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ACT I, SCENE I.

A desert place.

Thunder and lightning. Enter three Witches

First Witch
001: When shall we three meet again
002: In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

Second Witch
003: When the hurlyburly's done,
004: When the battle's lost and won.

Third Witch
005: That will be ere the set of sun.

First Witch
006: Where the place?

Second Witch
007: Upon the heath.

Third Witch
008: There to meet with Macbeth.

First Witch
009: I come, Graymalkin!

Second Witch
010: Paddock calls.

Third Witch
011: Anon.

ALL
012: Fair is foul, and foul is fair:
013: Hover through the fog and filthy air.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE II.

A camp near Forres.

Alarum within. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, LENNOX, with Attendants, meeting a bleeding Sergeant

DUNCAN
001: What bloody man is that? He can report,
002: As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt
003: The newest state.

MALCOLM
004: This is the sergeant
005: Who like a good and hardy soldier fought
006: 'Gainst my captivity. Hail, brave friend!
007: Say to the king the knowledge of the broil
008: As thou didst leave it.

Sergeant
009: Doubtful it stood;
010: As two spent swimmers, that do cling together
011: And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald--
012: Worthy to be a rebel, for to that
013: The multiplying villanies of nature
014: Do swarm upon him--from the western isles
015: Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;
016: And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,
017: Show'd like a rebel's whore: but all's too weak:
018: For brave Macbeth--well he deserves that name--
019: Disdaining fortune, with his brandish'd steel,
020: Which smoked with bloody execution,
021: Like valour's minion carved out his passage
022: Till he faced the slave;
023: Which ne'er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,
024: Till he unseam'd him from the nave to the chaps,
025: And fix'd his head upon our battlements.

DUNCAN
026: O valiant cousin! worthy gentleman!

Sergeant
027: As whence the sun 'gins his reflection
028: Shipwrecking storms and direful thunders break,
029: So from that spring whence comfort seem'd to come
030: Discomfort swells. Mark, king of Scotland, mark:
031: No sooner justice had with valour arm'd
032: Compell'd these skipping kerns to trust their heels,
033: But the Norweyan lord surveying vantage,
034: With furbish'd arms and new supplies of men
035: Began a fresh assault.

DUNCAN
036: Dismay'd not this
037: Our captains, Macbeth and Banquo?

Sergeant
038: Yes;
039: As sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion.
040: If I say sooth, I must report they were
041: As cannons overcharged with double cracks, so they
042: Doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe:
043: Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds,
044: Or memorise another Golgotha,
045: I cannot tell.
046: But I am faint, my gashes cry for help.

DUNCAN
047: So well thy words become thee as thy wounds;
048: They smack of honour both. Go get him surgeons.
[Exit Sergeant, attended]
049: Who comes here?

Enter ROSS

MALCOLM
050: The worthy thane of Ross.

LENNOX
051: What a haste looks through his eyes! So should he look
052: That seems to speak things strange.

ROSS
053: God save the king!

DUNCAN
054: Whence camest thou, worthy thane?

ROSS
055: From Fife, great king;
056: Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky
057: And fan our people cold. Norway himself,
058: With terrible numbers,
059: Assisted by that most disloyal traitor
060: The thane of Cawdor, began a dismal conflict;
061: Till that Bellona's bridegroom, lapp'd in proof,
062: Confronted him with self-comparisons,
063: Point against point rebellious, arm 'gainst arm.
064: Curbing his lavish spirit: and, to conclude,
065: The victory fell on us.

DUNCAN
066: Great happiness!

ROSS
067: That now
068: Sweno, the Norways' king, craves composition:
069: Nor would we deign him burial of his men
070: Till he disbursed at Saint Colme's inch
071: Ten thousand dollars to our general use.

DUNCAN
072: No more that thane of Cawdor shall deceive
073: Our bosom interest: go pronounce his present death,
074: And with his former title greet Macbeth.

ROSS
075: I'll see it done.

DUNCAN
076: What he hath lost noble Macbeth hath won.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE III.

A heath near Forres.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches

First Witch
001: Where hast thou been, sister?

Second Witch
002: Killing swine.

Third Witch
003: Sister, where thou?

First Witch
004: A sailor's wife had chestnuts in her lap,
005: And munch'd, and munch'd, and munch'd:--
006: 'Give me,' quoth I:
007: 'Aroint thee, witch!' the rump-fed ronyon cries.
008: Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger:
009: But in a sieve I'll thither sail,
010: And, like a rat without a tail,
011: I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.

Second Witch
012: I'll give thee a wind.

First Witch
013: Thou'rt kind.

Third Witch
014: And I another.

First Witch
015: I myself have all the other,
016: And the very ports they blow,
017: All the quarters that they know
018: I' the shipman's card.
019: I will drain him dry as hay:
020: Sleep shall neither night nor day
021: Hang upon his pent-house lid;
022: He shall live a man forbid:
023: Weary se'nnights nine times nine
024: Shall he dwindle, peak and pine:
025: Though his bark cannot be lost,
026: Yet it shall be tempest-tost.
027: Look what I have.

Second Witch
028: Show me, show me.

First Witch
029: Here I have a pilot's thumb,
030: Wreck'd as homeward he did come.

Drum within

Third Witch
031: A drum, a drum!
032: Macbeth doth come.

ALL
033: The weird sisters, hand in hand,
034: Posters of the sea and land,
035: Thus do go about, about:
036: Thrice to thine and thrice to mine
037: And thrice again, to make up nine.
038: Peace! the charm's wound up.

Enter MACBETH and BANQUO

MACBETH
039: So foul and fair a day I have not seen.

BANQUO
040: How far is't call'd to Forres? What are these
041: So wither'd and so wild in their attire,
042: That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,
043: And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught
044: That man may question? You seem to understand me,
045: By each at once her chappy finger laying
046: Upon her skinny lips: you should be women,
047: And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
048: That you are so.

MACBETH
049: Speak, if you can: what are you?

First Witch
050: All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis!

Second Witch
051: All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, thane of Cawdor!

Third Witch
052: All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter!

BANQUO
053: Good sir, why do you start; and seem to fear
054: Things that do sound so fair? I' the name of truth,
055: Are ye fantastical, or that indeed
056: Which outwardly ye show? My noble partner
057: You greet with present grace and great prediction
058: Of noble having and of royal hope,
059: That he seems rapt withal: to me you speak not.
060: If you can look into the seeds of time,
061: And say which grain will grow and which will not,
062: Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear
063: Your favours nor your hate.

First Witch
064: Hail!

Second Witch
065: Hail!

Third Witch
066: Hail!

First Witch
067: Lesser than Macbeth, and greater.

Second Witch
068: Not so happy, yet much happier.

Third Witch
069: Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none:
070: So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!

First Witch
071: Banquo and Macbeth, all hail!

MACBETH
072: Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more:
073: By Sinel's death I know I am thane of Glamis;
074: But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,
075: A prosperous gentleman; and to be king
076: Stands not within the prospect of belief,
077: No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
078: You owe this strange intelligence? or why
079: Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
080: With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you.

Witches vanish

BANQUO
081: The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,
082: And these are of them. Whither are they vanish'd?

MACBETH
083: Into the air; and what seem'd corporal melted
084: As breath into the wind. Would they had stay'd!

BANQUO
085: Were such things here as we do speak about?
086: Or have we eaten on the insane root
087: That takes the reason prisoner?

MACBETH
088: Your children shall be kings.

BANQUO
089: You shall be king.

MACBETH
090: And thane of Cawdor too: went it not so?

BANQUO
091: To the selfsame tune and words. Who's here?

Enter ROSS and ANGUS

ROSS
092: The king hath happily received, Macbeth,
093: The news of thy success; and when he reads
094: Thy personal venture in the rebels' fight,
095: His wonders and his praises do contend
096: Which should be thine or his: silenced with that,
097: In viewing o'er the rest o' the selfsame day,
098: He finds thee in the stout Norweyan ranks,
099: Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make,
100: Strange images of death. As thick as hail
101: Came post with post; and every one did bear
102: Thy praises in his kingdom's great defence,
103: And pour'd them down before him.

ANGUS
104: We are sent
105: To give thee from our royal master thanks;
106: Only to herald thee into his sight,
107: Not pay thee.

ROSS
108: And, for an earnest of a greater honour,
109: He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor:
110: In which addition, hail, most worthy thane!
111: For it is thine.

BANQUO
112: What, can the devil speak true?

MACBETH
113: The thane of Cawdor lives: why do you dress me
114: In borrow'd robes?

ANGUS
115: Who was the thane lives yet;
116: But under heavy judgment bears that life
117: Which he deserves to lose. Whether he was combined
118: With those of Norway, or did line the rebel
119: With hidden help and vantage, or that with both
120: He labour'd in his country's wreck, I know not;
121: But treasons capital, confess'd and proved,
122: Have overthrown him.

MACBETH
123: [Aside] Glamis, and thane of Cawdor!
124: The greatest is behind.
[To ROSS and ANGUS]
125: Thanks for your pains.
[To BANQUO]
126: Do you not hope your children shall be kings,
127: When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me
128: Promised no less to them?

BANQUO
129: That trusted home
130: Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,
131: Besides the thane of Cawdor. But 'tis strange:
132: And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
133: The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
134: Win us with honest trifles, to betray's
135: In deepest consequence.
136: Cousins, a word, I pray you.

MACBETH
137: [Aside] Two truths are told,
138: As happy prologues to the swelling act
139: Of the imperial theme.--I thank you, gentlemen.
140: [Aside] This supernatural soliciting
141: Cannot be ill, cannot be good: if ill,
142: Why hath it given me earnest of success,
143: Commencing in a truth? I am thane of Cawdor:
144: If good, why do I yield to that suggestion
145: Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair
146: And make my seated heart knock at my ribs,
147: Against the use of nature? Present fears
148: Are less than horrible imaginings:
149: My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,
150: Shakes so my single state of man that function
151: Is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is
152: But what is not.

BANQUO
153: Look, how our partner's rapt.

MACBETH [Aside]
154: If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me,
155: Without my stir.

BANQUO
156: New horrors come upon him,
157: Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould
158: But with the aid of use.

MACBETH [Aside]
159: Come what come may,
160: Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

BANQUO
161: Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.

MACBETH
162: Give me your favour: my dull brain was wrought
163: With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains
164: Are register'd where every day I turn
165: The leaf to read them. Let us toward the king.
166: Think upon what hath chanced, and, at more time,
167: The interim having weigh'd it, let us speak
168: Our free hearts each to other.

BANQUO
169: Very gladly.

MACBETH
170: Till then, enough. Come, friends.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE IV.

Forres. The palace.

Flourish. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, LENNOX, and Attendants

DUNCAN
001: Is execution done on Cawdor? Are not
002: Those in commission yet return'd?

MALCOLM
003: My liege,
004: They are not yet come back. But I have spoke
005: With one that saw him die: who did report
006: That very frankly he confess'd his treasons,
007: Implored your highness' pardon and set forth
008: A deep repentance: nothing in his life
009: Became him like the leaving it; he died
010: As one that had been studied in his death
011: To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
012: As 'twere a careless trifle.

DUNCAN
013: There's no art
014: To find the mind's construction in the face:
015: He was a gentleman on whom I built
016: An absolute trust.
[Enter MACBETH, BANQUO, ROSS, and ANGUS]
017: O worthiest cousin!
018: The sin of my ingratitude even now
019: Was heavy on me: thou art so far before
020: That swiftest wing of recompense is slow
021: To overtake thee. Would thou hadst less deserved,
022: That the proportion both of thanks and payment
023: Might have been mine! only I have left to say,
024: More is thy due than more than all can pay.

MACBETH
025: The service and the loyalty I owe,
026: In doing it, pays itself. Your highness' part
027: Is to receive our duties; and our duties
028: Are to your throne and state children and servants,
029: Which do but what they should, by doing every thing
030: Safe toward your love and honour.

DUNCAN
031: Welcome hither:
032: I have begun to plant thee, and will labour
033: To make thee full of growing. Noble Banquo,
034: That hast no less deserved, nor must be known
035: No less to have done so, let me enfold thee
036: And hold thee to my heart.

BANQUO
037: There if I grow,
038: The harvest is your own.

DUNCAN
039: My plenteous joys,
040: Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves
041: In drops of sorrow. Sons, kinsmen, thanes,
042: And you whose places are the nearest, know
043: We will establish our estate upon
044: Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter
045: The Prince of Cumberland; which honour must
046: Not unaccompanied invest him only,
047: But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine
048: On all deservers. From hence to Inverness,
049: And bind us further to you.

MACBETH
050: The rest is labour, which is not used for you:
051: I'll be myself the harbinger and make joyful
052: The hearing of my wife with your approach;
053: So humbly take my leave.

DUNCAN
054: My worthy Cawdor!

Aside
055: The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step
056: On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap,
057: For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires;
058: Let not light see my black and deep desires:
059: The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be,
060: Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.

Exit

DUNCAN
061: True, worthy Banquo; he is full so valiant,
062: And in his commendations I am fed;
063: It is a banquet to me. Let's after him,
064: Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome:
065: It is a peerless kinsman.

Flourish. Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE V.

Inverness. Macbeth's castle.

Enter LADY MACBETH, reading a letter

LADY MACBETH
001: 'They met me in the day of success: and I have
002: learned by the perfectest report, they have more in
003: them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire
004: to question them further, they made themselves air,
005: into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in
006: the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who
007: all-hailed me 'Thane of Cawdor;' by which title,
008: before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred
009: me to the coming on of time, with 'Hail, king that
010: shalt be!' This have I thought good to deliver
011: thee, my dearest partner of greatness, that thou
012: mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being
013: ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it
014: to thy heart, and farewell.'
015: Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
016: What thou art promised: yet do I fear thy nature;
017: It is too full o' the milk of human kindness
018: To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great;
019: Art not without ambition, but without
020: The illness should attend it: what thou wouldst highly,
021: That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false,
022: And yet wouldst wrongly win: thou'ldst have, great Glamis,
023: That which cries 'Thus thou must do, if thou have it;
024: And that which rather thou dost fear to do
025: Than wishest should be undone.' Hie thee hither,
026: That I may pour my spirits in thine ear;
027: And chastise with the valour of my tongue
028: All that impedes thee from the golden round,
029: Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
030: To have thee crown'd withal.
[Enter a Messenger]
031: What is your tidings?

Messenger
032: The king comes here to-night.

LADY MACBETH
033: Thou'rt mad to say it:
034: Is not thy master with him? who, were't so,
035: Would have inform'd for preparation.

Messenger
036: So please you, it is true: our thane is coming:
037: One of my fellows had the speed of him,
038: Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more
039: Than would make up his message.

LADY MACBETH
040: Give him tending;
041: He brings great news.
[Exit Messenger]
042: The raven himself is hoarse
043: That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
044: Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
045: That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
046: And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
047: Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
048: Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
049: That no compunctious visitings of nature
050: Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
051: The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts,
052: And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,
053: Wherever in your sightless substances
054: You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night,
055: And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
056: That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
057: Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
058: To cry 'Hold, hold!'
[Enter MACBETH]
059: Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!
060: Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter!
061: Thy letters have transported me beyond
062: This ignorant present, and I feel now
063: The future in the instant.

MACBETH
064: My dearest love,
065: Duncan comes here to-night.

LADY MACBETH
066: And when goes hence?

MACBETH
067: To-morrow, as he purposes.

LADY MACBETH
068: O, never
069: Shall sun that morrow see!
070: Your face, my thane, is as a book where men
071: May read strange matters. To beguile the time,
072: Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye,
073: Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower,
074: But be the serpent under't. He that's coming
075: Must be provided for: and you shall put
076: This night's great business into my dispatch;
077: Which shall to all our nights and days to come
078: Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.

MACBETH
079: We will speak further.

LADY MACBETH
080: Only look up clear;
081: To alter favour ever is to fear:
082: Leave all the rest to me.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE VI.

Before Macbeth's castle.

Hautboys and torches. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, BANQUO, LENNOX, MACDUFF, ROSS, ANGUS, and Attendants

DUNCAN
001: This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air
002: Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself
003: Unto our gentle senses.

BANQUO
004: This guest of summer,
005: The temple-haunting martlet, does approve,
006: By his loved mansionry, that the heaven's breath
007: Smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze,
008: Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird
009: Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle:
010: Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed,
011: The air is delicate.

Enter LADY MACBETH

DUNCAN
012: See, see, our honour'd hostess!
013: The love that follows us sometime is our trouble,
014: Which still we thank as love. Herein I teach you
015: How you shall bid God 'ild us for your pains,
016: And thank us for your trouble.

LADY MACBETH
017: All our service
018: In every point twice done and then done double
019: Were poor and single business to contend
020: Against those honours deep and broad wherewith
021: Your majesty loads our house: for those of old,
022: And the late dignities heap'd up to them,
023: We rest your hermits.

DUNCAN
024: Where's the thane of Cawdor?
025: We coursed him at the heels, and had a purpose
026: To be his purveyor: but he rides well;
027: And his great love, sharp as his spur, hath holp him
028: To his home before us. Fair and noble hostess,
029: We are your guest to-night.

LADY MACBETH
030: Your servants ever
031: Have theirs, themselves and what is theirs, in compt,
032: To make their audit at your highness' pleasure,
033: Still to return your own.

DUNCAN
034: Give me your hand;
035: Conduct me to mine host: we love him highly,
036: And shall continue our graces towards him.
037: By your leave, hostess.

Exeunt

ACT I, SCENE VII.

Macbeth's castle.

Hautboys and torches. Enter a Sewer, and divers Servants with dishes and service, and pass over the stage. Then enter MACBETH

MACBETH
001: If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well
002: It were done quickly: if the assassination
003: Could trammel up the consequence, and catch
004: With his surcease success; that but this blow
005: Might be the be-all and the end-all here,
006: But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
007: We'ld jump the life to come. But in these cases
008: We still have judgment here; that we but teach
009: Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
010: To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice
011: Commends the ingredients of our poison'd chalice
012: To our own lips. He's here in double trust;
013: First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,
014: Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,
015: Who should against his murderer shut the door,
016: Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan
017: Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
018: So clear in his great office, that his virtues
019: Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
020: The deep damnation of his taking-off;
021: And pity, like a naked new-born babe,
022: Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, horsed
023: Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
024: Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,
025: That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur
026: To prick the sides of my intent, but only
027: Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
028: And falls on the other.
[Enter LADY MACBETH]
029: How now! what news?

LADY MACBETH
030: He has almost supp'd: why have you left the chamber?

MACBETH
031: Hath he ask'd for me?

LADY MACBETH
032: Know you not he has?

MACBETH
033: We will proceed no further in this business:
034: He hath honour'd me of late; and I have bought
035: Golden opinions from all sorts of people,
036: Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,
037: Not cast aside so soon.

LADY MACBETH
038: Was the hope drunk
039: Wherein you dress'd yourself? hath it slept since?
040: And wakes it now, to look so green and pale
041: At what it did so freely? From this time
042: Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard
043: To be the same in thine own act and valour
044: As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that
045: Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life,
046: And live a coward in thine own esteem,
047: Letting 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would,'
048: Like the poor cat i' the adage?

MACBETH
049: Prithee, peace:
050: I dare do all that may become a man;
051: Who dares do more is none.

LADY MACBETH
052: What beast was't, then,
053: That made you break this enterprise to me?
054: When you durst do it, then you were a man;
055: And, to be more than what you were, you would
056: Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place
057: Did then adhere, and yet you would make both:
058: They have made themselves, and that their fitness now
059: Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know
060: How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me:
061: I would, while it was smiling in my face,
062: Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
063: And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you
064: Have done to this.

MACBETH
065: If we should fail?

LADY MACBETH
066: We fail!
067: But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
068: And we'll not fail. When Duncan is asleep--
069: Whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey
070: Soundly invite him--his two chamberlains
071: Will I with wine and wassail so convince
072: That memory, the warder of the brain,
073: Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
074: A limbeck only: when in swinish sleep
075: Their drenched natures lie as in a death,
076: What cannot you and I perform upon
077: The unguarded Duncan? what not put upon
078: His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
079: Of our great quell?

MACBETH
080: Bring forth men-children only;
081: For thy undaunted mettle should compose
082: Nothing but males. Will it not be received,
083: When we have mark'd with blood those sleepy two
084: Of his own chamber and used their very daggers,
085: That they have done't?

LADY MACBETH
086: Who dares receive it other,
087: As we shall make our griefs and clamour roar
088: Upon his death?

MACBETH
089: I am settled, and bend up
090: Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.
091: Away, and mock the time with fairest show:
092: False face must hide what the false heart doth know.

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE I.

Court of Macbeth's castle.

Enter BANQUO, and FLEANCE bearing a torch before him

BANQUO
001: How goes the night, boy?

FLEANCE
002: The moon is down; I have not heard the clock.

BANQUO
003: And she goes down at twelve.

FLEANCE
004: I take't, 'tis later, sir.

BANQUO
005: Hold, take my sword. There's husbandry in heaven;
006: Their candles are all out. Take thee that too.
007: A heavy summons lies like lead upon me,
008: And yet I would not sleep: merciful powers,
009: Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature
010: Gives way to in repose!
[Enter MACBETH, and a Servant with a torch]
011: Give me my sword.
012: Who's there?

MACBETH
013: A friend.

BANQUO
014: What, sir, not yet at rest? The king's a-bed:
015: He hath been in unusual pleasure, and
016: Sent forth great largess to your offices.
017: This diamond he greets your wife withal,
018: By the name of most kind hostess; and shut up
019: In measureless content.

MACBETH
020: Being unprepared,
021: Our will became the servant to defect;
022: Which else should free have wrought.

BANQUO
023: All's well.
024: I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters:
025: To you they have show'd some truth.

MACBETH
026: I think not of them:
027: Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,
028: We would spend it in some words upon that business,
029: If you would grant the time.

BANQUO
030: At your kind'st leisure.

MACBETH
031: If you shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis,
032: It shall make honour for you.

BANQUO
033: So I lose none
034: In seeking to augment it, but still keep
035: My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,
036: I shall be counsell'd.

MACBETH
037: Good repose the while!

BANQUO
038: Thanks, sir: the like to you!

Exeunt BANQUO and FLEANCE

MACBETH
039: Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,
040: She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.
[Exit Servant]
041: Is this a dagger which I see before me,
042: The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
043: I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
044: Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
045: To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
046: A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
047: Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
048: I see thee yet, in form as palpable
049: As this which now I draw.
050: Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going;
051: And such an instrument I was to use.
052: Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses,
053: Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still,
054: And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,
055: Which was not so before. There's no such thing:
056: It is the bloody business which informs
057: Thus to mine eyes. Now o'er the one halfworld
058: Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
059: The curtain'd sleep; witchcraft celebrates
060: Pale Hecate's offerings, and wither'd murder,
061: Alarum'd by his sentinel, the wolf,
062: Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace.
063: With Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his design
064: Moves like a ghost. Thou sure and firm-set earth,
065: Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
066: Thy very stones prate of my whereabout,
067: And take the present horror from the time,
068: Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives:
069: Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.
[A bell rings]
070: I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.
071: Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
072: That summons thee to heaven or to hell.

Exit

ACT II, SCENE II.

The same.

Enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH
001: That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold;
002: What hath quench'd them hath given me fire.
003: Hark! Peace!
004: It was the owl that shriek'd, the fatal bellman,
005: Which gives the stern'st good-night. He is about it:
006: The doors are open; and the surfeited grooms
007: Do mock their charge with snores: I have drugg'd
008: their possets,
009: That death and nature do contend about them,
010: Whether they live or die.

MACBETH [Within]
011: Who's there? what, ho!

LADY MACBETH
012: Alack, I am afraid they have awaked,
013: And 'tis not done. The attempt and not the deed
014: Confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready;
015: He could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled
016: My father as he slept, I had done't.
[Enter MACBETH]
017: My husband!

MACBETH
018: I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?

LADY MACBETH
019: I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.
020: Did not you speak?

MACBETH
021: When?

LADY MACBETH
022: Now.

MACBETH
023: As I descended?

LADY MACBETH
024: Ay.

MACBETH
025: Hark!
026: Who lies i' the second chamber?

LADY MACBETH
027: Donalbain.

MACBETH
028: This is a sorry sight.

Looking on his hands

LADY MACBETH
029: A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.

MACBETH
030: There's one did laugh in's sleep, and one cried
031: 'Murder!'
032: That they did wake each other: I stood and heard them:
033: But they did say their prayers, and address'd them
034: Again to sleep.

LADY MACBETH
035: There are two lodged together.

MACBETH
036: One cried 'God bless us!' and 'Amen' the other;
037: As they had seen me with these hangman's hands.
038: Listening their fear, I could not say 'Amen,'
039: When they did say 'God bless us!'

LADY MACBETH
040: Consider it not so deeply.

MACBETH
041: But wherefore could not I pronounce 'Amen'?
042: I had most need of blessing, and 'Amen'
043: Stuck in my throat.

LADY MACBETH
044: These deeds must not be thought
045: After these ways; so, it will make us mad.

MACBETH
046: Methought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more!
047: Macbeth does murder sleep', the innocent sleep,
048: Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,
049: The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
050: Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
051: Chief nourisher in life's feast,--

LADY MACBETH
052: What do you mean?

MACBETH
053: Still it cried 'Sleep no more!' to all the house:
054: 'Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor
055: Shall sleep no more; Macbeth shall sleep no more.'

LADY MACBETH
056: Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,
057: You do unbend your noble strength, to think
058: So brainsickly of things. Go get some water,
059: And wash this filthy witness from your hand.
060: Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
061: They must lie there: go carry them; and smear
062: The sleepy grooms with blood.

MACBETH
063: I'll go no more:
064: I am afraid to think what I have done;
065: Look on't again I dare not.

LADY MACBETH
066: Infirm of purpose!
067: Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
068: Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood
069: That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
070: I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal;
071: For it must seem their guilt.

Exit. Knocking within

MACBETH
072: Whence is that knocking?
073: How is't with me, when every noise appals me?
074: What hands are here? ha! they pluck out mine eyes.
075: Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
076: Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather
077: The multitudinous seas in incarnadine,
078: Making the green one red.

Re-enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH
079: My hands are of your colour; but I shame
080: To wear a heart so white.
[Knocking within]
081: I hear a knocking
082: At the south entry: retire we to our chamber;
083: A little water clears us of this deed:
084: How easy is it, then! Your constancy
085: Hath left you unattended.
[Knocking within]
086: Hark! more knocking.
087: Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us,
088: And show us to be watchers. Be not lost
089: So poorly in your thoughts.

MACBETH
090: To know my deed, 'twere best not know myself.
[Knocking within]
091: Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE III.

The same.

Knocking within. Enter a Porter

Porter
001: Here's a knocking indeed! If a
002: man were porter of hell-gate, he should have
003: old turning the key.
[Knocking within]
004: Knock,
005: knock, knock! Who's there, i' the name of
006: Beelzebub? Here's a farmer, that hanged
007: himself on the expectation of plenty: come in
008: time; have napkins enow about you; here
009: you'll sweat for't.
[Knocking within]
010: Knock,
011: knock! Who's there, in the other devil's
012: name? Faith, here's an equivocator, that could
013: swear in both the scales against either scale;
014: who committed treason enough for God's sake,
015: yet could not equivocate to heaven: O, come
016: in, equivocator.
[Knocking within]
017: Knock,
018: knock, knock! Who's there? Faith, here's an
019: English tailor come hither, for stealing out of
020: a French hose: come in, tailor; here you may
021: roast your goose.
[Knocking within]
022: Knock,
023: knock; never at quiet! What are you? But
024: this place is too cold for hell. I'll devil-porter
025: it no further: I had thought to have let in
026: some of all professions that go the primrose
027: way to the everlasting bonfire.
[Knocking within]
028: Anon, anon! I pray you, remember the porter.

Opens the gate

Enter MACDUFF and LENNOX

MACDUFF
029: Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed,
030: That you do lie so late?

Porter
031: 'Faith sir, we were carousing till the
032: second cock: and drink, sir, is a great
033: provoker of three things.

MACDUFF
034: What three things does drink especially provoke?

Porter
035: Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and
036: urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes, and unprovokes;
037: it provokes the desire, but it takes
038: away the performance: therefore, much drink
039: may be said to be an equivocator with lechery:
040: it makes him, and it mars him; it sets
041: him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him,
042: and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and
043: not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates him
044: in a sleep, and, giving him the lie, leaves him.

MACDUFF
045: I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.

Porter
046: That it did, sir, i' the very throat on
047: me: but I requited him for his lie; and, I
048: think, being too strong for him, though he took
049: up my legs sometime, yet I made a shift to cast
050: him.

MACDUFF
051: Is thy master stirring?
[Enter MACBETH]
052: Our knocking has awaked him; here he comes.

LENNOX
053: Good morrow, noble sir.

MACBETH
054: Good morrow, both.

MACDUFF
055: Is the king stirring, worthy thane?

MACBETH
056: Not yet.

MACDUFF
057: He did command me to call timely on him:
058: I have almost slipp'd the hour.

MACBETH
059: I'll bring you to him.

MACDUFF
060: I know this is a joyful trouble to you;
061: But yet 'tis one.

MACBETH
062: The labour we delight in physics pain.
063: This is the door.

MACDUFF
064: I'll make so bold to call,
065: For 'tis my limited service.

Exit

LENNOX
066: Goes the king hence to-day?

MACBETH
067: He does: he did appoint so.

LENNOX
068: The night has been unruly: where we lay,
069: Our chimneys were blown down; and, as they say,
070: Lamentings heard i' the air; strange screams of death,
071: And prophesying with accents terrible
072: Of dire combustion and confused events
073: New hatch'd to the woeful time: the obscure bird
074: Clamour'd the livelong night: some say, the earth
075: Was feverous and did shake.

MACBETH
076: 'Twas a rough night.

LENNOX
077: My young remembrance cannot parallel
078: A fellow to it.

Re-enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF
079: O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart
080: Cannot conceive nor name thee!

MACBETH, LENNOX
081: What's the matter.

MACDUFF
082: Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!
083: Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
084: The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence
085: The life o' the building!

MACBETH
086: What is 't you say? the life?

LENNOX
087: Mean you his majesty?

MACDUFF
088: Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight
089: With a new Gorgon: do not bid me speak;
090: See, and then speak yourselves.
[Exeunt MACBETH and LENNOX]
091: Awake, awake!
092: Ring the alarum-bell. Murder and treason!
093: Banquo and Donalbain! Malcolm! awake!
094: Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit,
095: And look on death itself! up, up, and see
096: The great doom's image! Malcolm! Banquo!
097: As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites,
098: To countenance this horror! Ring the bell.

Bell rings

Enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH
099: What's the business,
100: That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
101: The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!

MACDUFF
102: O gentle lady,
103: 'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:
104: The repetition, in a woman's ear,
105: Would murder as it fell.
[Enter BANQUO]
106: O Banquo, Banquo,
107: Our royal master 's murder'd!

LADY MACBETH
108: Woe, alas!
109: What, in our house?

BANQUO
110: Too cruel any where.
111: Dear Duff, I prithee, contradict thyself,
112: And say it is not so.

Re-enter MACBETH and LENNOX, with ROSS

MACBETH
113: Had I but died an hour before this chance,
114: I had lived a blessed time; for, from this instant,
115: There 's nothing serious in mortality:
116: All is but toys: renown and grace is dead;
117: The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
118: Is left this vault to brag of.

Enter MALCOLM and DONALBAIN

DONALBAIN
119: What is amiss?

MACBETH
120: You are, and do not know't:
121: The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
122: Is stopp'd; the very source of it is stopp'd.

MACDUFF
123: Your royal father 's murder'd.

MALCOLM
124: O, by whom?

LENNOX
125: Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done 't:
126: Their hands and faces were an badged with blood;
127: So were their daggers, which unwiped we found
128: Upon their pillows:
129: They stared, and were distracted; no man's life
130: Was to be trusted with them.

MACBETH
131: O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
132: That I did kill them.

MACDUFF
133: Wherefore did you so?

MACBETH
134: Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,
135: Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:
136: The expedition my violent love
137: Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,
138: His silver skin laced with his golden blood;
139: And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature
140: For ruin's wasteful entrance: there, the murderers,
141: Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers
142: Unmannerly breech'd with gore: who could refrain,
143: That had a heart to love, and in that heart
144: Courage to make 's love known?

LADY MACBETH
145: Help me hence, ho!

MACDUFF
146: Look to the lady.

MALCOLM [Aside to DONALBAIN]
147: Why do we hold our tongues,
148: That most may claim this argument for ours?

DONALBAIN [Aside to MALCOLM]
149: What should be spoken here,
150: where our fate,
151: Hid in an auger-hole, may rush, and seize us?
152: Let 's away;
153: Our tears are not yet brew'd.

MALCOLM [Aside to DONALBAIN]
154: Nor our strong sorrow
155: Upon the foot of motion.

BANQUO
156: Look to the lady:
[LADY MACBETH is carried out]
157: And when we have our naked frailties hid,
158: That suffer in exposure, let us meet,
159: And question this most bloody piece of work,
160: To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us:
161: In the great hand of God I stand; and thence
162: Against the undivulged pretence I fight
163: Of treasonous malice.

MACDUFF
164: And so do I.

ALL
165: So all.

MACBETH
166: Let's briefly put on manly readiness,
167: And meet i' the hall together.

ALL
168: Well contented.

Exeunt all but Malcolm and Donalbain

MALCOLM
169: What will you do? Let's not consort with them:
170: To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
171: Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.

DONALBAIN
172: To Ireland, I; our separated fortune
173: Shall keep us both the safer: where we are,
174: There's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood,
175: The nearer bloody.

MALCOLM
176: This murderous shaft that's shot
177: Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way
178: Is to avoid the aim. Therefore, to horse;
179: And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
180: But shift away: there's warrant in that theft
181: Which steals itself, when there's no mercy left.

Exeunt

ACT II, SCENE IV.

Outside Macbeth's castle.

Enter ROSS and an old Man

Old Man
001: Threescore and ten I can remember well:
002: Within the volume of which time I have seen
003: Hours dreadful and things strange; but this sore night
004: Hath trifled former knowings.

ROSS
005: Ah, good father,
006: Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
007: Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, 'tis day,
008: And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp:
009: Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame,
010: That darkness does the face of earth entomb,
011: When living light should kiss it?

Old Man
012: 'Tis unnatural,
013: Even like the deed that's done. On Tuesday last,
014: A falcon, towering in her pride of place,
015: Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd.

ROSS
016: And Duncan's horses--a thing most strange and certain--
017: Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,
018: Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
019: Contending 'gainst obedience, as they would make
020: War with mankind.

Old Man
021: 'Tis said they eat each other.

ROSS
022: They did so, to the amazement of mine eyes
023: That look'd upon't. Here comes the good Macduff.
[Enter MACDUFF]
024: How goes the world, sir, now?

MACDUFF
025: Why, see you not?

ROSS
026: Is't known who did this more than bloody deed?

MACDUFF
027: Those that Macbeth hath slain.

ROSS
028: Alas, the day!
029: What good could they pretend?

MACDUFF
030: They were suborn'd:
031: Malcolm and Donalbain, the king's two sons,
032: Are stol'n away and fled; which puts upon them
033: Suspicion of the deed.

ROSS
034: 'Gainst nature still!
035: Thriftless ambition, that wilt ravin up
036: Thine own life's means! Then 'tis most like
037: The sovereignty will fall upon Macbeth.

MACDUFF
038: He is already named, and gone to Scone
039: To be invested.

ROSS
040: Where is Duncan's body?

MACDUFF
041: Carried to Colmekill,
042: The sacred storehouse of his predecessors,
043: And guardian of their bones.

ROSS
044: Will you to Scone?

MACDUFF
045: No, cousin, I'll to Fife.

ROSS
046: Well, I will thither.

MACDUFF
047: Well, may you see things well done there: adieu!
048: Lest our old robes sit easier than our new!

ROSS
049: Farewell, father.

Old Man
050: God's benison go with you; and with those
051: That would make good of bad, and friends of foes!

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE I.

Forres. The palace.

Enter BANQUO

BANQUO
001: Thou hast it now: king, Cawdor, Glamis, all,
002: As the weird women promised, and, I fear,
003: Thou play'dst most foully for't: yet it was said
004: It should not stand in thy posterity,
005: But that myself should be the root and father
006: Of many kings. If there come truth from them--
007: As upon thee, Macbeth, their speeches shine--
008: Why, by the verities on thee made good,
009: May they not be my oracles as well,
010: And set me up in hope? But hush! no more.

Sennet sounded. Enter MACBETH, as king, LADY MACBETH, as queen, LENNOX, ROSS, Lords, Ladies, and Attendants

MACBETH
011: Here's our chief guest.

LADY MACBETH
012: If he had been forgotten,
013: It had been as a gap in our great feast,
014: And all-thing unbecoming.

MACBETH
015: To-night we hold a solemn supper sir,
016: And I'll request your presence.

BANQUO
017: Let your highness
018: Command upon me; to the which my duties
019: Are with a most indissoluble tie
020: For ever knit.

MACBETH
021: Ride you this afternoon?

BANQUO
022: Ay, my good lord.

MACBETH
023: We should have else desired your good advice,
024: Which still hath been both grave and prosperous,
025: In this day's council; but we'll take to-morrow.
026: Is't far you ride?

BANQUO
027: As far, my lord, as will fill up the time
028: 'Twixt this and supper: go not my horse the better,
029: I must become a borrower of the night
030: For a dark hour or twain.

MACBETH
031: Fail not our feast.

BANQUO
032: My lord, I will not.

MACBETH
033: We hear, our bloody cousins are bestow'd
034: In England and in Ireland, not confessing
035: Their cruel parricide, filling their hearers
036: With strange invention: but of that to-morrow,
037: When therewithal we shall have cause of state
038: Craving us jointly. Hie you to horse: adieu,
039: Till you return at night. Goes Fleance with you?

BANQUO
040: Ay, my good lord: our time does call upon 's.

MACBETH
041: I wish your horses swift and sure of foot;
042: And so I do commend you to their backs. Farewell.
[Exit BANQUO]
043: Let every man be master of his time
044: Till seven at night: to make society
045: The sweeter welcome, we will keep ourself
046: Till supper-time alone: while then, God be with you!
[Exeunt all but MACBETH, and an attendant]
047: Sirrah, a word with you: attend those men
048: Our pleasure?

Attendant
049: They are, my lord, without the palace gate.

MACBETH
050: Bring them before us.
[Exit Attendant]
051: To be thus is nothing;
052: But to be safely thus.--Our fears in Banquo
053: Stick deep; and in his royalty of nature
054: Reigns that which would be fear'd: 'tis much he dares;
055: And, to that dauntless temper of his mind,
056: He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour
057: To act in safety. There is none but he
058: Whose being I do fear: and, under him,
059: My Genius is rebuked; as, it is said,
060: Mark Antony's was by Caesar. He chid the sisters
061: When first they put the name of king upon me,
062: And bade them speak to him: then prophet-like
063: They hail'd him father to a line of kings:
064: Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown,
065: And put a barren sceptre in my gripe,
066: Thence to be wrench'd with an unlineal hand,
067: No son of mine succeeding. If 't be so,
068: For Banquo's issue have I filed my mind;
069: For them the gracious Duncan have I murder'd;
070: Put rancours in the vessel of my peace
071: Only for them; and mine eternal jewel
072: Given to the common enemy of man,
073: To make them kings, the seed of Banquo kings!
074: Rather than so, come fate into the list.
075: And champion me to the utterance! Who's there!
[Re-enter Attendant, with two Murderers]
076: Now go to the door, and stay there till we call.
[Exit Attendant]
077: Was it not yesterday we spoke together?

First Murderer
078: It was, so please your highness.

MACBETH
079: Well then, now
080: Have you consider'd of my speeches? Know
081: That it was he in the times past which held you
082: So under fortune, which you thought had been
083: Our innocent self: this I made good to you
084: In our last conference, pass'd in probation with you,
085: How you were borne in hand, how cross'd,
086: the instruments,
087: Who wrought with them, and all things else that might
088: To half a soul and to a notion crazed
089: Say 'Thus did Banquo.'

First Murderer
090: You made it known to us.

MACBETH
091: I did so, and went further, which is now
092: Our point of second meeting. Do you find
093: Your patience so predominant in your nature
094: That you can let this go? Are you so gospell'd
095: To pray for this good man and for his issue,
096: Whose heavy hand hath bow'd you to the grave
097: And beggar'd yours for ever?

First Murderer
098: We are men, my liege.

MACBETH
099: Ay, in the catalogue ye go for men;
100: As hounds and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs,
101: Shoughs, water-rugs and demi-wolves, are clept
102: All by the name of dogs: the valued file
103: Distinguishes the swift, the slow, the subtle,
104: The housekeeper, the hunter, every one
105: According to the gift which bounteous nature
106: Hath in him closed; whereby he does receive
107: Particular addition. from the bill
108: That writes them all alike: and so of men.
109: Now, if you have a station in the file,
110: Not i' the worst rank of manhood, say 't;
111: And I will put that business in your bosoms,
112: Whose execution takes your enemy off,
113: Grapples you to the heart and love of us,
114: Who wear our health but sickly in his life,
115: Which in his death were perfect.

Second Murderer
116: I am one, my liege,
117: Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world
118: Have so incensed that I am reckless what
119: I do to spite the world.

First Murderer
120: And I another
121: So weary with disasters, tugg'd with fortune,
122: That I would set my lie on any chance,
123: To mend it, or be rid on't.

MACBETH
124: Both of you
125: Know Banquo was your enemy.

Both Murderers
126: True, my lord.

MACBETH
127: So is he mine; and in such bloody distance,
128: That every minute of his being thrusts
129: Against my near'st of life: and though I could
130: With barefaced power sweep him from my sight
131: And bid my will avouch it, yet I must not,
132: For certain friends that are both his and mine,
133: Whose loves I may not drop, but wail his fall
134: Who I myself struck down; and thence it is,
135: That I to your assistance do make love,
136: Masking the business from the common eye
137: For sundry weighty reasons.

Second Murderer
138: We shall, my lord,
139: Perform what you command us.

First Murderer
140: Though our lives--

MACBETH
141: Your spirits shine through you. Within this hour at most
142: I will advise you where to plant yourselves;
143: Acquaint you with the perfect spy o' the time,
144: The moment on't; for't must be done to-night,
145: And something from the palace; always thought
146: That I require a clearness: and with him--
147: To leave no rubs nor botches in the work--
148: Fleance his son, that keeps him company,
149: Whose absence is no less material to me
150: Than is his father's, must embrace the fate
151: Of that dark hour. Resolve yourselves apart:
152: I'll come to you anon.

Both Murderers
153: We are resolved, my lord.

MACBETH
154: I'll call upon you straight: abide within.
[Exeunt Murderers]
155: It is concluded. Banquo, thy soul's flight,
156: If it find heaven, must find it out to-night.

Exit

ACT III, SCENE II.

The palace.

Enter LADY MACBETH and a Servant

LADY MACBETH
001: Is Banquo gone from court?

Servant
002: Ay, madam, but returns again to-night.

LADY MACBETH
003: Say to the king, I would attend his leisure
004: For a few words.

Servant
005: Madam, I will.

Exit

LADY MACBETH
006: Nought's had, all's spent,
007: Where our desire is got without content:
008: 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy
009: Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.
[Enter MACBETH]
010: How now, my lord! why do you keep alone,
011: Of sorriest fancies your companions making,
012: Using those thoughts which should indeed have died
013: With them they think on? Things without all remedy
014: Should be without regard: what's done is done.

MACBETH
015: We have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it:
016: She'll close and be herself, whilst our poor malice
017: Remains in danger of her former tooth.
018: But let the frame of things disjoint, both the
019: worlds suffer,
020: Ere we will eat our meal in fear and sleep
021: In the affliction of these terrible dreams
022: That shake us nightly: better be with the dead,
023: Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,
024: Than on the torture of the mind to lie
025: In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;
026: After life's fitful fever he sleeps well;
027: Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison,
028: Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing,
029: Can touch him further.

LADY MACBETH
030: Come on;
031: Gentle my lord, sleek o'er your rugged looks;
032: Be bright and jovial among your guests to-night.

MACBETH
033: So shall I, love; and so, I pray, be you:
034: Let your remembrance apply to Banquo;
035: Present him eminence, both with eye and tongue:
036: Unsafe the while, that we
037: Must lave our honours in these flattering streams,
038: And make our faces vizards to our hearts,
039: Disguising what they are.

LADY MACBETH
040: You must leave this.

MACBETH
041: O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!
042: Thou know'st that Banquo, and his Fleance, lives.

LADY MACBETH
043: But in them nature's copy's not eterne.

MACBETH
044: There's comfort yet; they are assailable;
045: Then be thou jocund: ere the bat hath flown
046: His cloister'd flight, ere to black Hecate's summons
047: The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums
048: Hath rung night's yawning peal, there shall be done
049: A deed of dreadful note.

LADY MACBETH
050: What's to be done?

MACBETH
051: Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck,
052: Till thou applaud the deed. Come, seeling night,
053: Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day;
054: And with thy bloody and invisible hand
055: Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond
056: Which keeps me pale! Light thickens; and the crow
057: Makes wing to the rooky wood:
058: Good things of day begin to droop and drowse;
059: While night's black agents to their preys do rouse.
060: Thou marvell'st at my words: but hold thee still;
061: Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill.
062: So, prithee, go with me.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE III.

A park near the palace.

Enter three Murderers

First Murderer
001: But who did bid thee join with us?

Third Murderer
002: Macbeth.

Second Murderer
003: He needs not our mistrust, since he delivers
004: Our offices and what we have to do
005: To the direction just.

First Murderer
006: Then stand with us.
007: The west yet glimmers with some streaks of day:
008: Now spurs the lated traveller apace
009: To gain the timely inn; and near approaches
010: The subject of our watch.

Third Murderer
011: Hark! I hear horses.

BANQUO [Within]
012: Give us a light there, ho!

Second Murderer
013: Then 'tis he: the rest
014: That are within the note of expectation
015: Already are i' the court.

First Murderer
016: His horses go about.

Third Murderer
017: Almost a mile: but he does usually,
018: So all men do, from hence to the palace gate
019: Make it their walk.

Second Murderer
020: A light, a light!

Enter BANQUO, and FLEANCE with a torch

Third Murderer
021: 'Tis he.

First Murderer
022: Stand to't.

BANQUO
023: It will be rain to-night.

First Murderer
024: Let it come down.

They set upon BANQUO

BANQUO
025: O, treachery! Fly, good Fleance, fly, fly, fly!
026: Thou mayst revenge. O slave!

Dies. FLEANCE escapes

Third Murderer
027: Who did strike out the light?

First Murderer
028: Wast not the way?

Third Murderer
029: There's but one down; the son is fled.

Second Murderer
030: We have lost
031: Best half of our affair.

First Murderer
032: Well, let's away, and say how much is done.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE IV..

The same. Hall in the palace.

A banquet prepared. Enter MACBETH, LADY MACBETH, ROSS, LENNOX, Lords, and Attendants

MACBETH
001: You know your own degrees; sit down: at first
002: And last the hearty welcome.

Lords
003: Thanks to your majesty.

MACBETH
004: Ourself will mingle with society,
005: And play the humble host.
006: Our hostess keeps her state, but in best time
007: We will require her welcome.

LADY MACBETH
008: Pronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends;
009: For my heart speaks they are welcome.

First Murderer appears at the door

MACBETH
010: See, they encounter thee with their hearts' thanks.
011: Both sides are even: here I'll sit i' the midst:
012: Be large in mirth; anon we'll drink a measure
013: The table round.
[Approaching the door]
014: There's blood on thy face.

First Murderer
015: 'Tis Banquo's then.

MACBETH
016: 'Tis better thee without than he within.
017: Is he dispatch'd?

First Murderer
018: My lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him.

MACBETH
019: Thou art the best o' the cut-throats: yet he's good
020: That did the like for Fleance: if thou didst it,
021: Thou art the nonpareil.

First Murderer
022: Most royal sir,
023: Fleance is 'scaped.

MACBETH
024: Then comes my fit again: I had else been perfect,
025: Whole as the marble, founded as the rock,
026: As broad and general as the casing air:
027: But now I am cabin'd, cribb'd, confined, bound in
028: To saucy doubts and fears. But Banquo's safe?

First Murderer
029: Ay, my good lord: safe in a ditch he bides,
030: With twenty trenched gashes on his head;
031: The least a death to nature.

MACBETH
032: Thanks for that:
033: There the grown serpent lies; the worm that's fled
034: Hath nature that in time will venom breed,
035: No teeth for the present. Get thee gone: to-morrow
036: We'll hear, ourselves, again.

Exit Murderer

LADY MACBETH
037: My royal lord,
038: You do not give the cheer: the feast is sold
039: That is not often vouch'd, while 'tis a-making,
040: 'Tis given with welcome: to feed were best at home;
041: From thence the sauce to meat is ceremony;
042: Meeting were bare without it.

MACBETH
043: Sweet remembrancer!
044: Now, good digestion wait on appetite,
045: And health on both!

LENNOX
046: May't please your highness sit.

The GHOST OF BANQUO enters, and sits in MACBETH's place

MACBETH
047: Here had we now our country's honour roof'd,
048: Were the graced person of our Banquo present;
049: Who may I rather challenge for unkindness
050: Than pity for mischance!

ROSS
051: His absence, sir,
052: Lays blame upon his promise. Please't your highness
053: To grace us with your royal company.

MACBETH
054: The table's full.

LENNOX
055: Here is a place reserved, sir.

MACBETH
056: Where?

LENNOX
057: Here, my good lord. What is't that moves your highness?

MACBETH
058: Which of you have done this?

Lords
059: What, my good lord?

MACBETH
060: Thou canst not say I did it: never shake
061: Thy gory locks at me.

ROSS
062: Gentlemen, rise: his highness is not well.

LADY MACBETH
063: Sit, worthy friends: my lord is often thus,
064: And hath been from his youth: pray you, keep seat;
065: The fit is momentary; upon a thought
066: He will again be well: if much you note him,
067: You shall offend him and extend his passion:
068: Feed, and regard him not. Are you a man?

MACBETH
069: Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that
070: Which might appal the devil.

LADY MACBETH
071: O proper stuff!
072: This is the very painting of your fear:
073: This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said,
074: Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts,
075: Impostors to true fear, would well become
076: A woman's story at a winter's fire,
077: Authorized by her grandam. Shame itself!
078: Why do you make such faces? When all's done,
079: You look but on a stool.

MACBETH
080: Prithee, see there! behold! look! lo!
081: how say you?
082: Why, what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.
083: If charnel-houses and our graves must send
084: Those that we bury back, our monuments
085: Shall be the maws of kites.

GHOST OF BANQUO vanishes

LADY MACBETH
086: What, quite unmann'd in folly?

MACBETH
087: If I stand here, I saw him.

LADY MACBETH
088: Fie, for shame!

MACBETH
089: Blood hath been shed ere now, i' the olden time,
090: Ere human statute purged the gentle weal;
091: Ay, and since too, murders have been perform'd
092: Too terrible for the ear: the times have been,
093: That, when the brains were out, the man would die,
094: And there an end; but now they rise again,
095: With twenty mortal murders on their crowns,
096: And push us from our stools: this is more strange
097: Than such a murder is.

LADY MACBETH
098: My worthy lord,
099: Your noble friends do lack you.

MACBETH
100: I do forget.
101: Do not muse at me, my most worthy friends,
102: I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing
103: To those that know me. Come, love and health to all;
104: Then I'll sit down. Give me some wine; fill full.
105: I drink to the general joy o' the whole table,
106: And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss;
107: Would he were here! to all, and him, we thirst,
108: And all to all.

Lords
109: Our duties, and the pledge.

Re-enter GHOST OF BANQUO

MACBETH
110: Avaunt! and quit my sight! let the earth hide thee!
111: Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold;
112: Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
113: Which thou dost glare with!

LADY MACBETH
114: Think of this, good peers,
115: But as a thing of custom: 'tis no other;
116: Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.

MACBETH
117: What man dare, I dare:
118: Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
119: The arm'd rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger;
120: Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
121: Shall never tremble: or be alive again,
122: And dare me to the desert with thy sword;
123: If trembling I inhabit then, protest me
124: The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow!
125: Unreal mockery, hence!
[GHOST OF BANQUO vanishes]
126: Why, so: being gone,
127: I am a man again. Pray you, sit still.

LADY MACBETH
128: You have displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting,
129: With most admired disorder.

MACBETH
130: Can such things be,
131: And overcome us like a summer's cloud,
132: Without our special wonder? You make me strange
133: Even to the disposition that I owe,
134: When now I think you can behold such sights,
135: And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,
136: When mine is blanched with fear.

ROSS
137: What sights, my lord?

LADY MACBETH
138: I pray you, speak not; he grows worse and worse;
139: Question enrages him. At once, good night:
140: Stand not upon the order of your going,
141: But go at once.

LENNOX
142: Good night; and better health
143: Attend his majesty!

LADY MACBETH
144: A kind good night to all!

Exeunt all but MACBETH and LADY MACBETH

MACBETH
145: It will have blood; they say, blood will have blood:
146: Stones have been known to move and trees to speak;
147: Augurs and understood relations have
148: By magot-pies and choughs and rooks brought forth
149: The secret'st man of blood. What is the night?

LADY MACBETH
150: Almost at odds with morning, which is which.

MACBETH
151: How say'st thou, that Macduff denies his person
152: At our great bidding?

LADY MACBETH
153: Did you send to him, sir?

MACBETH
154: I hear it by the way; but I will send:
155: There's not a one of them but in his house
156: I keep a servant fee'd. I will to-morrow,
157: And betimes I will, to the weird sisters:
158: More shall they speak; for now I am bent to know,
159: By the worst means, the worst. For mine own good,
160: All causes shall give way: I am in blood
161: Stepp'd in so far that, should I wade no more,
162: Returning were as tedious as go o'er:
163: Strange things I have in head, that will to hand;
164: Which must be acted ere they may be scann'd.

LADY MACBETH
165: You lack the season of all natures, sleep.

MACBETH
166: Come, we'll to sleep. My strange and self-abuse
167: Is the initiate fear that wants hard use:
168: We are yet but young in deed.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE V.

A Heath.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches meeting HECATE

First Witch
001: Why, how now, Hecate! you look angerly.

HECATE
002: Have I not reason, beldams as you are,
003: Saucy and overbold? How did you dare
004: To trade and traffic with Macbeth
005: In riddles and affairs of death;
006: And I, the mistress of your charms,
007: The close contriver of all harms,
008: Was never call'd to bear my part,
009: Or show the glory of our art?
010: And, which is worse, all you have done
011: Hath been but for a wayward son,
012: Spiteful and wrathful, who, as others do,
013: Loves for his own ends, not for you.
014: But make amends now: get you gone,
015: And at the pit of Acheron
016: Meet me i' the morning: thither he
017: Will come to know his destiny:
018: Your vessels and your spells provide,
019: Your charms and every thing beside.
020: I am for the air; this night I'll spend
021: Unto a dismal and a fatal end:
022: Great business must be wrought ere noon:
023: Upon the corner of the moon
024: There hangs a vaporous drop profound;
025: I'll catch it ere it come to ground:
026: And that distill'd by magic sleights
027: Shall raise such artificial sprites
028: As by the strength of their illusion
029: Shall draw him on to his confusion:
030: He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear
031: He hopes 'bove wisdom, grace and fear:
032: And you all know, security
033: Is mortals' chiefest enemy.
[Music and a song within: 'Come away, come away,' &c]
034: Hark! I am call'd; my little spirit, see,
035: Sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me.

Exit

First Witch
036: Come, let's make haste; she'll soon be back again.

Exeunt

ACT III, SCENE VI.

Forres. The palace.

Enter LENNOX and another Lord

LENNOX
001: My former speeches have but hit your thoughts,
002: Which can interpret further: only, I say,
003: Things have been strangely borne. The
004: gracious Duncan
005: Was pitied of Macbeth: marry, he was dead:
006: And the right-valiant Banquo walk'd too late;
007: Whom, you may say, if't please you, Fleance kill'd,
008: For Fleance fled: men must not walk too late.
009: Who cannot want the thought how monstrous
010: It was for Malcolm and for Donalbain
011: To kill their gracious father? damned fact!
012: How it did grieve Macbeth! did he not straight
013: In pious rage the two delinquents tear,
014: That were the slaves of drink and thralls of sleep?
015: Was not that nobly done? Ay, and wisely too;
016: For 'twould have anger'd any heart alive
017: To hear the men deny't. So that, I say,
018: He has borne all things well: and I do think
019: That had he Duncan's sons under his key--
020: As, an't please heaven, he shall not--they
021: should find
022: What 'twere to kill a father; so should Fleance.
023: But, peace! for from broad words and 'cause he fail'd
024: His presence at the tyrant's feast, I hear
025: Macduff lives in disgrace: sir, can you tell
026: Where he bestows himself?

Lord
027: The son of Duncan,
028: From whom this tyrant holds the due of birth
029: Lives in the English court, and is received
030: Of the most pious Edward with such grace
031: That the malevolence of fortune nothing
032: Takes from his high respect: thither Macduff
033: Is gone to pray the holy king, upon his aid
034: To wake Northumberland and warlike Siward:
035: That, by the help of these--with Him above
036: To ratify the work--we may again
037: Give to our tables meat, sleep to our nights,
038: Free from our feasts and banquets bloody knives,
039: Do faithful homage and receive free honours:
040: All which we pine for now: and this report
041: Hath so exasperate the king that he
042: Prepares for some attempt of war.

LENNOX
043: Sent he to Macduff?

Lord
044: He did: and with an absolute 'Sir, not I,'
045: The cloudy messenger turns me his back,
046: And hums, as who should say 'You'll rue the time
047: That clogs me with this answer.'

LENNOX
048: And that well might
049: Advise him to a caution, to hold what distance
050: His wisdom can provide. Some holy angel
051: Fly to the court of England and unfold
052: His message ere he come, that a swift blessing
053: May soon return to this our suffering country
054: Under a hand accursed!

Lord
055: I'll send my prayers with him.

Exeunt

ACT IV, SCENE I.

A cavern. In the middle, a boiling cauldron.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches

First Witch
001: Thrice the brinded cat hath mew'd.

Second Witch
002: Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.

Third Witch
003: Harpier cries 'Tis time, 'tis time.

First Witch
004: Round about the cauldron go;
005: In the poison'd entrails throw.
006: Toad, that under cold stone
007: Days and nights has thirty-one
008: Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
009: Boil thou first i' the charmed pot.

ALL
010: Double, double toil and trouble;
011: Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch
012: Fillet of a fenny snake,
013: In the cauldron boil and bake;
014: Eye of newt and toe of frog,
015: Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
016: Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
017: Lizard's leg and owlet's wing,
018: For a charm of powerful trouble,
019: Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL
020: Double, double toil and trouble;
021: Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Third Witch
022: Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
023: Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
024: Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
025: Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
026: Liver of blaspheming Jew,
027: Gall of goat, and slips of yew
028: Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
029: Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
030: Finger of birth-strangled babe
031: Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
032: Make the gruel thick and slab:
033: Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
034: For the ingredients of our cauldron.

ALL
035: Double, double toil and trouble;
036: Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch
037: Cool it with a baboon's blood,
038: Then the charm is firm and good.

Enter HECATE to the other three Witches

HECATE
039: O well done! I commend your pains;
040: And every one shall share i' the gains;
041: And now about the cauldron sing,
042: Live elves and fairies in a ring,
043: Enchanting all that you put in.

Music and a song: 'Black spirits,' &c

HECATE retires

Second Witch
044: By the pricking of my thumbs,
045: Something wicked this way comes.
046: Open, locks,
047: Whoever knocks!

Enter MACBETH

MACBETH
048: How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!
049: What is't you do?

ALL
050: A deed without a name.

MACBETH
051: I conjure you, by that which you profess,
052: Howe'er you come to know it, answer me:
053: Though you untie the winds and let them fight
054: Against the churches; though the yesty waves
055: Confound and swallow navigation up;
056: Though bladed corn be lodged and trees blown down;
057: Though castles topple on their warders' heads;
058: Though palaces and pyramids do slope
059: Their heads to their foundations; though the treasure
060: Of nature's germens tumble all together,
061: Even till destruction sicken; answer me
062: To what I ask you.

First Witch
063: Speak.

Second Witch
064: Demand.

Third Witch
065: We'll answer.

First Witch
066: Say, if thou'dst rather hear it from our mouths,
067: Or from our masters?

MACBETH
068: Call 'em; let me see 'em.

First Witch
069: Pour in sow's blood, that hath eaten
070: Her nine farrow; grease that's sweaten
071: From the murderer's gibbet throw
072: Into the flame.

ALL
073: Come, high or low;
074: Thyself and office deftly show!

Thunder. First Apparition: an armed Head

MACBETH
075: Tell me, thou unknown power,--

First Witch
076: He knows thy thought:
077: Hear his speech, but say thou nought.

First Apparition
078: Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! beware Macduff;
079: Beware the thane of Fife. Dismiss me. Enough.

Descends

MACBETH
080: Whate'er thou art, for thy good caution, thanks;
081: Thou hast harp'd my fear aright: but one
082: word more,--

First Witch
083: He will not be commanded: here's another,
084: More potent than the first.

Thunder. Second Apparition: A bloody Child

Second Apparition
085: Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth!

MACBETH
086: Had I three ears, I'ld hear thee.

Second Apparition
087: Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn
088: The power of man, for none of woman born
089: Shall harm Macbeth.

Descends

MACBETH
090: Then live, Macduff: what need I fear of thee?
091: But yet I'll make assurance double sure,
092: And take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live;
093: That I may tell pale-hearted fear it lies,
094: And sleep in spite of thunder.
[Thunder. Third Apparition: a Child crowned, with a tree in his hand]
095: What is this
096: That rises like the issue of a king,
097: And wears upon his baby-brow the round
098: And top of sovereignty?

ALL
099: Listen, but speak not to't.

Third Apparition
100: Be lion-mettled, proud; and take no care
101: Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are:
102: Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be until
103: Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
104: Shall come against him.

Descends

MACBETH
105: That will never be
106: Who can impress the forest, bid the tree
107: Unfix his earth-bound root? Sweet bodements! good!
108: Rebellion's head, rise never till the wood
109: Of Birnam rise, and our high-placed Macbeth
110: Shall live the lease of nature, pay his breath
111: To time and mortal custom. Yet my heart
112: Throbs to know one thing: tell me, if your art
113: Can tell so much: shall Banquo's issue ever
114: Reign in this kingdom?

ALL
115: Seek to know no more.

MACBETH
116: I will be satisfied: deny me this,
117: And an eternal curse fall on you! Let me know.
118: Why sinks that cauldron? and what noise is this?

Hautboys

First Witch
119: Show!

Second Witch
120: Show!

Third Witch
121: Show!

ALL
122: Show his eyes, and grieve his heart;
123: Come like shadows, so depart!

A show of Eight Kings, the last with a glass in his hand; GHOST OF BANQUO following

MACBETH
124: Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo: down!
125: Thy crown does sear mine eye-balls. And thy hair,
126: Thou other gold-bound brow, is like the first.
127: A third is like the former. Filthy hags!
128: Why do you show me this? A fourth! Start, eyes!
129: What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom?
130: Another yet! A seventh! I'll see no more:
131: And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass
132: Which shows me many more; and some I see
133: That two-fold balls and treble scepters carry:
134: Horrible sight! Now, I see, 'tis true;
135: For the blood-bolter'd Banquo smiles upon me,
136: And points at them for his.
[Apparitions vanish]
137: What, is this so?

First Witch
138: Ay, sir, all this is so: but why
139: Stands Macbeth thus amazedly?
140: Come, sisters, cheer we up his sprites,
141: And show the best of our delights:
142: I'll charm the air to give a sound,
143: While you perform your antic round:
144: That this great king may kindly say,
145: Our duties did his welcome pay.

Music. The witches dance and then vanish, with HECATE

MACBETH
146: Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour
147: Stand aye accursed in the calendar!
148: Come in, without there!

Enter LENNOX

LENNOX
149: What's your grace's will?

MACBETH
150: Saw you the weird sisters?

LENNOX
151: No, my lord.

MACBETH
152: Came they not by you?

LENNOX
153: No, indeed, my lord.

MACBETH
154: Infected be the air whereon they ride;
155: And damn'd all those that trust them! I did hear
156: The galloping of horse: who was't came by?

LENNOX
157: 'Tis two or three, my lord, that bring you word
158: Macduff is fled to England.

MACBETH
159: Fled to England!

LENNOX
160: Ay, my good lord.

MACBETH
161: Time, thou anticipatest my dread exploits:
162: The flighty purpose never is o'ertook
163: Unless the deed go with it; from this moment
164: The very firstlings of my heart shall be
165: The firstlings of my hand. And even now,
166: To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done:
167: The castle of Macduff I will surprise;
168: Seize upon Fife; give to the edge o' the sword
169: His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls
170: That trace him in his line. No boasting like a fool;
171: This deed I'll do before this purpose cool.
172: But no more sights!--Where are these gentlemen?
173: Come, bring me where they are.

Exeunt

ACT IV, SCENE II.

Fife. Macduff's castle.

Enter LADY MACDUFF, her Son, and ROSS

LADY MACDUFF
001: What had he done, to make him fly the land?

ROSS
002: You must have patience, madam.

LADY MACDUFF
003: He had none:
004: His flight was madness: when our actions do not,
005: Our fears do make us traitors.

ROSS
006: You know not
007: Whether it was his wisdom or his fear.

LADY MACDUFF
008: Wisdom! to leave his wife, to leave his babes,
009: His mansion and his titles in a place
010: From whence himself does fly? He loves us not;
011: He wants the natural touch: for the poor wren,
012: The most diminutive of birds, will fight,
013: Her young ones in her nest, against the owl.
014: All is the fear and nothing is the love;
015: As little is the wisdom, where the flight
016: So runs against all reason.

ROSS
017: My dearest coz,
018: I pray you, school yourself: but for your husband,
019: He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows
020: The fits o' the season. I dare not speak
021: much further;
022: But cruel are the times, when we are traitors
023: And do not know ourselves, when we hold rumour
024: From what we fear, yet know not what we fear,
025: But float upon a wild and violent sea
026: Each way and move. I take my leave of you:
027: Shall not be long but I'll be here again:
028: Things at the worst will cease, or else climb upward
029: To what they were before. My pretty cousin,
030: Blessing upon you!

LADY MACDUFF
031: Father'd he is, and yet he's fatherless.

ROSS
032: I am so much a fool, should I stay longer,
033: It would be my disgrace and your discomfort:
034: I take my leave at once.

Exit

LADY MACDUFF
035: Sirrah, your father's dead;
036: And what will you do now? How will you live?

Son
037: As birds do, mother.

LADY MACDUFF
038: What, with worms and flies?

Son
039: With what I get, I mean; and so do they.

LADY MACDUFF
040: Poor bird! thou'ldst never fear the net nor lime,
041: The pitfall nor the gin.

Son
042: Why should I, mother? Poor birds they are not set for.
043: My father is not dead, for all your saying.

LADY MACDUFF
044: Yes, he is dead; how wilt thou do for a father?

Son
045: Nay, how will you do for a husband?

LADY MACDUFF
046: Why, I can buy me twenty at any market.

Son
047: Then you'll buy 'em to sell again.

LADY MACDUFF
048: Thou speak'st with all thy wit: and yet, i' faith,
049: With wit enough for thee.

Son
050: Was my father a traitor, mother?

LADY MACDUFF
051: Ay, that he was.

Son
052: What is a traitor?

LADY MACDUFF
053: Why, one that swears and lies.

Son
054: And be all traitors that do so?

LADY MACDUFF
055: Every one that does so is a traitor, and must be hanged.

Son
056: And must they all be hanged that swear and lie?

LADY MACDUFF
057: Every one.

Son
058: Who must hang them?

LADY MACDUFF
059: Why, the honest men.

Son
060: Then the liars and swearers are fools,
061: for there are liars and swearers enow to beat
062: the honest men and hang up them.

LADY MACDUFF
063: Now, God help thee, poor monkey!
064: But how wilt thou do for a father?

Son
065: If he were dead, you'ld weep for
066: him: if you would not, it were a good sign
067: that I should quickly have a new father.

LADY MACDUFF
068: Poor prattler, how thou talk'st!

Enter a Messenger

Messenger
069: Bless you, fair dame! I am not to you known,
070: Though in your state of honour I am perfect.
071: I doubt some danger does approach you nearly:
072: If you will take a homely man's advice,
073: Be not found here; hence, with your little ones.
074: To fright you thus, methinks, I am too savage;
075: To do worse to you were fell cruelty,
076: Which is too nigh your person. Heaven preserve you!
077: I dare abide no longer.

Exit

LADY MACDUFF
078: Whither should I fly?
079: I have done no harm. But I remember now
080: I am in this earthly world; where to do harm
081: Is often laudable, to do good sometime
082: Accounted dangerous folly: why then, alas,
083: Do I put up that womanly defence,
084: To say I have done no harm?
[Enter Murderers]
085: What are these faces?

First Murderer
086: Where is your husband?

LADY MACDUFF
087: I hope, in no place so unsanctified
088: Where such as thou mayst find him.

First Murderer
089: He's a traitor.

Son
090: Thou liest, thou shag-hair'd villain!

First Murderer
091: What, you egg!
[Stabbing him]
092: Young fry of treachery!

Son
093: He has kill'd me, mother:
094: Run away, I pray you!

Dies

Exit LADY MACDUFF, crying 'Murder!' Exeunt Murderers, following her

ACT IV, SCENE III.

England. Before the King's palace.

Enter MALCOLM and MACDUFF

MALCOLM
001: Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there
002: Weep our sad bosoms empty.

MACDUFF
003: Let us rather
004: Hold fast the mortal sword, and like good men
005: Bestride our down-fall'n birthdom: each new morn
006: New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows
007: Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds
008: As if it felt with Scotland and yell'd out
009: Like syllable of dolour.

MALCOLM
010: What I believe I'll wail,
011: What know believe, and what I can redress,
012: As I shall find the time to friend, I will.
013: What you have spoke, it may be so perchance.
014: This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,
015: Was once thought honest: you have loved him well.
016: He hath not touch'd you yet. I am young;
017: but something
018: You may deserve of him through me, and wisdom
019: To offer up a weak poor innocent lamb
020: To appease an angry god.

MACDUFF
021: I am not treacherous.

MALCOLM
022: But Macbeth is.
023: A good and virtuous nature may recoil
024: In an imperial charge. But I shall crave
025: your pardon;
026: That which you are my thoughts cannot transpose:
027: Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell;
028: Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace,
029: Yet grace must still look so.

MACDUFF
030: I have lost my hopes.

MALCOLM
031: Perchance even there where I did find my doubts.
032: Why in that rawness left you wife and child,
033: Those precious motives, those strong knots of love,
034: Without leave-taking? I pray you,
035: Let not my jealousies be your dishonours,
036: But mine own safeties. You may be rightly just,
037: Whatever I shall think.

MACDUFF
038: Bleed, bleed, poor country!
039: Great tyranny! lay thou thy basis sure,
040: For goodness dare not cheque thee: wear thou
041: thy wrongs;
042: The title is affeer'd! Fare thee well, lord:
043: I would not be the villain that thou think'st
044: For the whole space that's in the tyrant's grasp,
045: And the rich East to boot.

MALCOLM
046: Be not offended:
047: I speak not as in absolute fear of you.
048: I think our country sinks beneath the yoke;
049: It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash
050: Is added to her wounds: I think withal
051: There would be hands uplifted in my right;
052: And here from gracious England have I offer
053: Of goodly thousands: but, for all this,
054: When I shall tread upon the tyrant's head,
055: Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country
056: Shall have more vices than it had before,
057: More suffer and more sundry ways than ever,
058: By him that shall succeed.

MACDUFF
059: What should he be?

MALCOLM
060: It is myself I mean: in whom I know
061: All the particulars of vice so grafted
062: That, when they shall be open'd, black Macbeth
063: Will seem as pure as snow, and the poor state
064: Esteem him as a lamb, being compared
065: With my confineless harms.

MACDUFF
066: Not in the legions
067: Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn'd
068: In evils to top Macbeth.

MALCOLM
069: I grant him bloody,
070: Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,
071: Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin
072: That has a name: but there's no bottom, none,
073: In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daughters,
074: Your matrons and your maids, could not fill up
075: The cistern of my lust, and my desire
076: All continent impediments would o'erbear
077: That did oppose my will: better Macbeth
078: Than such an one to reign.

MACDUFF
079: Boundless intemperance
080: In nature is a tyranny; it hath been
081: The untimely emptying of the happy throne
082: And fall of many kings. But fear not yet
083: To take upon you what is yours: you may
084: Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty,
085: And yet seem cold, the time you may so hoodwink.
086: We have willing dames enough: there cannot be
087: That vulture in you, to devour so many
088: As will to greatness dedicate themselves,
089: Finding it so inclined.

MALCOLM
090: With this there grows
091: In my most ill-composed affection such
092: A stanchless avarice that, were I king,
093: I should cut off the nobles for their lands,
094: Desire his jewels and this other's house:
095: And my more-having would be as a sauce
096: To make me hunger more; that I should forge
097: Quarrels unjust against the good and loyal,
098: Destroying them for wealth.

MACDUFF
099: This avarice
100: Sticks deeper, grows with more pernicious root
101: Than summer-seeming lust, and it hath been
102: The sword of our slain kings: yet do not fear;
103: Scotland hath foisons to fill up your will.
104: Of your mere own: all these are portable,
105: With other graces weigh'd.

MALCOLM
106: But I have none: the king-becoming graces,
107: As justice, verity, temperance, stableness,
108: Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,
109: Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,
110: I have no relish of them, but abound
111: In the division of each several crime,
112: Acting it many ways. Nay, had I power, I should
113: Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,
114: Uproar the universal peace, confound
115: All unity on earth.

MACDUFF
116: O Scotland, Scotland!

MALCOLM
117: If such a one be fit to govern, speak:
118: I am as I have spoken.

MACDUFF
119: Fit to govern!
120: No, not to live. O nation miserable,
121: With an untitled tyrant bloody-scepter'd,
122: When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again,
123: Since that the truest issue of thy throne
124: By his own interdiction stands accursed,
125: And does blaspheme his breed? Thy royal father
126: Was a most sainted king: the queen that bore thee,
127: Oftener upon her knees than on her feet,
128: Died every day she lived. Fare thee well!
129: These evils thou repeat'st upon thyself
130: Have banish'd me from Scotland. O my breast,
131: Thy hope ends here!

MALCOLM
132: Macduff, this noble passion,
133: Child of integrity, hath from my soul
134: Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts
135: To thy good truth and honour. Devilish Macbeth
136: By many of these trains hath sought to win me
137: Into his power, and modest wisdom plucks me
138: From over-credulous haste: but God above
139: Deal between thee and me! for even now
140: I put myself to thy direction, and
141: Unspeak mine own detraction, here abjure
142: The taints and blames I laid upon myself,
143: For strangers to my nature. I am yet
144: Unknown to woman, never was forsworn,
145: Scarcely have coveted what was mine own,
146: At no time broke my faith, would not betray
147: The devil to his fellow and delight
148: No less in truth than life: my first false speaking
149: Was this upon myself: what I am truly,
150: Is thine and my poor country's to command:
151: Whither indeed, before thy here-approach,
152: Old Siward, with ten thousand warlike men,
153: Already at a point, was setting forth.
154: Now we'll together; and the chance of goodness
155: Be like our warranted quarrel! Why are you silent?

MACDUFF
156: Such welcome and unwelcome things at once
157: 'Tis hard to reconcile.

Enter a Doctor

MALCOLM
158: Well; more anon.--Comes the king forth, I pray you?

Doctor
159: Ay, sir; there are a crew of wretched souls
160: That stay his cure: their malady convinces
161: The great assay of art; but at his touch--
162: Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand--
163: They presently amend.

MALCOLM
164: I thank you, doctor.

Exit Doctor

MACDUFF
165: What's the disease he means?

MALCOLM
166: 'Tis call'd the evil:
167: A most miraculous work in this good king;
168: Which often, since my here-remain in England,
169: I have seen him do. How he solicits heaven,
170: Himself best knows: but strangely-visited people,
171: All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
172: The mere despair of surgery, he cures,
173: Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,
174: Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken,
175: To the succeeding royalty he leaves
176: The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,
177: He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy,
178: And sundry blessings hang about his throne,
179: That speak him full of grace.

Enter ROSS

MACDUFF
180: See, who comes here?

MALCOLM
181: My countryman; but yet I know him not.

MACDUFF
182: My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither.

MALCOLM
183: I know him now. Good God, betimes remove
184: The means that makes us strangers!

ROSS
185: Sir, amen.

MACDUFF
186: Stands Scotland where it did?

ROSS
187: Alas, poor country!
188: Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
189: Be call'd our mother, but our grave; where nothing,
190: But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
191: Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rend the air
192: Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow seems
193: A modern ecstasy; the dead man's knell
194: Is there scarce ask'd for who; and good men's lives
195: Expire before the flowers in their caps,
196: Dying or ere they sicken.

MACDUFF
197: O, relation
198: Too nice, and yet too true!

MALCOLM
199: What's the newest grief?

ROSS
200: That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker:
201: Each minute teems a new one.

MACDUFF
202: How does my wife?

ROSS
203: Why, well.

MACDUFF
204: And all my children?

ROSS
205: Well too.

MACDUFF
206: The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace?

ROSS
207: No; they were well at peace when I did leave 'em.

MACDUFF
208: But not a niggard of your speech: how goes't?

ROSS
209: When I came hither to transport the tidings,
210: Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour
211: Of many worthy fellows that were out;
212: Which was to my belief witness'd the rather,
213: For that I saw the tyrant's power a-foot:
214: Now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland
215: Would create soldiers, make our women fight,
216: To doff their dire distresses.

MALCOLM
217: Be't their comfort
218: We are coming thither: gracious England hath
219: Lent us good Siward and ten thousand men;
220: An older and a better soldier none
221: That Christendom gives out.

ROSS
222: Would I could answer
223: This comfort with the like! But I have words
224: That would be howl'd out in the desert air,
225: Where hearing should not latch them.

MACDUFF
226: What concern they?
227: The general cause? or is it a fee-grief
228: Due to some single breast?

ROSS
229: No mind that's honest
230: But in it shares some woe; though the main part
231: Pertains to you alone.

MACDUFF
232: If it be mine,
233: Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it.

ROSS
234: Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever,
235: Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound
236: That ever yet they heard.

MACDUFF
237: Hum! I guess at it.

ROSS
238: Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
239: Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner,
240: Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,
241: To add the death of you.

MALCOLM
242: Merciful heaven!
243: What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;
244: Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak
245: Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break.

MACDUFF
246: My children too?

ROSS
247: Wife, children, servants, all
248: That could be found.

MACDUFF
249: And I must be from thence!
250: My wife kill'd too?

ROSS
251: I have said.

MALCOLM
252: Be comforted:
253: Let's make us medicines of our great revenge,
254: To cure this deadly grief.

MACDUFF
255: He has no children. All my pretty ones?
256: Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
257: What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
258: At one fell swoop?

MALCOLM
259: Dispute it like a man.

MACDUFF
260: I shall do so;
261: But I must also feel it as a man:
262: I cannot but remember such things were,
263: That were most precious to me. Did heaven look on,
264: And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,
265: They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,
266: Not for their own demerits, but for mine,
267: Fell slaughter on their souls. Heaven rest them now!

MALCOLM
268: Be this the whetstone of your sword: let grief
269: Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

MACDUFF
270: O, I could play the woman with mine eyes
271: And braggart with my tongue! But, gentle heavens,
272: Cut short all intermission; front to front
273: Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and myself;
274: Within my sword's length set him; if he 'scape,
275: Heaven forgive him too!

MALCOLM
276: This tune goes manly.
277: Come, go we to the king; our power is ready;
278: Our lack is nothing but our leave; Macbeth
279: Is ripe for shaking, and the powers above
280: Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you may:
281: The night is long that never finds the day.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE I.

Dunsinane. Ante-room in the castle.

Enter a Doctor of Physic and a Waiting-Gentlewoman

Doctor
001: I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive
002: no truth in your report. When was it she last walked?

Gentlewoman
003: Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen
004: her rise from her bed, throw her night-gown upon
005: her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it,
006: write upon't, read it, afterwards seal it, and again
007: return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep.

Doctor
008: A great perturbation in nature, to receive at once
009: the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of
010: watching! In this slumbery agitation, besides her
011: walking and other actual performances, what, at any
012: time, have you heard her say?

Gentlewoman
013: That, sir, which I will not report after her.

Doctor
014: You may to me: and 'tis most meet you should.

Gentlewoman
015: Neither to you nor any one; having no witness to
016: confirm my speech.
[Enter LADY MACBETH, with a taper]
017: Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise;
018: and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.

Doctor
019: How came she by that light?

Gentlewoman
020: Why, it stood by her: she has light by her
021: continually; 'tis her command.

Doctor
022: You see, her eyes are open.

Gentlewoman
023: Ay, but their sense is shut.

Doctor
024: What is it she does now? Look, how she rubs her hands.

Gentlewoman
025: It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus
026: washing her hands: I have known her continue in
027: this a quarter of an hour.

LADY MACBETH
028: Yet here's a spot.

Doctor
029: Hark! she speaks: I will set down what comes from
030: her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.

LADY MACBETH
031: Out, damned spot! out, I say!--One: two: why,
032: then, 'tis time to do't.--Hell is murky!--Fie, my
033: lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? What need we
034: fear who knows it, when none can call our power to
035: account?--Yet who would have thought the old man
036: to have had so much blood in him.

Doctor
037: Do you mark that?

LADY MACBETH
038: The thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?--
039: What, will these hands ne'er be clean?--No more o'
040: that, my lord, no more o' that: you mar all with
041: this starting.

Doctor
042: Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.

Gentlewoman
043: She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of
044: that: heaven knows what she has known.

LADY MACBETH
045: Here's the smell of the blood still: all the
046: perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
047: hand. Oh, oh, oh!

Doctor
048: What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.

Gentlewoman
049: I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the
050: dignity of the whole body.

Doctor
051: Well, well, well,--

Gentlewoman
052: Pray God it be, sir.

Doctor
053: This disease is beyond my practise: yet I have known
054: those which have walked in their sleep who have died
055: holily in their beds.

LADY MACBETH
056: Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look not so
057: pale.--I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried; he
058: cannot come out on's grave.

Doctor
059: Even so?

LADY MACBETH
060: To bed, to bed! there's knocking at the gate:
061: come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What's
062: done cannot be undone.--To bed, to bed, to bed!

Exit

Doctor
063: Will she go now to bed?

Gentlewoman
064: Directly.

Doctor
065: Foul whisperings are abroad: unnatural deeds
066: Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds
067: To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets:
068: More needs she the divine than the physician.
069: God, God forgive us all! Look after her;
070: Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
071: And still keep eyes upon her. So, good night:
072: My mind she has mated, and amazed my sight.
073: I think, but dare not speak.

Gentlewoman
074: Good night, good doctor.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE II.

The country near Dunsinane.

Drum and colours. Enter MENTEITH, CAITHNESS, ANGUS, LENNOX, and Soldiers

MENTEITH
001: The English power is near, led on by Malcolm,
002: His uncle Siward and the good Macduff:
003: Revenges burn in them; for their dear causes
004: Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm
005: Excite the mortified man.

ANGUS
006: Near Birnam wood
007: Shall we well meet them; that way are they coming.

CAITHNESS
008: Who knows if Donalbain be with his brother?

LENNOX
009: For certain, sir, he is not: I have a file
010: Of all the gentry: there is Siward's son,
011: And many unrough youths that even now
012: Protest their first of manhood.

MENTEITH
013: What does the tyrant?

CAITHNESS
014: Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies:
015: Some say he's mad; others that lesser hate him
016: Do call it valiant fury: but, for certain,
017: He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause
018: Within the belt of rule.

ANGUS
019: Now does he feel
020: His secret murders sticking on his hands;
021: Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;
022: Those he commands move only in command,
023: Nothing in love: now does he feel his title
024: Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
025: Upon a dwarfish thief.

MENTEITH
026: Who then shall blame
027: His pester'd senses to recoil and start,
028: When all that is within him does condemn
029: Itself for being there?

CAITHNESS
030: Well, march we on,
031: To give obedience where 'tis truly owed:
032: Meet we the medicine of the sickly weal,
033: And with him pour we in our country's purge
034: Each drop of us.

LENNOX
035: Or so much as it needs,
036: To dew the sovereign flower and drown the weeds.
037: Make we our march towards Birnam.

Exeunt, marching

ACT V, SCENE III.

Dunsinane. A room in the castle.

Enter MACBETH, Doctor, and Attendants

MACBETH
001: Bring me no more reports; let them fly all:
002: Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,
003: I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm?
004: Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know
005: All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus:
006: 'Fear not, Macbeth; no man that's born of woman
007: Shall e'er have power upon thee.' Then fly,
008: false thanes,
009: And mingle with the English epicures:
010: The mind I sway by and the heart I bear
011: Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear.
[Enter a Servant]
012: The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
013: Where got'st thou that goose look?

Servant
014: There is ten thousand--

MACBETH
015: Geese, villain!

Servant
016: Soldiers, sir.

MACBETH
017: Go prick thy face, and over-red thy fear,
018: Thou lily-liver'd boy. What soldiers, patch?
019: Death of thy soul! those linen cheeks of thine
020: Are counsellors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?

Servant
021: The English force, so please you.

MACBETH
022: Take thy face hence.
[Exit Servant]
023: Seyton!--I am sick at heart,
024: When I behold--Seyton, I say!--This push
025: Will cheer me ever, or disseat me now.
026: I have lived long enough: my way of life
027: Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf;
028: And that which should accompany old age,
029: As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,
030: I must not look to have; but, in their stead,
031: Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath,
032: Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not. Seyton!

Enter SEYTON

SEYTON
033: What is your gracious pleasure?

MACBETH
034: What news more?

SEYTON
035: All is confirm'd, my lord, which was reported.

MACBETH
036: I'll fight till from my bones my flesh be hack'd.
037: Give me my armour.

SEYTON
038: 'Tis not needed yet.

MACBETH
039: I'll put it on.
040: Send out more horses; skirr the country round;
041: Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine armour.
042: How does your patient, doctor?

Doctor
043: Not so sick, my lord,
044: As she is troubled with thick coming fancies,
045: That keep her from her rest.

MACBETH
046: Cure her of that.
047: Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
048: Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
049: Raze out the written troubles of the brain
050: And with some sweet oblivious antidote
051: Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
052: Which weighs upon the heart?

Doctor
053: Therein the patient
054: Must minister to himself.

MACBETH
055: Throw physic to the dogs; I'll none of it.
056: Come, put mine armour on; give me my staff.
057: Seyton, send out. Doctor, the thanes fly from me.
058: Come, sir, dispatch. If thou couldst, doctor, cast
059: The water of my land, find her disease,
060: And purge it to a sound and pristine health,
061: I would applaud thee to the very echo,
062: That should applaud again.--Pull't off, I say.--
063: What rhubarb, cyme, or what purgative drug,
064: Would scour these English hence? Hear'st thou of them?

Doctor
065: Ay, my good lord; your royal preparation
066: Makes us hear something.

MACBETH
067: Bring it after me.
068: I will not be afraid of death and bane,
069: Till Birnam forest come to Dunsinane.

Doctor [aside]
070: Were I from Dunsinane away and clear,
071: Profit again should hardly draw me here.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE IV.

Country near Birnam wood.

Drum and colours. Enter MALCOLM, SIWARD and YOUNG SIWARD, MACDUFF, MENTEITH, CAITHNESS, ANGUS, LENNOX, ROSS, and Soldiers, marching

MALCOLM
001: Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand
002: That chambers will be safe.

MENTEITH
003: We doubt it nothing.

SIWARD
004: What wood is this before us?

MENTEITH
005: The wood of Birnam.

MALCOLM
006: Let every soldier hew him down a bough
007: And bear't before him: thereby shall we shadow
008: The numbers of our host and make discovery
009: Err in report of us.

Soldiers, Soldier
010: It shall be done.

SIWARD
011: We learn no other but the confident tyrant
012: Keeps still in Dunsinane, and will endure
013: Our setting down before 't.

MALCOLM
014: 'Tis his main hope:
015: For where there is advantage to be given,
016: Both more and less have given him the revolt,
017: And none serve with him but constrained things
018: Whose hearts are absent too.

MACDUFF
019: Let our just censures
020: Attend the true event, and put we on
021: Industrious soldiership.

SIWARD
022: The time approaches
023: That will with due decision make us know
024: What we shall say we have and what we owe.
025: Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate,
026: But certain issue strokes must arbitrate:
027: Towards which advance the war.

Exeunt, marching

ACT V, SCENE V.

Dunsinane. Within the castle.

Enter MACBETH, SEYTON, and Soldiers, with drum and colours

MACBETH
001: Hang out our banners on the outward walls;
002: The cry is still 'They come:' our castle's strength
003: Will laugh a siege to scorn: here let them lie
004: Till famine and the ague eat them up:
005: Were they not forced with those that should be ours,
006: We might have met them dareful, beard to beard,
007: And beat them backward home.
[A cry of women within]
008: What is that noise?

SEYTON
009: It is the cry of women, my good lord.

Exit

MACBETH
010: I have almost forgot the taste of fears;
011: The time has been, my senses would have cool'd
012: To hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair
013: Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
014: As life were in't: I have supp'd full with horrors;
015: Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts
016: Cannot once start me.
[Re-enter SEYTON]
017: Wherefore was that cry?

SEYTON
018: The queen, my lord, is dead.

MACBETH
019: She should have died hereafter;
020: There would have been a time for such a word.
021: To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
022: Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
023: To the last syllable of recorded time,
024: And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
025: The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
026: Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
027: That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
028: And then is heard no more: it is a tale
029: Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
030: Signifying nothing.
[Enter a Messenger]
031: Thou comest to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.

Messenger
032: Gracious my lord,
033: I should report that which I say I saw,
034: But know not how to do it.

MACBETH
035: Well, say, sir.

Messenger
036: As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
037: I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought,
038: The wood began to move.

MACBETH
039: Liar and slave!

Messenger
040: Let me endure your wrath, if't be not so:
041: Within this three mile may you see it coming;
042: I say, a moving grove.

MACBETH
043: If thou speak'st false,
044: Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive,
045: Till famine cling thee: if thy speech be sooth,
046: I care not if thou dost for me as much.
047: I pull in resolution, and begin
048: To doubt the equivocation of the fiend
049: That lies like truth: 'Fear not, till Birnam wood
050: Do come to Dunsinane:' and now a wood
051: Comes toward Dunsinane. Arm, arm, and out!
052: If this which he avouches does appear,
053: There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.
054: I gin to be aweary of the sun,
055: And wish the estate o' the world were now undone.
056: Ring the alarum-bell! Blow, wind! come, wrack!
057: At least we'll die with harness on our back.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE VI.

Dunsinane. Before the castle.

Drum and colours. Enter MALCOLM, SIWARD, MACDUFF, and their Army, with boughs

MALCOLM
001: Now near enough: your leafy screens throw down.
002: And show like those you are. You, worthy uncle,
003: Shall, with my cousin, your right-noble son,
004: Lead our first battle: worthy Macduff and we
005: Shall take upon 's what else remains to do,
006: According to our order.

SIWARD
007: Fare you well.
008: Do we but find the tyrant's power to-night,
009: Let us be beaten, if we cannot fight.

MACDUFF
010: Make all our trumpets speak; give them all breath,
011: Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.

Exeunt

ACT V, SCENE VII.

Another part of the field.

Alarums. Enter MACBETH

MACBETH
001: They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly,
002: But, bear-like, I must fight the course. What's he
003: That was not born of woman? Such a one
004: Am I to fear, or none.

Enter YOUNG SIWARD

YOUNG SIWARD
005: What is thy name?

MACBETH
006: Thou'lt be afraid to hear it.

YOUNG SIWARD
007: No; though thou call'st thyself a hotter name
008: Than any is in hell.

MACBETH
009: My name's Macbeth.

YOUNG SIWARD
010: The devil himself could not pronounce a title
011: More hateful to mine ear.

MACBETH
012: No, nor more fearful.

YOUNG SIWARD
013: Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my sword
014: I'll prove the lie thou speak'st.

They fight and YOUNG SIWARD is slain

MACBETH
015: Thou wast born of woman
016: But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,
017: Brandish'd by man that's of a woman born.

Exit

Alarums. Enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF
018: That way the noise is. Tyrant, show thy face!
019: If thou be'st slain and with no stroke of mine,
020: My wife and children's ghosts will haunt me still.
021: I cannot strike at wretched kerns, whose arms
022: Are hired to bear their staves: either thou, Macbeth,
023: Or else my sword with an unbatter'd edge
024: I sheathe again undeeded. There thou shouldst be;
025: By this great clatter, one of greatest note
026: Seems bruited. Let me find him, fortune!
027: And more I beg not.

Exit. Alarums

Enter MALCOLM and SIWARD

SIWARD
028: This way, my lord; the castle's gently render'd:
029: The tyrant's people on both sides do fight;
030: The noble thanes do bravely in the war;
031: The day almost itself professes yours,
032: And little is to do.

MALCOLM
033: We have met with foes
034: That strike beside us.

SIWARD
035: Enter, sir, the castle.

Exeunt. Alarums

ACT V, SCENE VIII.

Another part of the field.

Enter MACBETH

MACBETH
001: Why should I play the Roman fool, and die
002: On mine own sword? whiles I see lives, the gashes
003: Do better upon them.

Enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF
004: Turn, hell-hound, turn!

MACBETH
005: Of all men else I have avoided thee:
006: But get thee back; my soul is too much charged
007: With blood of thine already.

MACDUFF
008: I have no words:
009: My voice is in my sword: thou bloodier villain
010: Than terms can give thee out!

They fight

MACBETH
011: Thou losest labour:
012: As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air
013: With thy keen sword impress as make me bleed:
014: Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests;
015: I bear a charmed life, which must not yield,
016: To one of woman born.

MACDUFF
017: Despair thy charm;
018: And let the angel whom thou still hast served
019: Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb
020: Untimely ripp'd.

MACBETH
021: Accursed be that tongue that tells me so,
022: For it hath cow'd my better part of man!
023: And be these juggling fiends no more believed,
024: That palter with us in a double sense;
025: That keep the word of promise to our ear,
026: And break it to our hope. I'll not fight with thee.

MACDUFF
027: Then yield thee, coward,
028: And live to be the show and gaze o' the time:
029: We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
030: Painted on a pole, and underwrit,
031: 'Here may you see the tyrant.'

MACBETH
032: I will not yield,
033: To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet,
034: And to be baited with the rabble's curse.
035: Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane,
036: And thou opposed, being of no woman born,
037: Yet I will try the last. Before my body
038: I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff,
039: And damn'd be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!'

Exeunt, fighting. Alarums

Retreat. Flourish. Enter, with drum and colours, MALCOLM, SIWARD, ROSS, the other Thanes, and Soldiers

MALCOLM
040: I would the friends we miss were safe arrived.

SIWARD
041: Some must go off: and yet, by these I see,
042: So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

MALCOLM
043: Macduff is missing, and your noble son.

ROSS
044: Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt:
045: He only lived but till he was a man;
046: The which no sooner had his prowess confirm'd
047: In the unshrinking station where he fought,
048: But like a man he died.

SIWARD
049: Then he is dead?

ROSS
050: Ay, and brought off the field: your cause of sorrow
051: Must not be measured by his worth, for then
052: It hath no end.

SIWARD
053: Had he his hurts before?

ROSS
054: Ay, on the front.

SIWARD
055: Why then, God's soldier be he!
056: Had I as many sons as I have hairs,
057: I would not wish them to a fairer death:
058: And so, his knell is knoll'd.

MALCOLM
059: He's worth more sorrow,
060: And that I'll spend for him.

SIWARD
061: He's worth no more
062: They say he parted well, and paid his score:
063: And so, God be with him! Here comes newer comfort.

Re-enter MACDUFF, with MACBETH's head

MACDUFF
064: Hail, king! for so thou art: behold, where stands
065: The usurper's cursed head: the time is free:
066: I see thee compass'd with thy kingdom's pearl,
067: That speak my salutation in their minds;
068: Whose voices I desire aloud with mine:
069: Hail, King of Scotland!

ALL
070: Hail, King of Scotland!

Flourish

MALCOLM
071: We shall not spend a large expense of time
072: Before we reckon with your several loves,
073: And make us even with you. My thanes and kinsmen,
074: Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland
075: In such an honour named. What's more to do,
076: Which would be planted newly with the time,
077: As calling home our exiled friends abroad
078: That fled the snares of watchful tyranny;
079: Producing forth the cruel ministers
080: Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen,
081: Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands
082: Took off her life; this, and what needful else
083: That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace,
084: We will perform in measure, time and place:
085: So, thanks to all at once and to each one,
086: Whom we invite to see us crown'd at Scone.

Flourish. Exeunt