes recoil upon himself, are
broken and disjointed; he is the double thrall of his passions and
his evil destiny. Richard is not a character either of imagination
or pathos, but of pure self-will. There is no conflict of opposite
feelings in his breast.
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