Grace StaffordM. TappyEnglish December 1-29, 2013The Darkness of AmbitionPresident Franklin D. Roosevelt's wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, once said, “Ambition is merciless. Any merit he cannot use seems contemptible to him. » Ambition can be an emotion that can drive people to madness and this character flaw is visible in the play Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Macbeth is about a Scottish Thane who decides to kill the King of Scotland to obtain the crown. This murder sets off a chain of evil acts on Macbeth's part because he does not know how to deal with his ambition. At the end of the play, the reader learns that ambition was actually the cause of Macbeth's downfall. In the famous play Macbeth, Macbeth's character's lack of ambition leads him to self-destruct before anything else. At the very beginning of the play, Macbeth is already beginning to be overwhelmed by his desire for power. Macbeth's ambition begins to blind him when three witches tell him that he will be Thane of Cawdor and King. The reader can see his desire to be able to begin to grow and blind him in this quote: “This supernatural solicitation cannot be bad, cannot be good. If I am sick, why did this give me serious success, starting with a truth? I am the Thane of Cawdor” (Act I. Scene III.134-137). This quote explains how Macbeth thinks killing the king could be bad or good? If everything witches say is bad, then why am I the Thane of Cawdor? If he wanted to do the right thing, he wouldn't even think about killing King Duncan. Ambition is already beginning to appear as his flaw. Later in the act, Macbeth's lust for power is in full swing when he decides to kill Duncan. This desire blinds him to what he should really be doing. The audience can see this greed in this quote: "If it were... middle of paper... ambition reactions such as lying, cheating, and stealing to get ahead." Everyone has flaws but very few people's flaws result in their destruction. This is not the case in Macbeth, however. The main character, Macbeth, uses his lack of ambition and ends up getting killed for it. His ambition begins small, such as simply thinking about the idea of ​​killing Duncan, but then escalates into actually killing him. After that, he kills his friends, innocent women and children, and he brings pain and suffering to his country. However, in the end, he finally realizes that he was blinded and took the wrong path. Like when Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “Ambition is ruthless.” Any merit he cannot use seems contemptible to him. » Ambition pities no one and devours all the good aspects of people. Macbeth is a famous example of what ambition can do to a person.