In Macbeth, Lady Macbeth’s character changes from her callous nature to one where she is weighed down with guilt. Ultimately, Shakespeare presents Lady Macbeth as a complex character whose transformation from ambition to guilt illustrates the dire consequences of defying the Great Chain of Being and rejecting societal norms regarding morality and gender roles. At the start of the play, Shakespeare begins his depiction of Lady Macbeth as immoral and unconventional, perhaps to criticise subversive women. When Lady Macbeth has just received the letter from Macbeth about his meeting with the three witches, she commands spirits to “come you spirits…unsex me here”. The imperative “come” demonstrates Lady Macbeth’s immorality as she is willing to engage with the supernatural, which, in the Jacobean era, had connotations of the devil and darkness. Furthermore, it conveys Lady Macbeth’s commanding nature and desperation for power as she orders the spirits to do her bidding. Shakespeare uses this to immediately establish Lady Macbeth’s dominant nature, subverting traditional gender roles. Additionally, the imperative “unsex” shows how she is demanding the spirits again to rid her of her feminine qualities, since females were commonly thought of as weaker than men, to be able to handle the sins she was planning to commit, further indicating the extent of her twisted ambition as she is calling on the devil through the spirits to help her go against nature and God. Her unconventional actions in a deeply religious society depict how immoral she is since she is not only engaging with the supernatural but also using it to benefit herself. Perhaps by depicting Lady Macbeth as immoral and subverting the nature of her gender, it makes it harder for the Christian Jacobean to empathise with her. However, due to the patriarchal society, Lady Macbeth has no choice but to call on the supernatural for masculine qualities, which were synonymous with power. Because women were expected to be more subservient, females desiring power was a subversion of gender expectations. It would not have been natural for women to gain power, so Lady Macbeth may have needed the spirits' intervention for power, as she could never gain it naturally.*. Her immorality in her unconventional actions is yet again demonstrated through the violent imagery of “whilst it was smiling…dash’d the brain out”. Here, she uses this vivid description of the murder of a newborn to persuade her husband to commit regicide. The verb “smiling” juxtaposes the brutality of the murder with the innocence of a baby, highlighting her immorality as she is willing to kill a baby who trusts her. The harsh and abrupt verb of “dash’d” illustrates how Lady Macbeth has rejected her feminine nature as she is unwilling to associate herself with being a role of a mother. In a society where many of its beliefs stemmed from the Bible, females were expected to embody the characteristics of the Virgin Mary. Since she was defined primarily as the mother of Jesus, Jacobean women were also expected to raise and nurture children. Through Lady Mabeth’s subversion of female expectations and immoral murder of a baby who trusts her, Shakespeare highlights her atypical and transgressive nature. Perhaps he does this to argue how dangerous unconventional women are to society by how they disrupt their role as caregivers through the immoral portrayal of Lady Macbeth. As the play progresses, Lady Macbeth is described as troubled by her actions and remorseful. In Act 5, she is seen to oppose earlier perceptions that were made of her. Her troubled demeanour is reflected in her angsty state of sleepwalking, where she repeats “to bed, to bed, to bed”. The repetition of 'to bed' highlights Lady Macbeth's profound guilt and her desperate yearning for peace, which is ironic given that her actions—killing Duncan in his sleep—have irrevocably disrupted her ability to find rest, symbolising her mental decline. The lack of sleep reflects her guilt due to the motif of sleep representing innocence. Additionally, since sleep is a natural function, the lack of sleep is a “perturbation in nature” which coincides with the “perturbation” of the natural order of the Great Chain of Being. Lady Macbeth's insomnia serves as a direct consequence of her transgression against the natural order, reflecting her internal turmoil and the psychological repercussions of her ambition. The idea of nature troubling her is further expressed when Lady Macbeth is described to be “washing her hands” whilst exclaiming “out damned spot! Out, I say!”. Her troubling nature is shown through the frantic and pleading use of the imperative “out”, contrasting with her use in Act 1, where they were controlled and diabolical. The repetition of “out” creates an obsessive tone to not only reflect her psychological torment of her past actions but to get rid of the “spot”, which describes the permanent stain of guilt and metaphorical blood on her, labelling her as a traitor to the Great Chain of Being (the hierarchical structure of society). The blood staining her hands come from all the murders she was complicit in, and the inability of even natural resources, such as water, to battle with the crime of murder and regicide projects the inability for Lady Macbeth to be forgiven by God. With all her past murders being mentioned in one sentence, it displays the intensity of her remorse and how she cannot escape from guilt as her mind gradually weakens due to the toil of regret. Lady Macbeth's eventual remorse aligns with Jacobean ideals of femininity, where women were expected to embody fragility and sensitivity, thus highlighting the tragic irony of her earlier ambition. This current character depiction shows that all traces of ruthlessness in Act 1 have now gradually disappeared, and Lady Macbeth has transformed to a woman who is remorseful of what she has done. Perhaps Shakespeare depicts how women’s nature cannot handle the guilt of murder, as they are life givers instead. Therefore, the consequences of her trying to defy the Great Chain of Being through murder have made Lady Macbeth feel guilty, which serves as a psychological punishment to her since she has taken away life rather than given life. Furthermore, Lady Macbeth acknowledges the evil she has spread when she uses the phrase “damned”. This reference to eternal damnation signifies that she now finally understands the consequences of her actions when she influenced Macbeth to commit regicide. Her later suicide off stage reiterates how she eventually lost control of herself and Macbeth and how she was compelled by remorse to surrender to the inevitable damnation caused by her earlier actions. Through Lady Macbeth's tragic downfall, Shakespeare cautions Jacobean audiences about the consequences of defying the Great Chain of Being, particularly in the context of the Gunpowder Plot's threat to King James I's reign. Ultimately, Lady Macbeth evolves from being the embodiment of evil to someone who cannot cope with the consequences of her actions. Her distressed state of mind at the end of the play is the consequence of someone who, at the beginning, strongly opposed morality, nature and the confines of religion, hence posing a lesson for a typical Jacobean audience.