The Macbeths, in my opinion, are deliberately portrayed as the potential of good people to change under specific circumstances. In this situation, however, the motivation for crime is not 'for the good' of anyone but the Macbeth"s themselves, it is in the name of ambition and ultimately greed. How then can their actions be justified? Personally I believe they can't, but this does not make them necessarily totally evil. Characters in the text, namely the doctor in act five scene one and Malcolm, act five scene nine, voice both aspects of this argument. The doctor seems to...
is a matter of one's own opinion to what level the Macbeths' evil extends. I think, however, that most would agree that though they certainly show streaks of evil, huge qualities of leadership are shown in Macbeth in the events preceding the play, and towards the end, but circumstances were not kind. Lady Macbeth also shows merits such as argument and persuasion, which can certainly be regarded as qualities then and indeed now.

So even though the Macbeths may be primarily evil, they are shown to have better elements therefore ruling out the possibility of total evil.