In human society there are different rank and class systems that distinguish groups of people. Ambition – the pursuit of power – is an internal drive that is rooted in each of us. It motivates us to improve ourselves. Ambition can lead to corruption, such as in William Shakespeare's play Macbeth, where the main character Macbeth is driven by his ambition and ultimately becomes corrupt. Macbeth chooses to let ambition override his humanity to achieve and hold the throne which will ultimately lead to his and Scotland's downfall. Initially, Macbeth is a loyal and courageous subject of the King of Scotland, but he is also a man who harbors a hidden ambition for power. In a military camp near the king's palace at Forres, a wounded captain describes to King Duncan of Scotland how "brave Macbeth" plunged fearlessly into the Scottish civil war while "Disdaining Fortune" (1.2.16-17) he killed the traitor Macdonwald, rebel leader of the Irish invaders. The captain's account of Macbeth's courage and loyalty in battle is immediately contradicted by Macbeth's obvious fixation on the witches' prophecy that reveals his great ambition. After hearing the witches' prophecy that he would become king "Macbeth comes to regard the promise of the witches' crown in light of a contract with fate" (Cohen), Banquo observed him "beginning" as one who "seem[s] to “fear/Things that seem so beautiful” (1.3.49-50) This is the “reaction of a guilty man who has heard his secret thoughts guessed and expressed.” arbiters of destiny, but simply diabolical spirits whose function is to plant seeds of temptation in the souls of people already inclined to sin and despair." (Cohen). Macbeth becomes Thane of Caw... in the middle of the sheet... the advice of his wife in murdering Duncan knew the risks he was taking and ended up being the cause of his own death. It works Quoted Cohen, Joshua “'That great bond that makes me pale': Macbeth's contract with fate.” Shakespeare Newsletter Fall 2010: 61+ Web April 7, 2014. Jaffa, Harry V. "Macbeth and the Moral Universe." Claremont Review of Books Winter 2007: 27+. Literature Resource Center. Web. April 7, 2014. McGrail, Mary Ann. "Macbeth: What Does the Tyrant?" In Tyranny in Shakespeare. Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2001. 19-46. in Shakespearean Criticism Ed. Michelle Lee: Gale, 2006. Literature Resource Center 7 April 2014. British Literature Ed. JanetAllen et al. Evanston: Holt McDougal-Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010. 348-431.