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Power Corrupts, Power Helps

In: English and Literature

Submitted By kaily
Words 2009
Pages 9
April18th, 2011
Power Corrupts, Power Helps
Power changes people, by altering how they think and act. Power has the ability to make living-beings change for the better or for the worse, depending on the individual’s personality. William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth shows many incidents resulting in the want for power, or to become powerful. The characters in Macbeth show how the outcome of becoming powerful can be both negative and positive. Macbeth’s personality drastically changes for the worse after hearing the witches’ three prophecies about the power that is ahead. Malcom and Macduff are completely selfless; they have the desire to become powerful to help their people, not for self-gratitude. These events would not have happened if it was not for the three witches and their prophecies. The desire for power itself is not a bad thing. It is the outcome of having power that can be harmful depending on the intentions of the power-holder their self.
Macbeth is portrayed as a hero by his fellow soldiers at the beginning of the play;
For brave Macbeth-well he deserves that name
Disdaining fortune, with his brandish’d steel
Which smoked with bloody excecution,
Like valour’s minion carved out his passage
Till he faced the slave;/which ne’er shook hands from the nave to chaps,
And fix’d his head upon our battlements. (I.ii.18-25)
Macbeth’s character changes not long after his heroic actions had been brought to the attention of others. This happens because of one thing, the desire to be powerful. There are three witches that can tell the future, they gave Macbeth three prophecies saying; he will become Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and King hereafter. Macbeth was skeptical about what the witches had told him, but after Macbeth became Thane of Cawdor he realizes that the prophecies are true, and he will become King. From that point on

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