If good, why do I yield to that suggestion
Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair
And make my seated heart...
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Macbeth describes what the "suggestion" that enters into his thoughts does to him: it "unfix[es]" his "hair." In other words, it makes his hair stand up on end. Macbeth also uses a sound image, saying that what he is thinking makes his "heart knock at" his "ribs," meaning it is pounding hard and fast. These are images we associate with fright: Macbeth's thoughts scare him because they are so terrible. It is much more powerful and creepy to show that what he is thinking is so "horrid" that it terrifies him rather than simply to say he is thinking of murdering the king. In act 1, scene 4, when he realizes that Duncan has named Malcolm his heir, Macbeth's power hunger again comes to the forefront. Rather than back away from the desire to be king, he holds tightly to his evil thoughts of murder. Shakespeare uses the literary device of apostrophe—addressing an inanimate object or absent person—as a way for Macbeth to express his ambitions. He tells the stars to put out their lights so that they can't see his desires. He also uses the image of the eye winking or closing so it won't see the horrible thing the hand is going to do. Finally, the poetic device of rhyming couplets adds to the intensity of the scene, making Macbeth's line more memorable for us:
knock at my ribs,
Against the use of nature?
Stars, hide your fires;
Let not light see my black and deep desires.
The eye wink at the hand, yet let that be
Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.