The collective minds of the people in England in Shakespeare's time struggled to explain the inexplicable; they had difficulty understanding chance and human nature. They believed that since the beginning of time, a certain cosmic order had emerged. This order was expressed in the Elizabethan chain of being. When something or someone went out of place, it would send the universe into total chaos. There would be no simple confusion, as the modern definition would imply, it would send the cosmos into a downward spiral destroying all life unless this natural order was restored. “We lose some of the immensity of Elizabethan tragedy, the irony of its comedy, and the insult of its mockery” (Elizabethan World Order; Cynthia Fuhrman) because this state of mind is unknown to modern readers . Shakespeare uses the element of Elizabethan chaos to emphasize the tragedy of Macbeth. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Shakespeare carefully illustrates the violation of the Elizabethan chain of being through symbolism parallel in nature to the events of the play. The common thread is the chaotic element. The Witches' first line "What is right is wrong and what is wrong is right" (Act I, scene I, line 12) sums up the plot before it is even introduced. Shakespeare played on the Elizabethan people's fear of the inexplicable powers of evil acting to overthrow the natural order. Witches represented evil and by saying these words, they foreshadowed destruction. The oxymoron in words does not exist in order to confuse the reader and add an air of mystery. The aim is to strike the reader with the importance of the events that would continue in the play. Macbeth's natural world followed a cyclical pattern. At first there was a semblance of order in nature. All beings fit well into their niche. However, the weather forecast predicted a wind which gave way to chaos. When Macbeth disrupted order by destroying a life, he left a gap in the chain, he became the stone that caused a ripple that spread from one bank to the other. Duncan's unplanned removal created a gap that needed to be filled. Naturally, his sons would be next on the list. The turmoil caused by his untimely death could be resolved by the next logically sequential move. There could be no empty place, but Macbeth, rather than Malcolm, intervening, created a space that needed to be filled. This would continue until the order of the universe was in ruins. At the height of the disorder, we see nature in tumult. For example, a natural herbivore became cannibalistic without warning; docile horses in captivity would escape in anger and devour each other. The madness of one man's greed and lust for power affected the stables, even indirectly. This brought confusion and terror into the hearts of the characters. Darkness was falling when it should have been daylight. "In time it is day, and yet the dark night smothers the traveling lamp. Is it not the predominance of the night, or the shame of the day, that darkness covers the face of the earth when should the living light embrace it?' (Act II, scene 4, lines 5-11) Without a good understanding of the Elizabethan mentality, the reader cannot grasp its intensity or see its cause. The howling wind with death cries and the improbable defeat of the mighty hawk were the other notable incidents of Shakespeare's nature. Additionally, the weather was getting worse and worse until the climax of the play. With the gradual restoration of order, the.