Materialism In Both The Godfather And Macbeth

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Materialism is the tendency to consider material possessions and physical comfort as more important than spiritual values. Materialism allows Macbeth and Vito to think of their violent actions as justifiable because they believe they are helping and what they are doing is for the greater good. For example, Macbeth receives a prophecy telling him he will be king , so he decides to take matters into his own hands, going against his morality with the help of his wife. Don Corleone justifies his actions because he believes he is helping his family by ordering hits on people giving his family and godchildren money and power for when he is gone.
Macbeth justifies his immoral action because he is doing it to have more power and complete the prophecy …show more content…

In Macbeth, King Macbeth kills multiple people to stay in power because he was so paranoid, he knew what he was doing was wrong and yet he continued to do it, “As they had seen me with these hangman’s hands,list’ning their fear. I could not say ‘Amen!’ when they did say ‘God bless us!’... I had most need of blessing, and ‘Amen’ stuck in my throat (MAC 2.2.40-46).” Macbeth felt remorse, he was traumatized by the death of Duncan but his desire of materialism was much greater than his moral value. The difference between Macbeth and Michael was that Michael did not feel remorse for the people he killed because he truly believed they deserved it. Michael told assassins to kill 8 people while he was becoming the godfather of Connie’s son. “PRIEST: Michael Francis Rizzi -- do you renounce Satan? MICHAEL: I do renounce him. PRIEST: And all his works? MICHAEL:I do renounce them.(Coppola)” The price to pay for greed and materialism is the soul, this is shown when Michael ‘renounces’ satan while calling hits on multiple people. It is shown with Macbeth when he loses his wife and reacts as if it is just an inconvenience since he was about to go to war. In the end Macbeth loses his head and Michael his

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