25 Key Macbeth Quotes That Reveal Ambition & Guilt

The right quote can wake you, steady you, or make you see your own reflection more clearly. Shakespeare’s Macbeth is full of lines that expose raw ambition and wrenching guilt — and many of those lines also push us to act, to reflect, and to change. Use these quotes when you need courage to decide, a reminder of consequences, or a spark of literary clarity to motivate introspection and decisive action.

Motivational quotes

• "I dare do all that may become a man; who dares do more is none." — Macbeth
• "Screw your courage to the sticking-place, and we'll not fail." — Lady Macbeth
• "Come what come may, Time and the hour runs through the roughest day." — Macbeth
• "If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me, without my stir." — Macbeth
• "So foul and fair a day I have not seen." — Macbeth
• "Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn the power of man." — Apparition / Witches

Ambition & resolve quotes

• "I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself and falls on th' other." — Macbeth
• "The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step on which I must fall down, or else o'er-leap." — Macbeth
• "Stars, hide your fires; let not light see my black and deep desires." — Macbeth
• "Come, you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here..." — Lady Macbeth
• "Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't." — Lady Macbeth
• "I am settled, and bend up each corporal agent to this terrible feat." — Macbeth

Guilt & conscience quotes

• "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?" — Macbeth
• "Here's the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand." — Lady Macbeth
• "Out, damned spot! out, I say!" — Lady Macbeth
• "What's done cannot be undone." — Lady Macbeth
• "I am in blood stepped in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o'er." — Macbeth

Reflection & life wisdom quotes

• "What's done is done." — Lady Macbeth
• "There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face." — King Duncan
• "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day..." — Macbeth
• "Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage." — Macbeth
• "And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death." — Macbeth

Courage & action quotes

• "If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then to me." — Banquo
• "Make thick my blood; stop up the access and passage to remorse." — Lady Macbeth
• "There's daggers in men's smiles." — Donalbain
• "The instruments of darkness tell us truths to win us to our harm." — Banquo
• "Come what come may." — Macbeth

Conclusion Quotes shape how we think and act: a single line can steady resolve, warn against hubris, or prompt vital self-examination. These lines from Macbeth pair ambition’s fire with guilt’s weight — use them to motivate action, temper desire with wisdom, and keep your conscience honest as you pursue your goals.