A guilty conscience never feels secure-Publilius Syrus In the play Macbeth By William Shakespeare the character Lady Macbeth forces her husband Macbeth to kill King Duncan. . Macbeth killed the king to gain the throne. However, after the murder Macbeth is unable to handle the guilt properly. Guilt is one of the key images which recur throughout the play. The guilt troubled Macbeth from the start and couldn't take it anymore. Where Lady Macbeth craved the darkness from the start, but towards the end she couldn't handle the guilt. Both their guilty consciences showed how they could not bare the crime, but could not get rid of truth. Shakespeare uses Water and Blood as symbols to convey his theme that those with guilty consciences seek atonement. …show more content…
Blood represents a guilty conscience. With the shame Macbeth feels for killing Duncan which conveys the theme ,that those with a guilty conscience seek atonement. After killing Duncan kept hearing sounds around him and the blood on his hands made that worse. Macbeth thought he was going to get caught, So his wife told him that water will clear everything off. Macbeth said “ Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from my hand” (I.II.83). It demonstrates that Macbeth knows that the blood cannot escape his hands, this crime will never get erased.It will always be there to haunt him no matter what.Lady Macbeth shares the same feeling as Macbeth, but doesn't show any emotion. They both feel guilty for the death of King Duncan. Lady Macbeth displays her guilt when she says "Yet who would have thought the old man to have so much blood in him!" (.iv.213). Lady Macbeth seemed so brave committing the crimes, but as the play comes towards the end she feels guilty of the murder. She's confessing the mistakes she once made, because the crime as came back to haunt her. Lady Macbeth believes that if she confesses what she has done to King Duncan that her conscience might feel somewhat better than have the burden on her chest. Yet Lady Macbeth started has an evil killer until her guilt caught up to her where she falls into a state of