Macbeth Act II

In the second act of Macbeth, something that captured my attention was the overall restlessness on the night of the King's murder. Quite often in Shakespearean plays, the environment is used to accent the events unfolding in the story. For example when the witches appear in Macbeth, they are generally accompanied by thunder and lightning, and when sinister acts take place, the weather is often times stormy. Likewise on the night of the murder, the castle seems to be restless and uneasy. Reading Macbeth, I often got the feeling that evil and chaos manifest themselves within not only the people and situations, but environments as well. The second act begins with Banquo and his son Fleance roaming the castle in a seemingly aimless manner in the middle of the night. When Fleance questions Banquo about his restlessness, he replies that sleeping has recently caused him "cursed thoughts" (2.1.8). Meanwhile, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are similarly restless, wrapped up in their plot to murder King Duncan and experiencing moral conflicts about doing so. Likewise, Macduff and Lennox are up and awake very early in the morning so that Macduff can visit King Duncan. In scene three of the second act, Lennox even goes onto a rant that lasts from line forty-nine to fifty-six essentially stating that the night was one of great chaos unequal to anything that had been experienced in his life time. I found all of this particularly interesting because it wasn't just Macbeth and Lady Macbeth who experienced the chaos of the evening but that it had been shared by nearly everyone with substantial lines of dialogue throughout scenes one and two. It goes to exemplify how much of an evil and earth-shaking act that betraying the King was and it is very effective in setting the tone of the story.

Questions:
1. Is the decision to kill the King really due to Lady Macbeth's insistence? I feel like it is debatable as to whether or not Macbeth's drive for power would have led him down that path on his own.

2. Did Lady Macbeth hesitate to kill the King herself because he reminded her of her father and husband or did she have moral restraints on killing? It's difficult to tell just what her moral limit really is.

3. Are Macbeth's visions spawned by the witches in an attempt to manipulate him or are they simply signs of madness (or both)?