#itsdialgatime

[thehiddenrose]

+3

╬Now what brought you lot to my doorstep?╬

[sixoclockandtimetodie]

everybody get up its time to slam now, i just really want some scripts to shakesphere, heres your chance do your dance aT MACBETH JAM

ACT I

SCENE I. A desert place.

Thunder and lightning. Enter three Witches

First Witch

When shall we three meet again

In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

Second Witch

When the hurlyburly’s done,

When the battle’s lost and won.

Third Witch

That will be ere the set of sun.

First Witch

Where the place?

Second Witch

                  Upon the heath.

Third Witch

There to meet with Macbeth.

First Witch

I come, Graymalkin!

Second Witch

Paddock calls.

Third Witch

Anon.

ALL

Fair is foul, and foul is fair:

Hover through the fog and filthy air.

Exeunt

SCENE II. A camp near Forres.

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

DUNCAN

What bloody man is that? He can report,

As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt

The newest state.

MALCOLM

                  This is the sergeant

Who like a good and hardy soldier fought

'Gainst my captivity. Hail, brave friend!

Say to the king the knowledge of the broil

As thou didst leave it.

Sergeant

Doubtful it stood;

As two spent swimmers, that do cling together

And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald—

Worthy to be a rebel, for to that

The multiplying villanies of nature

Do swarm upon him—from the western isles

Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;

And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,

Show’d like a rebel’s whore: but all’s too weak:

For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name—

Disdaining fortune, with his brandish’d steel,

Which smoked with bloody execution,

Like valour’s minion carved out his passage

Till he faced the slave;

Which ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,

Till he unseam’d him from the nave to the chaps,

And fix’d his head upon our battlements.

DUNCAN

O valiant cousin! worthy gentleman!

Sergeant

As whence the sun ‘gins his reflection

Shipwrecking storms and direful thunders break,

So from that spring whence comfort seem’d to come

Discomfort swells. Mark, king of Scotland, mark:

No sooner justice had with valour arm’d

Compell’d these skipping kerns to trust their heels,

But the Norweyan lord surveying vantage,

With furbish’d arms and new supplies of men

Began a fresh assault.

DUNCAN

Dismay’d not this

Our captains, Macbeth and Banquo?

Sergeant

Yes;

As sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion.

If I say sooth, I must report they were

As cannons overcharged with double cracks, so they

Doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe:

Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds,

Or memorise another Golgotha,

I cannot tell.

But I am faint, my gashes cry for help.

DUNCAN

So well thy words become thee as thy wounds;

They smack of honour both. Go get him surgeons.

Exit Sergeant, attended

Who comes here?

Enter ROSS

MALCOLM

                  The worthy thane of Ross.

LENNOX

What a haste looks through his eyes! So should he look

That seems to speak things strange.

ROSS

God save the king!

DUNCAN

Whence camest thou, worthy thane?

ROSS

From Fife, great king;

Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky

And fan our people cold. Norway himself,

With terrible numbers,

Assisted by that most disloyal traitor

The thane of Cawdor, began a dismal conflict;

Till that Bellona’s bridegroom, lapp’d in proof,

Confronted him with self-comparisons,

Point against point rebellious, arm ‘gainst arm.

Curbing his lavish spirit: and, to conclude,

The victory fell on us.

DUNCAN

Great happiness!

ROSS

That now

Sweno, the Norways’ king, craves composition:

Nor would we deign him burial of his men

Till he disbursed at Saint Colme’s inch

Ten thousand dollars to our general use.

DUNCAN

No more that thane of Cawdor shall deceive

Our bosom interest: go pronounce his present death,

And with his former title greet Macbeth.

ROSS

I’ll see it done.

DUNCAN

What he hath lost noble Macbeth hath won.

Exeunt

SCENE III. A heath near Forres.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches

First Witch

Where hast thou been, sister?

Second Witch

Killing swine.

Third Witch

Sister, where thou?

First Witch

A sailor’s wife had chestnuts in her lap,

And munch’d, and munch’d, and munch’d:—

'Give me,' quoth I:

'Aroint thee, witch!' the rump-fed ronyon cries.

Her husband’s to Aleppo gone, master o’ the Tiger:

But in a sieve I’ll thither sail,

And, like a rat without a tail,

I’ll do, I’ll do, and I’ll do.

Second Witch

I’ll give thee a wind.

First Witch

Thou’rt kind.

Third Witch

And I another.

First Witch

I myself have all the other,

And the very ports they blow,

All the quarters that they know

I’ the shipman’s card.

I will drain him dry as hay:

Sleep shall neither night nor day

Hang upon his pent-house lid;

He shall live a man forbid:

Weary se’nnights nine times nine

Shall he dwindle, peak and pine:

Though his bark cannot be lost,

Yet it shall be tempest-tost.

Look what I have.

Second Witch

Show me, show me.

First Witch

Here I have a pilot’s thumb,

Wreck’d as homeward he did come.

Drum within

Third Witch

A drum, a drum!

Macbeth doth come.

ALL

The weird sisters, hand in hand,

Posters of the sea and land,

Thus do go about, about:

Thrice to thine and thrice to mine

And thrice again, to make up nine.

Peace! the charm’s wound up.

Enter MACBETH and BANQUO

MACBETH

So foul and fair a day I have not seen.

BANQUO

How far is’t call’d to Forres? What are these

So wither’d and so wild in their attire,

That look not like the inhabitants o’ the earth,

And yet are on’t? Live you? or are you aught

That man may question? You seem to understand me,

By each at once her chappy finger laying

Upon her skinny lips: you should be women,

And yet your beards forbid me to interpret

That you are so.

MACBETH

                  Speak, if you can: what are you?

First Witch

All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis!

Second Witch

All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, thane of Cawdor!

Third Witch

All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter!

BANQUO

Good sir, why do you start; and seem to fear

Things that do sound so fair? I’ the name of truth,

Are ye fantastical, or that indeed

Which outwardly ye show? My noble partner

You greet with present grace and great prediction

Of noble having and of royal hope,

That he seems rapt withal: to me you speak not.

If you can look into the seeds of time,

And say which grain will grow and which will not,

Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear

Your favours nor your hate.

First Witch

Hail!

Second Witch

Hail!

Third Witch

Hail!

First Witch

Lesser than Macbeth, and greater.

Second Witch

Not so happy, yet much happier.

Third Witch

Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none:

So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!

First Witch

Banquo and Macbeth, all hail!

MACBETH

Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more:

By Sinel’s death I know I am thane of Glamis;

But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,

A prosperous gentleman; and to be king

Stands not within the prospect of belief,

No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence

You owe this strange intelligence? or why

Upon this blasted heath you stop our way

With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you.

Witches vanish

BANQUO

The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,

And these are of them. Whither are they vanish’d?

MACBETH

Into the air; and what seem’d corporal melted

As breath into the wind. Would they had stay’d!

BANQUO

Were such things here as we do speak about?

Or have we eaten on the insane root

That takes the reason prisoner?

MACBETH

Your children shall be kings.

BANQUO

You shall be king.

MACBETH

And thane of Cawdor too: went it not so?

BANQUO

To the selfsame tune and words. Who’s here?

Enter ROSS and ANGUS

ROSS

The king hath happily received, Macbeth,

The news of thy success; and when he reads

Thy personal venture in the rebels’ fight,

His wonders and his praises do contend

Which should be thine or his: silenced with that,

In viewing o’er the rest o’ the selfsame day,

He finds thee in the stout Norweyan ranks,

Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make,

Strange images of death. As thick as hail

Came post with post; and every one did bear

Thy praises in his kingdom’s great defence,

And pour’d them down before him.

ANGUS

We are sent

To give thee from our royal master thanks;

Only to herald thee into his sight,

Not pay thee.

ROSS

And, for an earnest of a greater honour,

He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor:

In which addition, hail, most worthy thane!

For it is thine.

BANQUO

                  What, can the devil speak true?

MACBETH

The thane of Cawdor lives: why do you dress me

In borrow’d robes?

ANGUS

                  Who was the thane lives yet;

But under heavy judgment bears that life

Which he deserves to lose. Whether he was combined

With those of Norway, or did line the rebel

With hidden help and vantage, or that with both

He labour’d in his country’s wreck, I know not;

But treasons capital, confess’d and proved,

Have overthrown him.

MACBETH

[Aside]  Glamis, and thane of Cawdor!

The greatest is behind.

To ROSS and ANGUS

Thanks for your pains.

To BANQUO

Do you not hope your children shall be kings,

When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me

Promised no less to them?

BANQUO

That trusted home

Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,

Besides the thane of Cawdor. But ‘tis strange:

And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,

The instruments of darkness tell us truths,

Win us with honest trifles, to betray’s

In deepest consequence.

Cousins, a word, I pray you.

MACBETH

[Aside] Two truths are told,

As happy prologues to the swelling act

Of the imperial theme.—I thank you, gentlemen.

Aside

Cannot be ill, cannot be good: if ill,

Why hath it given me earnest of success,

Commencing in a truth? I am thane of Cawdor:

If good, why do I yield to that suggestion

Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair

And make my seated heart knock at my ribs,

Against the use of nature? Present fears

Are less than horrible imaginings:

My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,

Shakes so my single state of man that function

Is smother’d in surmise, and nothing is

But what is not.

BANQUO

                  Look, how our partner’s rapt.

MACBETH

[Aside]  If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me,

Without my stir.

BANQUO

                  New horrors come upon him,

Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould

But with the aid of use.

MACBETH

[Aside]                Come what come may,

Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

BANQUO

Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.

MACBETH

Give me your favour: my dull brain was wrought

With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains

Are register’d where every day I turn

The leaf to read them. Let us toward the king.

Think upon what hath chanced, and, at more time,

The interim having weigh’d it, let us speak

Our free hearts each to other.

BANQUO

Very gladly.

MACBETH

Till then, enough. Come, friends.

Exeunt

SCENE IV. Forres. The palace.

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

DUNCAN

Is execution done on Cawdor? Are not

Those in commission yet return’d?

MALCOLM

My liege,

They are not yet come back. But I have spoke

With one that saw him die: who did report

That very frankly he confess’d his treasons,

Implored your highness’ pardon and set forth

A deep repentance: nothing in his life

Became him like the leaving it; he died

As one that had been studied in his death

To throw away the dearest thing he owed,

As ‘twere a careless trifle.

DUNCAN

There’s no art

To find the mind’s construction in the face:

He was a gentleman on whom I built

An absolute trust.

Enter MACBETH, BANQUO, ROSS, and ANGUS

O worthiest cousin!

The sin of my ingratitude even now

Was heavy on me: thou art so far before

That swiftest wing of recompense is slow

To overtake thee. Would thou hadst less deserved,

That the proportion both of thanks and payment

Might have been mine! only I have left to say,

More is thy due than more than all can pay.

MACBETH

The service and the loyalty I owe,

In doing it, pays itself. Your highness’ part

Is to receive our duties; and our duties

Are to your throne and state children and servants,

Which do but what they should, by doing every thing

Safe toward your love and honour.

DUNCAN

Welcome hither:

I have begun to plant thee, and will labour

To make thee full of growing. Noble Banquo,

That hast no less deserved, nor must be known

No less to have done so, let me enfold thee

And hold thee to my heart.

BANQUO

There if I grow,

The harvest is your own.

DUNCAN

My plenteous joys,

Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves

In drops of sorrow. Sons, kinsmen, thanes,

And you whose places are the nearest, know

We will establish our estate upon

Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter

The Prince of Cumberland; which honour must

Not unaccompanied invest him only,

But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine

On all deservers. From hence to Inverness,

And bind us further to you.

MACBETH

The rest is labour, which is not used for you:

I’ll be myself the harbinger and make joyful

The hearing of my wife with your approach;

So humbly take my leave.

DUNCAN

My worthy Cawdor!

MACBETH

[Aside]  The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step

On which I must fall down, or else o’erleap,

For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires;

Let not light see my black and deep desires:

The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be,

Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.

Exit

DUNCAN

True, worthy Banquo; he is full so valiant,

And in his commendations I am fed;

It is a banquet to me. Let’s after him,

Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome:

It is a peerless kinsman.

Flourish. Exeunt

SCENE V. Inverness. Macbeth’s castle.

Enter LADY MACBETH, reading a letter

LADY MACBETH

'They met me in the day of success: and I have

learned by the perfectest report, they have more in

them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire

to question them further, they made themselves air,

into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in

the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who

all-hailed me ‘Thane of Cawdor;’ by which title,

before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred

me to the coming on of time, with ‘Hail, king that

shalt be!’ This have I thought good to deliver

thee, my dearest partner of greatness, that thou

mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being

ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it

to thy heart, and farewell.’

Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be

What thou art promised: yet do I fear thy nature;

It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness

To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great;

Art not without ambition, but without

The illness should attend it: what thou wouldst highly,

That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false,

And yet wouldst wrongly win: thou’ldst have, great Glamis,

That which cries ‘Thus thou must do, if thou have it;

And that which rather thou dost fear to do

Than wishest should be undone.’ Hie thee hither,

That I may pour my spirits in thine ear;

And chastise with the valour of my tongue

All that impedes thee from the golden round,

Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem

To have thee crown’d withal.

Enter a Messenger

What is your tidings?

Messenger

The king comes here to-night.

LADY MACBETH

Thou’rt mad to say it:

Is not thy master with him? who, were’t so,

Would have inform’d for preparation.

Messenger

So please you, it is true: our thane is coming:

One of my fellows had the speed of him,

Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more

Than would make up his message.

LADY MACBETH

Give him tending;

He brings great news.

Exit Messenger

The raven himself is hoarse

That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan

Under my battlements. Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;

Stop up the access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between

The effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature’s mischief! Come, thick night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,

To cry ‘Hold, hold!’

Enter MACBETH

Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!

Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter!

Thy letters have transported me beyond

This ignorant present, and I feel now

The future in the instant.

MACBETH

My dearest love,

Duncan comes here to-night.

LADY MACBETH

And when goes hence?

MACBETH

To-morrow, as he purposes.

LADY MACBETH

O, never

Shall sun that morrow see!

Your face, my thane, is as a book where men

May read strange matters. To beguile the time,

Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye,

Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower,

But be the serpent under’t. He that’s coming

Must be provided for: and you shall put

This night’s great business into my dispatch;

Which shall to all our nights and days to come

Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.

MACBETH

We will speak further.

LADY MACBETH

Only look up clear;

To alter favour ever is to fear:

Leave all the rest to me.

Exeunt

SCENE VI. Before Macbeth’s castle.

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

DUNCAN

This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air

Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself

Unto our gentle senses.

BANQUO

This guest of summer,

The temple-haunting martlet, does approve,

By his loved mansionry, that the heaven’s breath

Smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze,

Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird

Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle:

Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed,

The air is delicate.

Enter LADY MACBETH

DUNCAN

See, see, our honour’d hostess!

The love that follows us sometime is our trouble,

Which still we thank as love. Herein I teach you

How you shall bid God ‘ild us for your pains,

And thank us for your trouble.

LADY MACBETH

All our service

In every point twice done and then done double

Were poor and single business to contend

Against those honours deep and broad wherewith

Your majesty loads our house: for those of old,

And the late dignities heap’d up to them,

We rest your hermits.

DUNCAN

Where’s the thane of Cawdor?

We coursed him at the heels, and had a purpose

To be his purveyor: but he rides well;

And his great love, sharp as his spur, hath holp him

To his home before us. Fair and noble hostess,

We are your guest to-night.

LADY MACBETH

Your servants ever

Have theirs, themselves and what is theirs, in compt,

To make their audit at your highness’ pleasure,

Still to return your own.

DUNCAN

Give me your hand;

Conduct me to mine host: we love him highly,

And shall continue our graces towards him.

By your leave, hostess.

Exeunt

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

If it were done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well

It were done quickly: if the assassination

Could trammel up the consequence, and catch

With his surcease success; that but this blow

Might be the be-all and the end-all here,

But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,

We’ld jump the life to come. But in these cases

We still have judgment here; that we but teach

Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return

To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice

Commends the ingredients of our poison’d chalice

To our own lips. He’s here in double trust;

First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,

Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,

Who should against his murderer shut the door,

Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan

Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been

So clear in his great office, that his virtues

Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against

The deep damnation of his taking-off;

And pity, like a naked new-born babe,

Striding the blast, or heaven’s cherubim, horsed

Upon the sightless couriers of the air,

Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur

To prick the sides of my intent, but only

Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself

And falls on the other.

Enter LADY MACBETH

How now! what news?

LADY MACBETH

He has almost supp’d: why have you left the chamber?

MACBETH

Hath he ask’d for me?

LADY MACBETH

Know you not he has?

MACBETH

We will proceed no further in this business:

He hath honour’d me of late; and I have bought

Golden opinions from all sorts of people,

Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,

Not cast aside so soon.

LADY MACBETH

Was the hope drunk

Wherein you dress’d yourself? hath it slept since?

And wakes it now, to look so green and pale

At what it did so freely? From this time

Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard

To be the same in thine own act and valour

As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that

Which thou esteem’st the ornament of life,

And live a coward in thine own esteem,

Letting ‘I dare not’ wait upon ‘I would,’

Like the poor cat i’ the adage?

MACBETH

Prithee, peace:

I dare do all that may become a man;

Who dares do more is none.

LADY MACBETH

What beast was’t, then,

That made you break this enterprise to me?

When you durst do it, then you were a man;

And, to be more than what you were, you would

Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place

Did then adhere, and yet you would make both:

They have made themselves, and that their fitness now

Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know

How tender ‘tis to love the babe that milks me:

I would, while it was smiling in my face,

Have pluck’d my nipple from his boneless gums,

And dash’d the brains out, had I so sworn as you

Have done to this.

MACBETH

                  If we should fail?

LADY MACBETH

We fail!

But screw your courage to the sticking-place,

And we’ll not fail. When Duncan is asleep—

Whereto the rather shall his day’s hard journey

Soundly invite him—his two chamberlains

Will I with wine and wassail so convince

That memory, the warder of the brain,

Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason

A limbeck only: when in swinish sleep

Their drenched natures lie as in a death,

What cannot you and I perform upon

The unguarded Duncan? what not put upon

His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt

Of our great quell?

MACBETH

Bring forth men-children only;

For thy undaunted mettle should compose

Nothing but males. Will it not be received,

When we have mark’d with blood those sleepy two

Of his own chamber and used their very daggers,

That they have done’t?

LADY MACBETH

Who dares receive it other,

As we shall make our griefs and clamour roar

Upon his death?

MACBETH

                  I am settled, and bend up

Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.

Away, and mock the time with fairest show:

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

How goes the night, boy?

FLEANCE

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

BANQUO

And she goes down at twelve.

FLEANCE

I take’t, ‘tis later, sir.

BANQUO

Hold, take my sword. There’s husbandry in heaven;

Their candles are all out. Take thee that too.

A heavy summons lies like lead upon me,

And yet I would not sleep: merciful powers,

Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature

Gives way to in repose!

Enter MACBETH, and a Servant with a torch

Give me my sword.

Who’s there?

MACBETH

A friend.

BANQUO

What, sir, not yet at rest? The king’s a-bed:

He hath been in unusual pleasure, and

Sent forth great largess to your offices.

This diamond he greets your wife withal,

By the name of most kind hostess; and shut up

In measureless content.

MACBETH

Being unprepared,

Our will became the servant to defect;

Which else should free have wrought.

BANQUO

All’s well.

I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters:

To you they have show’d some truth.

MACBETH

I think not of them:

Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,

We would spend it in some words upon that business,

If you would grant the time.

BANQUO

At your kind’st leisure.

MACBETH

If you shall cleave to my consent, when ‘tis,

It shall make honour for you.

BANQUO

So I lose none

In seeking to augment it, but still keep

My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,

I shall be counsell’d.

MACBETH

Good repose the while!

BANQUO

Thanks, sir: the like to you!

Exeunt BANQUO and FLEANCE

MACBETH

Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,

She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.

Exit Servant

Is this a dagger which I see before me,

The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.

I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible

To feeling as to sight? or art thou but

A dagger of the mind, a false creation,

Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?

I see thee yet, in form as palpable

As this which now I draw.

Thou marshall’st me the way that I was going;

And such an instrument I was to use.

Mine eyes are made the fools o’ the other senses,

Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still,

And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,

Which was not so before. There’s no such thing:

It is the bloody business which informs

Thus to mine eyes. Now o’er the one halfworld

Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse

The curtain’d sleep; witchcraft celebrates

Pale Hecate’s offerings, and wither’d murder,

Alarum’d by his sentinel, the wolf,

Whose howl’s his watch, thus with his stealthy pace.

With Tarquin’s ravishing strides, towards his design

Moves like a ghost. Thou sure and firm-set earth,

Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear

Thy very stones prate of my whereabout,

And take the present horror from the time,

Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives:

Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.

A bell rings

I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.

Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell

That summons thee to heaven or to hell.

Exit

SCENE II. The same.

Enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH

That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold;

What hath quench’d them hath given me fire.

Hark! Peace!

It was the owl that shriek’d, the fatal bellman,

Which gives the stern’st good-night. He is about it:

The doors are open; and the surfeited grooms

Do mock their charge with snores: I have drugg’d

their possets,

That death and nature do contend about them,

Whether they live or die.

MACBETH

[Within]  Who’s there? what, ho!

LADY MACBETH

Alack, I am afraid they have awaked,

And ‘tis not done. The attempt and not the deed

Confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready;

He could not miss ‘em. Had he not resembled

My father as he slept, I had done’t.

Enter MACBETH

My husband!

MACBETH

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

LADY MACBETH

I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.

Did not you speak?

MACBETH

                  When?

LADY MACBETH

Now.

MACBETH

As I descended?

LADY MACBETH

Ay.

MACBETH

Hark!

Who lies i’ the second chamber?

LADY MACBETH

Donalbain.

MACBETH

This is a sorry sight.

Looking on his hands

LADY MACBETH

A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.

MACBETH

There’s one did laugh in’s sleep, and one cried

'Murder!'

That they did wake each other: I stood and heard them:

But they did say their prayers, and address’d them

Again to sleep.

LADY MACBETH

                  There are two lodged together.

MACBETH

One cried ‘God bless us!’ and ‘Amen’ the other;

As they had seen me with these hangman’s hands.

Listening their fear, I could not say ‘Amen,’

When they did say ‘God bless us!’

LADY MACBETH

Consider it not so deeply.

MACBETH

But wherefore could not I pronounce ‘Amen’?

I had most need of blessing, and ‘Amen’

Stuck in my throat.

LADY MACBETH

These deeds must not be thought

After these ways; so, it will make us mad.

MACBETH

Methought I heard a voice cry ‘Sleep no more!

Macbeth does murder sleep’, the innocent sleep,

Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleeve of care,

The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath,

Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,

Chief nourisher in life’s feast,—

LADY MACBETH

What do you mean?

MACBETH

Still it cried ‘Sleep no more!’ to all the house:

'Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor

Shall sleep no more; Macbeth shall sleep no more.’

LADY MACBETH

Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,

You do unbend your noble strength, to think

So brainsickly of things. Go get some water,

And wash this filthy witness from your hand.

Why did you bring these daggers from the place?

They must lie there: go carry them; and smear

The sleepy grooms with blood.

MACBETH

I’ll go no more:

I am afraid to think what I have done;

Look on’t again I dare not.

LADY MACBETH

Infirm of purpose!

Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead

Are but as pictures: ‘tis the eye of childhood

That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,

I’ll gild the faces of the grooms withal;

For it must seem their guilt.

Exit. Knocking within

MACBETH

Whence is that knocking?

How is’t with me, when every noise appals me?

What hands are here? ha! they pluck out mine eyes.

Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood

Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather

The multitudinous seas in incarnadine,

Making the green one red.

Re-enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH

My hands are of your colour; but I shame

To wear a heart so white.

Knocking within

I hear a knocking

At the south entry: retire we to our chamber;

A little water clears us of this deed:

How easy is it, then! Your constancy

Hath left you unattended.

Knocking within

Hark! more knocking.

Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us,

And show us to be watchers. Be not lost

So poorly in your thoughts.

MACBETH

To know my deed, ‘twere best not know myself.

Knocking within

Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!

Exeunt

SCENE III. The same.

Knocking within. Enter a Porter

Porter

Here’s a knocking indeed! If a

man were porter of hell-gate, he should have

old turning the key.

Knocking within

Knock,

knock, knock! Who’s there, i’ the name of

Beelzebub? Here’s a farmer, that hanged

himself on the expectation of plenty: come in

time; have napkins enow about you; here

you’ll sweat for’t.

Knocking within

Knock,

knock! Who’s there, in the other devil’s

name? Faith, here’s an equivocator, that could

swear in both the scales against either scale;

who committed treason enough for God’s sake,

yet could not equivocate to heaven: O, come

in, equivocator.

Knocking within

Knock,

knock, knock! Who’s there? Faith, here’s an

English tailor come hither, for stealing out of

a French hose: come in, tailor; here you may

roast your goose.

Knocking within

Knock,

knock; never at quiet! What are you? But

this place is too cold for hell. I’ll devil-porter

it no further: I had thought to have let in

some of all professions that go the primrose

way to the everlasting bonfire.

Knocking within

Anon, anon! I pray you, remember the porter.

Opens the gate

Enter MACDUFF and LENNOX

MACDUFF

Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed,

That you do lie so late?

Porter

'Faith sir, we were carousing till the

second cock: and drink, sir, is a great

provoker of three things.

MACDUFF

What three things does drink especially provoke?

Porter

Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and

urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes, and unprovokes;

it provokes the desire, but it takes

away the performance: therefore, much drink

may be said to be an equivocator with lechery:

it makes him, and it mars him; it sets

him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him,

and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and

not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates him

in a sleep, and, giving him the lie, leaves him.

MACDUFF

I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.

Porter

That it did, sir, i’ the very throat on

me: but I requited him for his lie; and, I

think, being too strong for him, though he took

up my legs sometime, yet I made a shift to cast

him.

MACDUFF

Is thy master stirring?

Enter MACBETH

Our knocking has awaked him; here he comes.

LENNOX

Good morrow, noble sir.

MACBETH

Good morrow, both.

MACDUFF

Is the king stirring, worthy thane?

MACBETH

Not yet.

MACDUFF

He did command me to call timely on him:

I have almost slipp’d the hour.

MACBETH

I’ll bring you to him.

MACDUFF

I know this is a joyful trouble to you;

But yet ‘tis one.

MACBETH

The labour we delight in physics pain.

This is the door.

MACDUFF

                  I’ll make so bold to call,

For ‘tis my limited service.

Exit

LENNOX

Goes the king hence to-day?

MACBETH

He does: he did appoint so.

LENNOX

The night has been unruly: where we lay,

Our chimneys were blown down; and, as they say,

Lamentings heard i’ the air; strange screams of death,

And prophesying with accents terrible

Of dire combustion and confused events

New hatch’d to the woeful time: the obscure bird

Clamour’d the livelong night: some say, the earth

Was feverous and did shake.

MACBETH

'Twas a rough night.

LENNOX

My young remembrance cannot parallel

A fellow to it.

Re-enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF

O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart

Cannot conceive nor name thee!

MACBETH LENNOX

What’s the matter.

MACDUFF

Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!

Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope

The Lord’s anointed temple, and stole thence

The life o’ the building!

MACBETH

What is ‘t you say? the life?

LENNOX

Mean you his majesty?

MACDUFF

Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight

With a new Gorgon: do not bid me speak;

See, and then speak yourselves.

Exeunt MACBETH and LENNOX

Awake, awake!

Ring the alarum-bell. Murder and treason!

Banquo and Donalbain! Malcolm! awake!

Shake off this downy sleep, death’s counterfeit,

And look on death itself! up, up, and see

The great doom’s image! Malcolm! Banquo!

As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites,

To countenance this horror! Ring the bell.

Bell rings

Enter LADY MACBETH

LADY MACBETH

What’s the business,

That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley

The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!

MACDUFF

O gentle lady,

'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:

The repetition, in a woman’s ear,

Would murder as it fell.

Enter BANQUO

O Banquo, Banquo,

Our royal master ‘s murder’d!

LADY MACBETH

Woe, alas!

What, in our house?

BANQUO

Too cruel any where.

Dear Duff, I prithee, contradict thyself,

And say it is not so.

Re-enter MACBETH and LENNOX, with ROSS

MACBETH

Had I but died an hour before this chance,

I had lived a blessed time; for, from this instant,

There ‘s nothing serious in mortality:

All is but toys: renown and grace is dead;

The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees

Is left this vault to brag of.

Enter MALCOLM and DONALBAIN

DONALBAIN

What is amiss?

MACBETH

                  You are, and do not know’t:

The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood

Is stopp’d; the very source of it is stopp’d.

MACDUFF

Your royal father ‘s murder’d.

MALCOLM

O, by whom?

LENNOX

Those of his chamber, as it seem’d, had done ‘t:

Their hands and faces were an badged with blood;

So were their daggers, which unwiped we found

Upon their pillows:

They stared, and were distracted; no man’s life

Was to be trusted with them.

MACBETH

O, yet I do repent me of my fury,

That I did kill them.

MACDUFF

Wherefore did you so?

MACBETH

Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,

Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:

The expedition my violent love

Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,

His silver skin laced with his golden blood;

And his gash’d stabs look’d like a breach in nature

For ruin’s wasteful entrance: there, the murderers,

Steep’d in the colours of their trade, their daggers

Unmannerly breech’d with gore: who could refrain,

That had a heart to love, and in that heart

Courage to make ‘s love kno wn?

LADY MACBETH

Help me hence, ho!

MACDUFF

Look to the lady.

MALCOLM

[Aside to DONALBAIN]  Why do we hold our tongues,

That most may claim this argument for ours?

DONALBAIN

[Aside to MALCOLM]  What should be spoken here,

where our fate,

Hid in an auger-hole, may rush, and seize us?

Let ‘s away;

Our tears are not yet brew’d.

MALCOLM

[Aside to DONALBAIN]        Nor our strong sorrow

Upon the foot of motion.

BANQUO

Look to the lady:

LADY MACBETH is carried out

And when we have our naked frailties hid,

That suffer in exposure, let us meet,

And question this most bloody piece of work,

To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us:

In the great hand of God I stand; and thence

Against the undivulged pretence I fight

Of treasonous malice.

MACDUFF

And so do I.

ALL

So all.

MACBETH

Let’s briefly put on manly readiness,

And meet i’ the hall together.

ALL

Well contented.

Exeunt all but Malcolm and Donalbain.

MALCOLM

What will you do? Let’s not consort with them:

To show an unfelt sorrow is an office

Which the false man does easy. I’ll to England.

DONALBAIN

To Ireland, I; our separated fortune

Shall keep us both the safer: where we are,

There’s daggers in men’s smiles: the near in blood,

The nearer bloody.

MALCOLM

                  This murderous shaft that’s shot

Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way

Is to avoid the aim. Therefore, to horse;

And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,

But shift away: there’s warrant in that theft

Which steals itself, when there’s no mercy left.

Exeunt

SCENE IV. Outside Macbeth’s castle.

Enter ROSS and an old Man

Old Man

Threescore and ten I can remember well:

Within the volume of which time I have seen

Hours dreadful and things strange; but this sore night

Hath trifled former knowings.

ROSS

Ah, good father,

Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man’s act,

Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, ‘tis day,

And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp:

Is’t night’s predominance, or the day’s shame,

That darkness does the face of earth entomb,

When living light should kiss it?

Old Man

'Tis unnatural,

Even like the deed that’s done. On Tuesday last,

A falcon, towering in her pride of place,

Was by a mousing owl hawk’d at and kill’d.

ROSS

And Duncan’s horses—a thing most strange and certain—

Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,

Turn’d wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,

Contending ‘gainst obedience, as they would make

War with mankind.

Old Man

'Tis said they eat each other.

ROSS

They did so, to the amazement of mine eyes

That look’d upon’t. Here comes the good Macduff.

Enter MACDUFF

How goes the world, sir, now?

MACDUFF

Why, see you not?

ROSS

Is’t known who did this more than bloody deed?

MACDUFF

Those that Macbeth hath slain.

ROSS

Alas, the day!

What good could they pretend?

MACDUFF

They were suborn’d:

Malcolm and Donalbain, the king’s two sons,

Are stol’n away and fled; which puts upon them

Suspicion of the deed.

ROSS

'Gainst nature still!

Thriftless ambition, that wilt ravin up

Thine own life’s means! Then ‘tis most like

The sovereignty will fall upon Macbeth.

MACDUFF

He is already named, and gone to Scone

To be invested.

ROSS

                  Where is Duncan’s body?

MACDUFF

Carried to Colmekill,

The sacred storehouse of his predecessors,

And guardian of their bones.

ROSS

Will you to Scone?

MACDUFF

No, cousin, I’ll to Fife.

ROSS

Well, I will thither.

MACDUFF

Well, may you see things well done there: adieu!

Lest our old robes sit easier than our new!

ROSS

Farewell, father.

Old Man

God’s benison go with you; and with those

That would make good of bad, and friends of foes!

Exeunt

ACT III

SCENE I. Forres. The palace.

Enter BANQUO

BANQUO

Thou hast it now: king, Cawdor, Glamis, all,

As the weird women promised, and, I fear,

Thou play’dst most foully for’t: yet it was said

It should not stand in thy posterity,

But that myself should be the root and father

Of many kings. If there come truth from them—

As upon thee, Macbeth, their speeches shine—

Why, by the verities on thee made good,

May they not be my oracles as well,

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

Here’s our chief guest.

LADY MACBETH

If he had been forgotten,

It had been as a gap in our great feast,

And all-thing unbecoming.

MACBETH

To-night we hold a solemn supper sir,

And I’ll request your presence.

BANQUO

Let your highness

Command upon me; to the which my duties

Are with a most indissoluble tie

For ever knit.

MACBETH

                  Ride you this afternoon?

BANQUO

Ay, my good lord.

MACBETH

We should have else desired your good advice,

Which still hath been both grave and prosperous,

In this day’s council; but we’ll take to-morrow.

Is’t far you ride?

BANQUO

As far, my lord, as will fill up the time

'Twixt this and supper: go not my horse the better,

I must become a borrower of the night

For a dark hour or twain.

MACBETH

Fail not our feast.

BANQUO

My lord, I will not.

MACBETH

We hear, our bloody cousins are bestow’d

In England and in Ireland, not confessing

Their cruel parricide, filling their hearers

With strange invention: but of that to-morrow,

When therewithal we shall have cause of state

Craving us jointly. Hie you to horse: adieu,

Till you return at night. Goes Fleance with you?

BANQUO

Ay, my good lord: our time does call upon ‘s.

MACBETH

I wish your horses swift and sure of foot;

And so I do commend you to their backs. Farewell.

Exit BANQUO

Let every man be master of his time

Till seven at night: to make society

The sweeter welcome, we will keep ourself

Till supper-time alone: while then, God be with you!

Exeunt all but MACBETH, and an attendant

Sirrah, a word with you: attend those men

Our pleasure?

ATTENDANT

They are, my lord, without the palace gate.

MACBETH

Bring them before us.

Exit Attendant

To be thus is nothing;

But to be safely thus.—Our fears in Banquo

Stick deep; and in his royalty of nature

Reigns that which would be fear’d: ‘tis much he dares;

And, to that dauntless temper of his mind,

He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour

To act in safety. There is none but he

Whose being I do fear: and, under him,

My Genius is rebuked; as, it is said,

Mark Antony’s was by Caesar. He chid the sisters

When first they put the name of king upon me,

And bade them speak to him: then prophet-like

They hail’d him father to a line of kings:

Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown,

And put a barren sceptre in my gripe,

Thence to be wrench’d with an unlineal hand,

No son of mine succeeding. If ‘t be so,

For Banquo’s issue have I filed my mind;

For them the gracious Duncan have I murder’d;

Put rancours in the vessel of my peace

Only for them; and mine eternal jewel

Given to the common enemy of man,

To make them kings, the seed of Banquo kings!

Rather than so, come fate into the list.

And champion me to the utterance! Who’s there!

Re-enter Attendant, with two Murderers

Now go to the door, and stay there till we call.

Exit Attendant

Was it not yesterday we spoke together?

First Murderer

It was, so please your highness.

MACBETH

Well then, now

Have you consider’d of my speeches? Know

That it was he in the times past which held you

So under fortune, which you thought had been

Our innocent self: this I made good to you

In our last conference, pass’d in probation with you,

How you were borne in hand, how cross’d,

the instruments,

Who wrought with them, and all things else that might

To half a soul and to a notion crazed

Say ‘Thus did Banquo.’

First Murderer

You made it known to us.

MACBETH

I did so, and went further, which is now

Our point of second meeting. Do you find

Your patience so predominant in your nature

That you can let this go? Are you so gospell’d

To pray for this good man and for his issue,

Whose heavy hand hath bow’d you to the grave

And beggar’d yours for ever?

First Murderer

We are men, my liege.

MACBETH

Ay, in the catalogue ye go for men;

As hounds and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs,

Shoughs, water-rugs and demi-wolves, are clept

All by the name of dogs: the valued file

Distinguishes the swift, the slow, the subtle,

The housekeeper, the hunter, every one

According to the gift which bounteous nature

Hath in him closed; whereby he does receive

Particular addition. from the bill

That writes them all alike: and so of men.

Now, if you have a station in the file,

Not i’ the worst rank of manhood, say ‘t;

And I will put that business in your bosoms,

Whose execution takes your enemy off,

Grapples you to the heart and love of us,

Who wear our health but sickly in his life,

Which in his death were perfect.

Second Murderer

I am one, my liege,

Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world

Have so incensed that I am reckless what

I do to spite the world.

First Murderer

And I another

So weary with disasters, tugg’d with fortune,

That I would set my lie on any chance,

To mend it, or be rid on’t.

MACBETH

Both of you

Know Banquo was your enemy.

Both Murderers

True, my lord.

MACBETH

So is he mine; and in such bloody distance,

That every minute of his being thrusts

Against my near’st of life: and though I could

With barefaced power sweep him from my sight

And bid my will avouch it, yet I must not,

For certain friends that are both his and mine,

Whose loves I may not drop, but wail his fall

Who I myself struck down; and thence it is,

That I to your assistance do make love,

Masking the business from the common eye

For sundry weighty reasons.

Second Murderer

We shall, my lord,

Perform what you command us.

First Murderer

Though our lives—

MACBETH

Your spirits shine through you. Within this hour at most

I will advise you where to plant yourselves;

Acquaint you with the perfect spy o’ the time,

The moment on’t; for’t must be done to-night,

And something from the palace; always thought

That I require a clearness: and with him—

To leave no rubs nor botches in the work—

Fleance his son, that keeps him company,

Whose absence is no less material to me

Than is his father’s, must embrace the fate

Of that dark hour. Resolve yourselves apart:

I’ll come to you anon.

Both Murderers

We are resolved, my lord.

MACBETH

I’ll call upon you straight: abide within.

Exeunt Murderers

It is concluded. Banquo, thy soul’s flight,

If it find heaven, must find it out to-night.

Exit

SCENE II. The palace.

Enter LADY MACBETH and a Servant

LADY MACBETH

Is Banquo gone from court?

Servant

Ay, madam, but returns again to-night.

LADY MACBETH

Say to the king, I would attend his leisure

For a few words.

Servant

                  Madam, I will.

Exit

LADY MACBETH

Nought’s had, all’s spent,

Where our desire is got without content:

'Tis safer to be that which we destroy

Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.

Enter MACBETH

How now, my lord! why do you keep alone,

Of sorriest fancies your companions making,

Using those thoughts which should indeed have died

With them they think on? Things without all remedy

Should be without regard: what’s done is done.

MACBETH

We have scotch’d the snake, not kill’d it:

She’ll close and be herself, whilst our poor malice

Remains in danger of her former tooth.

But let the frame of things disjoint, both the

worlds suffer,

Ere we will eat our meal in fear and sleep

In the affliction of these terrible dreams

That shake us nightly: better be with the dead,

Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,

Than on the torture of the mind to lie

In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;

After life’s fitful fever he sleeps well;

Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison,

Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing,

Can touch him further.

LADY MACBETH

Come on;

Gentle my lord, sleek o’er your rugged looks;

Be bright and jovial among your guests to-night.

MACBETH

So shall I, love; and so, I pray, be you:

Let your remembrance apply to Banquo;

Present him eminence, both with eye and tongue:

Unsafe the while, that we

Must lave our honours in these flattering streams,

And make our faces vizards to our hearts,

Disguising what they are.

LADY MACBETH

You must leave this.

MACBETH

O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!

Thou know’st that Banquo, and his Fleance, lives.

LADY MACBETH

But in them nature’s copy’s not eterne.

MACBETH

There’s comfort yet; they are assailable;

Then be thou jocund: ere the bat hath flown

His cloister’d flight, ere to black Hecate’s summons

The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums

Hath rung night’s yawning peal, there shall be done

A deed of dreadful note.

LADY MACBETH

What’s to be done?

MACBETH

Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck,

Till thou applaud the deed. Come, seeling night,

Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day;

And with thy bloody and invisible hand

Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond

Which keeps me pale! Light thickens; and the crow

Makes wing to the rooky wood:

Good things of day begin to droop and drowse;

While night’s black agents to their preys do rouse.

Thou marvell’st at my words: but hold thee still;

Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill.

So, prithee, go with me.

Exeunt

SCENE III. A park near the palace.

Enter three Murderers

First Murderer

But who did bid thee join with us?

Third Murderer

Macbeth.

Second Murderer

He needs not our mistrust, since he delivers

Our offices and what we have to do

To the direction just.

First Murderer

Then stand with us.

The west yet glimmers with some streaks of day:

Now spurs the lated traveller apace

To gain the timely inn; and near approaches

The subject of our watch.

Third Murderer

Hark! I hear horses.

BANQUO

[Within]  Give us a light there, ho!

Second Murderer

Then ‘tis he: the rest

That are within the note of expectation

Already are i’ the court.

First Murderer

His horses go about.

Third Murderer

Almost a mile: but he does usually,

So all men do, from hence to the palace gate

Make it their walk.

Second Murderer

A light, a light!

Enter BANQUO, and FLEANCE with a torch

Third Murderer

'Tis he.

First Murderer

Stand to’t.

BANQUO

It will be rain to-night.

First Murderer

Let it come down.

They set upon BANQUO

BANQUO

O, treachery! Fly, good Fleance, fly, fly, fly!

Thou mayst revenge. O slave!

Dies. FLEANCE escapes

Third Murderer

Who did strike out the light?

First Murderer

Wast not the way?

Third Murderer

There’s but one down; the son is fled.

Second Murderer

We have lost

Best half of our affair.

First Murderer

Well, let’s away, and say how much is done.

Exeunt

SCENE IV. The same. Hall in the palace.

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

MACBETH

You know your own degrees; sit down: at first

And last the hearty welcome.

Lords

Thanks to your majesty.

MACBETH

Ourself will mingle with society,

And play the humble host.

Our hostess keeps her state, but in best time

We will require her welcome.

LADY MACBETH

Pronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends;

For my heart speaks they are welcome.

First Murderer appears at the door

MACBETH

See, they encounter thee with their hearts’ thanks.

Both sides are even: here I’ll sit i’ the midst:

Be large in mirth; anon we’ll drink a measure

The table round.

Approaching the door

There’s blood on thy face.

First Murderer

'Tis Banquo's then.

MACBETH

'Tis better thee without than he within.

Is he dispatch’d?

First Murderer

My lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him.

MACBETH

Thou art the best o’ the cut-throats: yet he’s good

That did the like for Fleance: if thou didst it,

Thou art the nonpareil.

First Murderer

Most royal sir,

Fleance is ‘scaped.

MACBETH

Then comes my fit again: I had else been perfect,

Whole as the marble, founded as the rock,

As broad and general as the casing air:

But now I am cabin’d, cribb’d, confined, bound in

To saucy doubts and fears. But Banquo’s safe?

First Murderer

Ay, my good lord: safe in a ditch he bides,

With twenty trenched gashes on his head;

The least a death to nature.

MACBETH

Thanks for that:

There the grown serpent lies; the worm that’s fled

Hath nature that in time will venom breed,

No teeth for the present. Get thee gone: to-morrow

We’ll hear, ourselves, again.

Exit Murderer

LADY MACBETH

My royal lord,

You do not give the cheer: the feast is sold

That is not often vouch’d, while ‘tis a-making,

'Tis given with welcome: to feed were best at home;

From thence the sauce to meat is ceremony;

Meeting were bare without it.

MACBETH

Sweet remembrancer!

Now, good digestion wait on appetite,

And health on both!

LENNOX

May’t please your highness sit.

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

MACBETH

Here had we now our country’s honour roof’d,

Were the graced person of our Banquo present;

Who may I rather challenge for unkindness

Than pity for mischance!

ROSS

His absence, sir,

Lays blame upon his promise. Please’t your highness

To grace us with your royal company.

MACBETH

The table’s full.

LENNOX

                  Here is a place reserved, sir.

MACBETH

Where?

LENNOX

Here, my good lord. What is’t that moves your highness?

MACBETH

Which of you have done this?

Lords

What, my good lord?

MACBETH

Thou canst not say I did it: never shake

Thy gory locks at me.

ROSS

Gentlemen, rise: his highness is not well.

LADY MACBETH

Sit, worthy friends: my lord is often thus,

And hath been from his youth: pray you, keep seat;

The fit is momentary; upon a thought

He will again be well: if much you note him,

You shall offend him and extend his passion:

Feed, and regard him not. Are you a man?

MACBETH

Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that

Which might appal the devil.

LADY MACBETH

O proper stuff!

This is the very painting of your fear:

This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said,

Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts,

Impostors to true fear, would well become

A woman’s story at a winter’s fire,

Authorized by her grandam. Shame itself!

Why do you make such faces? When all’s done,

You look but on a stool.

MACBETH

Prithee, see there! behold! look! lo!

how say you?

Why, what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.

If charnel-houses and our graves must send

Those that we bury back, our monuments

Shall be the maws of kites.

GHOST OF BANQUO vanishes

LADY MACBETH

What, quite unmann’d in folly?

MACBETH

If I stand here, I saw him.

LADY MACBETH

Fie, for shame!

MACBETH

Blood hath been shed ere now, i’ the olden time,

Ere human statute purged the gentle weal;

Ay, and since too, murders have been perform’d

Too terrible for the ear: the times have been,

That, when the brains were out, the man would die,

And there an end; but now they rise again,

With twenty mortal murders on their crowns,

And push us from our stools: this is more strange

Than such a murder is.

LADY MACBETH

My worthy lord,

Your noble friends do lack you.

MACBETH

I do forget.

Do not muse at me, my most worthy friends,

I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing

To those that know me. Come, love and health to all;

Then I’ll sit down. Give me some wine; fill full.

I drink to the general joy o’ the whole table,

And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss;

Would he were here! to all, and him, we thirst,

And all to all.

Lords

                  Our duties, and the pledge.

Re-enter GHOST OF BANQUO

MACBETH

Avaunt! and quit my sight! let the earth hide thee!

Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold;

Thou hast no speculation in those eyes

Which thou dost glare with!

LADY MACBETH

Think of this, good peers,

But as a thing of custom: ‘tis no other;

Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.

MACBETH

What man dare, I dare:

Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,

The arm’d rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger;

Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves

Shall never tremble: or be alive again,

And dare me to the desert with thy sword;

If trembling I inhabit then, protest me

The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow!

Unreal mockery, hence!

GHOST OF BANQUO vanishes

Why, so: being gone,

I am a man again. Pray you, sit still.

LADY MACBETH

You have displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting,

With most admired disorder.

MACBETH

Can such things be,

And overcome us like a summer’s cloud,

Without our special wonder? You make me strange

Even to the disposition that I owe,

When now I think you can behold such sights,

And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,

When mine is blanched with fear.

ROSS

What sights, my lord?

LADY MACBETH

I pray you, speak not; he grows worse and worse;

Question enrages him. At once, good night:

Stand not upon the order of your going,

But go at once.

LENNOX

                  Good night; and better health

Attend his majesty!

LADY MACBETH

A kind good night to all!

Exeunt all but MACBETH and LADY MACBETH

MACBETH

It will have blood; they say, blood will have blood:

Stones have been known to move and trees to speak;

Augurs and understood relations have

By magot-pies and choughs and rooks brought forth

The secret’st man of blood. What is the night?

LADY MACBETH

Almost at odds with morning, which is which.

MACBETH

How say’st thou, that Macduff denies his person

At our great bidding?

LADY MACBETH

Did you send to him, sir?

MACBETH

I hear it by the way; but I will send:

There’s not a one of them but in his house

I keep a servant fee’d. I will to-morrow,

And betimes I will, to the weird sisters:

More shall they speak; for now I am bent to know,

By the worst means, the worst. For mine own good,

All causes shall give way: I am in blood

Stepp’d in so far that, should I wade no more,

Returning were as tedious as go o’er:

Strange things I have in head, that will to hand;

Which must be acted ere they may be scann’d.

LADY MACBETH

You lack the season of all natures, sleep.

MACBETH

Come, we’ll to sleep. My strange and self-abuse

Is the initiate fear that wants hard use:

We are yet but young in deed.

Exeunt

SCENE V. A Heath.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches meeting HECATE

First Witch

Why, how now, Hecate! you look angerly.

HECATE

Have I not reason, beldams as you are,

Saucy and overbold? How did you dare

To trade and traffic with Macbeth

In riddles and affairs of death;

And I, the mistress of your charms,

The close contriver of all harms,

Was never call’d to bear my part,

Or show the glory of our art?

And, which is worse, all you have done

Hath been but for a wayward son,

Spiteful and wrathful, who, as others do,

Loves for his own ends, not for you.

But make amends now: get you gone,

And at the pit of Acheron

Meet me i’ the morning: thither he

Will come to know his destiny:

Your vessels and your spells provide,

Your charms and every thing beside.

I am for the air; this night I’ll spend

Unto a dismal and a fatal end:

Great business must be wrought ere noon:

Upon the corner of the moon

There hangs a vaporous drop profound;

I’ll catch it ere it come to ground:

And that distill’d by magic sleights

Shall raise such artificial sprites

As by the strength of their illusion

Shall draw him on to his confusion:

He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear

He hopes ‘bove wisdom, grace and fear:

And you all know, security

Is mortals’ chiefest enemy.

Music and a song within: ‘Come away, come away,’  & c

Hark! I am call’d; my little spirit, see,

Sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me.

Exit

First Witch

Come, let’s make haste; she’ll soon be back again.

Exeunt

SCENE VI. Forres. The palace.

Enter LENNOX and another Lord

LENNOX

My former speeches have but hit your thoughts,

Which can interpret further: only, I say,

Things have been strangely borne. The

gracious Duncan

Was pitied of Macbeth: marry, he was dead:

And the right-valiant Banquo walk’d too late;

Whom, you may say, if’t please you, Fleance kill’d,

For Fleance fled: men must not walk too late.

Who cannot want the thought how monstrous

It was for Malcolm and for Donalbain

To kill their gracious father? damned fact!

How it did grieve Macbeth! did he not straight

In pious rage the two delinquents tear,

That were the slaves of drink and thralls of sleep?

Was not that nobly done? Ay, and wisely too;

For ‘twould have anger’d any heart alive

To hear the men deny’t. So that, I say,

He has borne all things well: and I do think

That had he Duncan’s sons under his key—

As, an’t please heaven, he shall not—they

should find

What ‘twere to kill a father; so should Fleance.

But, peace! for from broad words and ‘cause he fail’d

His presence at the tyrant’s feast, I hear

Macduff lives in disgrace: sir, can you tell

Where he bestows himself?

Lord

The son of Duncan,

From whom this tyrant holds the due of birth

Lives in the English court, and is received

Of the most pious Edward with such grace

That the malevolence of fortune nothing

Takes from his high respect: thither Macduff

Is gone to pray the holy king, upon his aid

To wake Northumberland and warlike Siward:

That, by the help of these—with Him above

To ratify the work—we may again

Give to our tables meat, sleep to our nights,

Free from our feasts and banquets bloody knives,

Do faithful homage and receive free honours:

All which we pine for now: and this report

Hath so exasperate the king that he

Prepares for some attempt of war.

LENNOX

Sent he to Macduff?

Lord

He did: and with an absolute ‘Sir, not I,’

The cloudy messenger turns me his back,

And hums, as who should say ‘You’ll rue the time

That clogs me with this answer.’

LENNOX

And that well might

Advise him to a caution, to hold what distance

His wisdom can provide. Some holy angel

Fly to the court of England and unfold

His message ere he come, that a swift blessing

May soon return to this our suffering country

Under a hand accursed!

Lord

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

Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.

Second Witch

Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.

Third Witch

Harpier cries ‘Tis time, ‘tis time.

First Witch

Round about the cauldron go;

In the poison’d entrails throw.

Toad, that under cold stone

Days and nights has thirty-one

Swelter’d venom sleeping got,

Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot.

ALL

Double, double toil and trouble;

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch

Fillet of a fenny snake,

In the cauldron boil and bake;

Eye of newt and toe of frog,

Wool of bat and tongue of dog,

Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,

Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,

For a charm of powerful trouble,

Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL

Double, double toil and trouble;

Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Third Witch

Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,

Witches’ mummy, maw and gulf

Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark,

Root of hemlock digg’d i’ the dark,

Liver of blaspheming Jew,

Gall of goat, and slips of yew

Silver’d in the moon’s eclipse,

Nose of Turk and Tartar’s lips,

Finger of birth-strangled babe

Ditch-deliver’d by a drab,

Make the gruel thick and slab:

Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,

For the ingredients of our cauldron.

ALL

Double, double toil and trouble;

Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch

Cool it with a baboon’s blood,

Then the charm is firm and good.

Enter HECATE to the other three Witches

HECATE

O well done! I commend your pains;

And every one shall share i’ the gains;

And now about the cauldron sing,

Live elves and fairies in a ring,

Enchanting all that you put in.

Music and a song: ‘Black spirits,’  & c

HECATE retires

Second Witch

By the pricking of my thumbs,

Something wicked this way comes.

Open, locks,

Whoever knocks!

Enter MACBETH

MACBETH

How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!

What is’t you do?

ALL

                  A deed without a name.

MACBETH

I conjure you, by that which you profess,

Howe’er you come to know it, answer me:

Though you untie the winds and let them fight

Against the churches; though the yesty waves

Confound and swallow navigation up;

Though bladed corn be lodged and trees blown down;

Though castles topple on their warders’ heads;

Though palaces and pyramids do slope

Their heads to their foundations; though the treasure

Of nature’s germens tumble all together,

Even till destruction sicken; answer me

To what I ask you.

First Witch

                  Speak.

Second Witch

Demand.

Third Witch

We’ll answer.

First Witch

Say, if thou’dst rather hear it from our mouths,

Or from our masters?

MACBETH

Call ‘em; let me see ‘em.

First Witch

Pour in sow’s blood, that hath eaten

Her nine farrow; grease that’s sweaten

From the murderer’s gibbet throw

Into the flame.

ALL

                  Come, high or low;

Thyself and office deftly show!

Thunder. First Apparition: an armed Head

MACBETH

Tell me, thou unknown power,—

First Witch

He knows thy thought:

Hear his speech, but say thou nought.

First Apparition

Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! beware Macduff;

Beware the thane of Fife. Dismiss me. Enough.

Descends

MACBETH

Whate’er thou art, for thy good caution, thanks;

Thou hast harp’d my fear aright: but one

word more,—

First Witch

He will not be commanded: here’s another,

More potent than the first.

Thunder. Second Apparition: A bloody Child

Second Apparition

Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth!

MACBETH

Had I three ears, I’ld hear thee.

Second Apparition

Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn

The power of man, for none of woman born

Shall harm Macbeth.

Descends

MACBETH

Then live, Macduff: what need I fear of thee?

But yet I’ll make assurance double sure,

And take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live;

That I may tell pale-hearted fear it lies,

And sleep in spite of thunder.

Thunder. Third Apparition: a Child crowned, with a tree in his hand

What is this

That rises like the issue of a king,

And wears upon his baby-brow the round

And top of sovereignty?

ALL

Listen, but speak not to’t.

Third Apparition

Be lion-mettled, proud; and take no care

Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are:

Macbeth shall never vanquish’d be until

Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill

Shall come against him.

Descends

MACBETH

That will never be

Who can impress the forest, bid the tree

Unfix his earth-bound root? Sweet bodements! good!

Rebellion’s head, rise never till the wood

Of Birnam rise, and our high-placed Macbeth

Shall live the lease of nature, pay his breath

To time and mortal custom. Yet my heart

Throbs to know one thing: tell me, if your art

Can tell so much: shall Banquo’s issue ever

Reign in this kingdom?

ALL

Seek to know no more.

MACBETH

I will be satisfied: deny me this,

And an eternal curse fall on you! Let me know.

Why sinks that cauldron? and what noise is this?

Hautboys

First Witch

Show!

Second Witch

Show!

Third Witch

Show!

ALL

Show his eyes, and grieve his heart;

Come like shadows, so depart!

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

MACBETH

Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo: down!

Thy crown does sear mine eye-balls. And thy hair,

Thou other gold-bound brow, is like the first.

A third is like the former. Filthy hags!

Why do you show me this? A fourth! Start, eyes!

What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom?

Another yet! A seventh! I’ll see no more:

And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass

Which shows me many more; and some I see

That two-fold balls and treble scepters carry:

Horrible sight! Now, I see, ‘tis true;

For the blood-bolter’d Banquo smiles upon me,

And points at them for his.

Apparitions vanish

What, is this so?

First Witch

Ay, sir, all this is so: but why

Stands Macbeth thus amazedly?

Come, sisters, cheer we up his sprites,

And show the best of our delights:

I’ll charm the air to give a sound,

While you perform your antic round:

That this great king may kindly say,

Our duties did his welcome pay.

Music. The witches dance and then vanish, with HECATE

MACBETH

Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour

Stand aye accursed in the calendar!

Come in, without there!

Enter LENNOX

LENNOX

What’s your grace’s will?

MACBETH

Saw you the weird sisters?

LENNOX

No, my lord.

MACBETH

Came they not by you?

LENNOX

No, indeed, my lord.

MACBETH

Infected be the air whereon they ride;

And damn’d all those that trust them! I did hear

The galloping of horse: who was’t came by?

LENNOX

'Tis two or three, my lord, that bring you word

Macduff is fled to England.

MACBETH

Fled to England!

LENNOX

Ay, my good lord.

MACBETH

Time, thou anticipatest my dread exploits:

The flighty purpose never is o’ertook

Unless the deed go with it; from this moment

The very firstlings of my heart shall be

The firstlings of my hand. And even now,

To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done:

The castle of Macduff I will surprise;

Seize upon Fife; give to the edge o’ the sword

His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls

That trace him in his line. No boasting like a fool;

This deed I’ll do before this purpose cool.

But no more sights!—Where are these gentlemen?

Come, bring me where they are.

Exeunt

SCENE II. Fife. Macduff’s castle.

Enter LADY MACDUFF, her Son, and ROSS

LADY MACDUFF

What had he done, to make him fly the land?

ROSS

You must have patience, madam.

LADY MACDUFF

He had none:

His flight was madness: when our actions do not,

Our fears do make us traitors.

ROSS

You know not

Whether it was his wisdom or his fear.

LADY MACDUFF

Wisdom! to leave his wife, to leave his babes,

His mansion and his titles in a place

From whence himself does fly? He loves us not;

He wants the natural touch: for the poor wren,

The most diminutive of birds, will fight,

Her young ones in her nest, against the owl.

All is the fear and nothing is the love;

As little is the wisdom, where the flight

So runs against all reason.

ROSS

My dearest coz,

I pray you, school yourself: but for your husband,

He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows

The fits o’ the season. I dare not speak

much further;

But cruel are the times, when we are traitors

And do not know ourselves, when we hold rumour

From what we fear, yet know not what we fear,

But float upon a wild and violent sea

Each way and move. I take my leave of you:

Shall not be long but I’ll be here again:

Things at the worst will cease, or else climb upward

To what they were before. My pretty cousin,

Blessing upon you!

LADY MACDUFF

Father’d he is, and yet he’s fatherless.

ROSS

I am so much a fool, should I stay longer,

It would be my disgrace and your discomfort:

I take my leave at once.

Exit

LADY MACDUFF

Sirrah, your father’s dead;

And what will you do now? How will you live?

Son

As birds do, mother.

LADY MACDUFF

What, with worms and flies?

Son

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

LADY MACDUFF

Poor bird! thou’ldst never fear the net nor lime,

The pitfall nor the gin.

Son

Why should I, mother? Poor birds they are not set for.

My father is not dead, for all your saying.

LADY MACDUFF

Yes, he is dead; how wilt thou do for a father?

Son

Nay, how will you do for a husband?

LADY MACDUFF

Why, I can buy me twenty at any market.

Son

Then you’ll buy ‘em to sell again.

LADY MACDUFF

Thou speak’st with all thy wit: and yet, i’ faith,

With wit enough for thee.

Son

Was my father a traitor, mother?

LADY MACDUFF

Ay, that he was.

Son

What is a traitor?

LADY MACDUFF

Why, one that swears and lies.

Son

And be all traitors that do so?

LADY MACDUFF

Every one that does so is a traitor, and must be hanged.

Son

And must they all be hanged that swear and lie?

LADY MACDUFF

Every one.

Son

Who must hang them?

LADY MACDUFF

Why,  the honest men.

Son

Then the liars and swearers are fools,

for there are liars and swearers enow to beat

the honest men and hang up them.

LADY MACDUFF

Now, God help thee, poor monkey!

But how wilt thou do for a father?

Son

If he were dead, you’ld weep for

him: if you would not, it were a good sign

that I should quickly have a new father.

LADY MACDUFF

Poor prattler, how thou talk’st!

Enter a Messenger

Messenger

Bless you, fair dame! I am not to you known,

Though in your state of honour I am perfect.

I doubt some danger does approach you nearly:

If you will take a homely man’s advice,

Be not found here; hence, with your little ones.

To fright you thus, methinks, I am too savage;

To do worse to you were fell cruelty,

Which is too nigh your person. Heaven preserve you!

I dare abide no longer.

Exit

LADY MACDUFF

Whither should I fly?

I have done no harm. But I remember now

I am in this earthly world; where to do harm

Is often laudable, to do good sometime

Accounted dangerous folly: why then, alas,

Do I put up that womanly defence,

To say I have done no harm?

Enter Murderers

What are these faces?

First Murderer

Where is your husband?

LADY MACDUFF

I hope, in no place so unsanctified

Where such as thou mayst find him.

First Murderer

He’s a traitor.

Son

Thou liest, thou shag-hair’d villain!

First Murderer

What, you egg!

Stabbing him

Young fry of treachery!

Son

He has kill’d me, mother:

Run away, I pray you!

Dies

Exit LADY MACDUFF, crying ‘Murder!’ Exeunt Murderers, following her

SCENE III. England. Before the King’s palace.

Enter MALCOLM and MACDUFF

MALCOLM

Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there

Weep our sad bosoms empty.

MACDUFF

Let us rather

Hold fast the mortal sword, and like good men

Bestride our down-fall’n birthdom: each new morn

New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows

Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds

As if it felt with Scotland and yell’d out

Like syllable of dolour.

MALCOLM

What I believe I’ll wail,

What know believe, and what I can redress,

As I shall find the time to friend, I will.

What you have spoke, it may be so perchance.

This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,

Was once thought honest: you have loved him well.

He hath not touch’d you yet. I am young;

but something

You may deserve of him through me, and wisdom

To offer up a weak poor innocent lamb

To appease an angry god.

MACDUFF

I am not treacherous.

MALCOLM

But Macbeth is.

A good and virtuous nature may recoil

In an imperial charge. But I shall crave

your pardon;

That which you are my thoughts cannot transpose:

Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell;

Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace,

Yet grace must still look so.

MACDUFF

I have lost my hopes.

MALCOLM

Perchance even there where I did find my doubts.

Why in that rawness left you wife and child,

Those precious motives, those strong knots of love,

Without leave-taking? I pray you,

Let not my jealousies be your dishonours,

But mine own safeties. You may be rightly just,

Whatever I shall think.

MACDUFF

Bleed, bleed, poor country!

Great tyranny! lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dare not cheque thee: wear thou

thy wrongs;

The title is affeer’d! Fare thee well, lord:

I would not be the villain that thou think’st

For the whole space that’s in the tyrant’s grasp,

And the rich East to boot.

MALCOLM

Be not offended:

I speak not as in absolute fear of you.

I think our country sinks beneath the yoke;

It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash

Is added to her wounds: I think withal

There would be hands uplifted in my right;

And here from gracious England have I offer

Of goodly thousands: but, for all this,

When I shall tread upon the tyrant’s head,

Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country

Shall have more vices than it had before,

More suffer and more sundry ways than ever,

By him that shall succeed.

MACDUFF

What should he be?

MALCOLM

It is myself I mean: in whom I know

All the particulars of vice so grafted

That, when they shall be open’d, black Macbeth

Will seem as pure as snow, and the poor state

Esteem him as a lamb, being compared

With my confineless harms.

MACDUFF

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn’d

In evils to top Macbeth.

MALCOLM

I grant him bloody,

Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,

Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin

That has a name: but there’s no bottom, none,

In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daughters,

Your matrons and your maids, could not fill up

The cistern of my lust, and my desire

All continent impediments would o’erbear

That did oppose my will: better Macbeth

Than such an one to reign.

MACDUFF

Boundless intemperance

In nature is a tyranny; it hath been

The untimely emptying of the happy throne

And fall of many kings. But fear not yet

To take upon you what is yours: you may

Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty,

And yet seem cold, the time you may so hoodwink.

We have willing dames enough: there cannot be

That vulture in you, to devour so many

As will to greatness dedicate themselves,

Finding it so inclined.

MALCOLM

With this there grows

In my most ill-composed affection such

A stanchless avarice that, were I king,

I should cut off the nobles for their lands,

Desire his jewels and this other’s house:

And my more-having would be as a sauce

To make me hunger more; that I should forge

Quarrels unjust against the good and loyal,

Destroying them for wealth.

MACDUFF

This avarice

Sticks deeper, grows with more pernicious root

Than summer-seeming lust, and it hath been

The sword of our slain kings: yet do not fear;

Scotland hath foisons to fill up your will.

Of your mere own: all these are portable,

With other graces weigh’d.

MALCOLM

But I have none: the king-becoming graces,

As justice, verity, temperance, stableness,

Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,

Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,

I have no relish of them, but abound

In the division of each several crime,

Acting it many ways. Nay, had I power, I should

Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,

Uproar the universal peace, confound

All unity on earth.

MACDUFF

O Scotland, Scotland!

MALCOLM

If such a one be fit to govern, speak:

I am as I have spoken.

MACDUFF

Fit to govern!

No, not to live. O nation miserable,

With an untitled tyrant bloody-scepter’d,

When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again,

Since that the truest issue of thy throne

By his own interdiction stands accursed,

And does blaspheme his breed? Thy royal father

Was a most sainted king: the queen that bore thee,

Oftener upon her knees than on her feet,

Died every day she lived. Fare thee well!

These evils thou repeat’st upon thyself

Have banish’d me from Scotland. O my breast,

Thy hope ends here!

MALCOLM

Macduff, this noble passion,

Child of integrity, hath from my soul

Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts

To thy good truth and honour. Devilish Macbeth

By many of these trains hath sought to win me

Into his power, and modest wisdom plucks me

From over-credulous haste: but God above

Deal between thee and me! for even now

I put myself to thy direction, and

Unspeak mine own detraction, here abjure

The taints and blames I laid upon myself,

For strangers to my nature. I am yet

Unknown to woman, never was forsworn,

Scarcely have coveted what was mine own,

At no time broke my faith, would not betray

The devil to his fellow and delight

No less in truth than life: my first false speaking

Was this upon myself: what I am truly,

Is thine and my poor country’s to command:

Whither indeed, before thy here-approach,

Old Siward, with ten thousand warlike men,

Already at a point, was setting forth.

Now we’ll together; and the chance of goodness

Be like our warranted quarrel! Why are you silent?

MACDUFF

Such welcome and unwelcome things at once

'Tis hard to reconcile.

Enter a Doctor

MALCOLM

Well; more anon.—Comes the king forth, I pray you?

Doctor

Ay, sir; there are a crew of wretched souls

That stay his cure: their malady convinces

The great assay of art; but at his touch—

Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand—

They presently amend.

MALCOLM

I thank you, doctor.

Exit Doctor

MACDUFF

What’s the disease he means?

MALCOLM

'Tis call'd the evil:

A most miraculous work in this good king;

Which often, since my here-remain in England,

I have seen him do. How he solicits heaven,

Himself best knows: but strangely-visited people,

All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,

The mere despair of surgery, he cures,

Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,

Put on with holy prayers: and ‘tis spoken,

To the succeeding royalty he leaves

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,

He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy,

And sundry blessings hang about his throne,

That speak him full of grace.

Enter ROSS

MACDUFF

See, who comes here?

MALCOLM

My countryman; but yet I know him not.

MACDUFF

My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither.

MALCOLM

I know him now. Good God, betimes remove

The means that makes us strangers!

ROSS

Sir, amen.

MACDUFF

Stands Scotland where it did?

ROSS

Alas, poor country!

Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot

Be call’d our mother, but our grave; where nothing,

But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;

Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rend the air

Are made, not mark’d; where violent sorrow seems

A modern ecstasy; the dead man’s knell

Is there scarce ask’d for who; and good men’s lives

Expire before the flowers in their caps,

Dying or ere they sicken.

MACDUFF

O, relation

Too nice, and yet too true!

MALCOLM

What’s the newest grief?

ROSS

That of an hour’s age doth hiss the speaker:

Each minute teems a new one.

MACDUFF

How does my wife?

ROSS

Why, well.

MACDUFF

         And all my children?

ROSS

Well too.

MACDUFF

The tyrant has not batter’d at their peace?

ROSS

No; they were well at peace when I did leave ‘em.

MACDUFF

But not a niggard of your speech: how goes’t?

ROSS

When I came hither to transport the tidings,

Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour

Of many worthy fellows that were out;

Which was to my belief witness’d the rather,

For that I saw the tyrant’s power a-foot:

Now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland

Would create soldiers, make our women fight,

To doff their dire distresses.

MALCOLM

Be’t their comfort

We are coming thither: gracious England hath

Lent us good Siward and ten thousand men;

An older and a better soldier none

That Christendom gives out.

ROSS

Would I could answer

This comfort with the like! But I have words

That would be howl’d out in the desert air,

Where hearing should not latch them.

MACDUFF

What concern they?

The general cause? or is it a fee-grief

Due to some single breast?

ROSS

No mind that’s honest

But in it shares some woe; though the main part

Pertains to you alone.

MACDUFF

If it be mine,

Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it.

ROSS

Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever,

Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound

That ever yet they heard.

MACDUFF

Hum! I guess at it.

ROSS

Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes

Savagely slaughter’d: to relate the manner,

Were, on the quarry of these murder’d deer,

To add the death of you.

MALCOLM

Merciful heaven!

What, man! ne’er pull your hat upon your brows;

Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak

Whispers the o’er-fraught heart and bids it break.

MACDUFF

My children too?

ROSS

                  Wife, children, servants, all

That could be found.

MACDUFF

And I must be from thence!

My wife kill’d too?

ROSS

I have said.

MALCOLM

Be comforted:

Let’s make us medicines of our great revenge,

To cure this deadly grief.

MACDUFF

He has no children. All my pretty ones?

Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?

What, all my pretty chickens and their dam

At one fell swoop?

MALCOLM

Dispute it like a man.

MACDUFF

I shall do so;

But I must also feel it as a man:

I cannot but remember such things were,

That were most precious to me. Did heaven look on,

And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,

They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,

Not for their own demerits, but for mine,

Fell slaughter on their souls. Heaven rest them now!

MALCOLM

Be this the whetstone of your sword: let grief

Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

MACDUFF

O, I could play the woman with mine eyes

And braggart with my tongue! But, gentle heavens,

Cut short all intermission; front to front

Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and myself;

Within my sword’s length set him; if he ‘scape,

Heaven forgive him too!

MALCOLM

This tune goes manly.

Come, go we to the king; our power is ready;

Our lack is nothing but our leave; Macbeth

Is ripe for shaking, and the powers above

Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you may:

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

I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive

no truth in your report. When was it she last walked?

Gentlewoman

Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen

her rise from her bed, throw her night-gown upon

her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it,

write upon’t, read it, afterwards seal it, and again

return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep.

Doctor

A great perturbation in nature, to receive at once

the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of

watching! In this slumbery agitation, besides her

walking and other actual performances, what, at any

time, have you heard her say?

Gentlewoman

That, sir, which I will not report after her.

Doctor

You may to me: and ‘tis most meet you should.

Gentlewoman

Neither to you nor any one; having no witness to

confirm my speech.

Enter LADY MACBETH, with a taper

Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise;

and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.

Doctor

How came she by that light?

Gentlewoman

Why, it stood by her: she has light by her

continually; ‘tis her command.

Doctor

You see, her eyes are open.

Gentlewoman

Ay, but their sense is shut.

Doctor

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

Gentlewoman

It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus

washing her hands: I have known her continue in

this a quarter of an hour.

LADY MACBETH

Yet here’s a spot.

Doctor

Hark! she speaks: I will set down what comes from

her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.

LADY MACBETH

Out, damned spot! out, I say!—One: two: why,

then, ‘tis time to do’t.—Hell is murky!—Fie, my

lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? What need we

fear who knows it, when none can call our power to

account?—Yet who would have thought the old man

to have had so much blood in him.

Doctor

Do you mark that?

LADY MACBETH

The thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?—

What, will these hands ne’er be clean?—No more o’

that, my lord, no more o’ that: you mar all with

this starting.

Doctor

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

Gentlewoman

She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of

that: heaven knows what she has known.

LADY MACBETH

Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the

perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little

hand. Oh, oh, oh!

Doctor

What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.

Gentlewoman

I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the

dignity of the whole body.

Doctor

Well, well, well,—

Gentlewoman

Pray God it be, sir.

Doctor

This disease is beyond my practise: yet I have known

those which have walked in their sleep who have died

holily in their beds.

LADY MACBETH

Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look not so

pale.—I tell you yet again, Banquo’s buried; he

cannot come out on’s grave.

Doctor

Even so?

LADY MACBETH

To bed, to bed! there’s knocking at the gate:

come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What’s

done cannot be undone.—To bed, to bed, to bed!

Exit

Doctor

Will she go now to bed?

Gentlewoman

Directly.

Doctor

Foul whisperings are abroad: unnatural deeds

Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds

To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets:

More needs she the divine than the physician.

God, God forgive us all! Look after her;

Remove from her the means of all annoyance,

And still keep eyes upon her. So, good night:

My mind she has mated, and amazed my sight.

I think, but dare not speak.

Gentlewoman

Good night, good doctor.

Exeunt

SCENE II. The country near Dunsinane.

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

MENTEITH

The English power is near, led on by Malcolm,

His uncle Siward and the good Macduff:

Revenges burn in them; for their dear causes

Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm

Excite the mortified man.

ANGUS

Near Birnam wood

Shall we well meet them; that way are they coming.

CAITHNESS

Who knows if Donalbain be with his brother?

LENNOX

For certain, sir, he is not: I have a file

Of all the gentry: there is Siward’s son,

And many unrough youths that even now

Protest their first of manhood.

MENTEITH

What does the tyrant?

CAITHNESS

Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies:

Some say he’s mad; others that lesser hate him

Do call it valiant fury: but, for certain,

He cannot buckle his distemper’d cause

Within the belt of rule.

ANGUS

Now does he feel

His secret murders sticking on his hands;

Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;

Those he commands move only in command,

Nothing in love: now does he feel his title

Hang loose about him, like a giant’s robe

Upon a dwarfish thief.

MENTEITH

Who then shall blame

His pester’d senses to recoil and start,

When all that is within him does condemn

Itself for being there?

CAITHNESS

Well, march we on,

To give obedience where ‘tis truly owed:

Meet we the medicine of the sickly weal,

And with him pour we in our country’s purge

Each drop of us.

LENNOX

                  Or so much as it needs,

To dew the sovereign flower and drown the weeds.

Make we our march towards Birnam.

Exeunt, marching

SCENE III. Dunsinane. A room in the castle.

Enter MACBETH, Doctor, and Attendants

MACBETH

Bring me no more reports; let them fly all:

Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,

I cannot taint with fear. What’s the boy Malcolm?

Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know

All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus:

'Fear not, Macbeth; no man that's born of woman

Shall e’er have power upon thee.’ Then fly,

false thanes,

And mingle with the English epicures:

The mind I sway by and the heart I bear

Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear.

Enter a Servant

The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!

Where got’st thou that goose look?

Servant

There is ten thousand—

MACBETH

Geese, villain!

Servant

Soldiers, sir.

MACBETH

Go prick thy face, and over-red thy fear,

Thou lily-liver’d boy. What soldiers, patch?

Death of thy soul! those linen cheeks of thine

Are counsellors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?

Servant

The English force, so please you.

MACBETH

Take thy face hence.

Exit Servant

Seyton!—I am sick at heart,

When I behold—Seyton, I say!—This push

Will cheer me ever, or disseat me now.

I have lived long enough: my way of life

Is fall’n into the sear, the yellow leaf;

And that which should accompany old age,

As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,

I must not look to have; but, in their stead,

Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath,

Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not. Seyton!

Enter SEYTON

SEYTON

What is your gracious pleasure?

MACBETH

What news more?

SEYTON

All is confirm’d, my lord, which was reported.

MACBETH

I’ll fight till from my bones my flesh be hack’d.

Give me my armour.

SEYTON

'Tis not needed yet.

MACBETH

I’ll put it on.

Send out more horses; skirr the country round;

Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine armour.

How does your patient, doctor?

Doctor

Not so sick, my lord,

As she is troubled with thick coming fancies,

That keep her from her rest.

MACBETH

Cure her of that.

Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,

Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,

Raze out the written troubles of the brain

And with some sweet oblivious antidote

Cleanse the stuff’d bosom of that perilous stuff

Which weighs upon the heart?

Doctor

Therein the patient

Must minister to himself.

MACBETH

Throw physic to the dogs; I’ll none of it.

Come, put mine armour on; give me my staff.

Seyton, send out. Doctor, the thanes fly from me.

Come, sir, dispatch. If thou couldst, doctor, cast

The water of my land, find her disease,

And purge it to a sound and pristine health,

I would applaud thee to the very echo,

That should applaud again.—Pull’t off, I say.—

What rhubarb, cyme, or what purgative drug,

Would scour these English hence? Hear’st thou of them?

Doctor

Ay, my good lord; your royal preparation

Makes us hear something.

MACBETH

Bring it after me.

I will not be afraid of death and bane,

Till Birnam forest come to Dunsinane.

Doctor

[Aside]  Were I from Dunsinane away and clear,

Profit again should hardly draw me here.

Exeunt

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

Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand

That chambers will be safe.

MENTEITH

We doubt it nothing.

SIWARD

What wood is this before us?

MENTEITH

The wood of Birnam.

MALCOLM

Let every soldier hew him down a bough

And bear’t before him: thereby shall we shadow

The numbers of our host and make discovery

Err in report of us.

Soldiers

It shall be done.

SIWARD

We learn no other but the confident tyrant

Keeps still in Dunsinane, and will endure

Our setting down before ‘t.

MALCOLM

'Tis his main hope:

For where there is advantage to be given,

Both more and less have given him the revolt,

And none serve with him but constrained things

Whose hearts are absent too.

MACDUFF

Let our just censures

Attend the true event, and put we on

Industrious soldiership.

SIWARD

The time approaches

That will with due decision make us know

What we shall say we have and what we owe.

Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate,

But certain issue strokes must arbitrate:

Towards which advance the war.

Exeunt, marching

SCENE V. Dunsinane. Within the castle.

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

MACBETH

Hang out our banners on the outward walls;

The cry is still ‘They come:’ our castle’s strength

Will laugh a siege to scorn: here let them lie

Till famine and the ague eat them up:

Were they not forced with those that should be ours,

We might have met them dareful, beard to beard,

And beat them backward home.

A cry of women within

What is that noise?

SEYTON

It is the cry of women, my good lord.

Exit

MACBETH

I have almost forgot the taste of fears;

The time has been, my senses would have cool’d

To hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair

Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir

As life were in’t: I have supp’d full with horrors;

Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts

Cannot once start me.

Re-enter SEYTON

Wherefore was that cry?

SEYTON

The queen, my lord, is dead.

MACBETH

She should have died hereafter;

There would have been a time for such a word.

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day

To the last syllable of recorded time,

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is heard no more: it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

Enter a Messenger

Thou comest to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.

Messenger

Gracious my lord,

I should report that which I say I saw,

But know not how to do it.

MACBETH

Well, say, sir.

Messenger

As I did stand my watch upon the hill,

I look’d toward Birnam, and anon, methought,

The wood began to move.

MACBETH

Liar and slave!

Messenger

Let me endure your wrath, if’t be not so:

Within this three mile may you see it coming;

I say, a moving grove.

MACBETH

If thou speak’st false,

Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive,

Till famine cling thee: if thy speech be sooth,

I care not if thou dost for me as much.

I pull in resolution, and begin

To doubt the equivocation of the fiend

That lies like truth: ‘Fear not, till Birnam wood

Do come to Dunsinane:’  and now a wood

Comes toward Dunsinane. Arm, arm, and out!

If this which he avouches does appear,

There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.

I gin to be aweary of the sun,

And wish the estate o’ the world were now undone.

Ring the alarum-bell! Blow, wind! come, wrack!

At least we’ll die with harness on our back.

Exeunt

SCENE VI. Dunsinane. Before the castle.

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

MALCOLM

Now near enough: your leafy screens throw down.

And show like those you are. You, worthy uncle,

Shall, with my cousin, your right-noble son,

Lead our first battle: worthy Macduff and we

Shall take upon ‘s what else remains to do,

According to our order.

SIWARD

Fare you well.

Do we but find the tyrant’s power to-night,

Let us be beaten, if we cannot fight.

MACDUFF

Make all our trumpets speak; give them all breath,

Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.

Exeunt

SCENE VII. Another part of the field.

Alarums. Enter MACBETH

MACBETH

They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly,

But, bear-like, I must fight the course. What’s he

That was not born of woman? Such a one

Am I to fear, or none.

Enter YOUNG SIWARD

YOUNG SIWARD

What is thy name?

MACBETH

                  Thou’lt be afraid to hear it.

YOUNG SIWARD

No; though thou call’st thyself a hotter name

Than any is in hell.

MACBETH

My name’s Macbeth.

YOUNG SIWARD

The devil himself could not pronounce a title

More hateful to mine ear.

MACBETH

No, nor more fearful.

YOUNG SIWARD

Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my sword

I’ll prove the lie thou speak’st.

They fight and YOUNG SIWARD is slain

MACBETH

Thou wast born of woman

But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,

Brandish’d by man that’s of a woman born.

Exit

Alarums. Enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF

That way the noise is. Tyrant, show thy face!

If thou be’st slain and with no stroke of mine,

My wife and children’s ghosts will haunt me still.

I cannot strike at wretched kerns, whose arms

Are hired to bear their staves: either thou, Macbeth,

Or else my sword with an unbatter’d edge

I sheathe again undeeded. There thou shouldst be;

By this great clatter, one of greatest note

Seems bruited. Let me find him, fortune!

And more I beg not.

Exit. Alarums

Enter MALCOLM and SIWARD

SIWARD

This way, my lord; the castle’s gently render’d:

The tyrant’s people on both sides do fight;

The noble thanes do bravely in the war;

The day almost itself professes yours,

And little is to do.

MALCOLM

We have met with foes

That strike beside us.

SIWARD

Enter, sir, the castle.

Exeunt. Alarums

SCENE VIII. Another part of the field.

Enter MACBETH

MACBETH

Why should I play the Roman fool, and die

On mine own sword? whiles I see lives, the gashes

Do better upon them.

Enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF

Turn, hell-hound, turn!

MACBETH

Of all men else I have avoided thee:

But get thee back; my soul is too much charged

With blood of thine already.

MACDUFF

I have no words:

My voice is in my sword: thou bloodier villain

Than terms can give thee out!

They fight

MACBETH

Thou losest labour:

As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air

With thy keen sword impress as make me bleed:

Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests;

I bear a charmed life, which must not yield,

To one of woman born.

MACDUFF

Despair thy charm;

And let the angel whom thou still hast served

Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother’s womb

Untimely ripp’d.

MACBETH

Accursed be that tongue that tells me so,

For it hath cow’d my better part of man!

And be these juggling fiends no more believed,

That palter with us in a double sense;

That keep the word of promise to our ear,

And break it to our hope. I’ll not fight with thee.

MACDUFF

Then yield thee, coward,

And live to be the show and gaze o’ the time:

We’ll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,

Painted on a pole, and underwrit,

'Here may you see the tyrant.'

MACBETH

I will not yield,

To kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet,

And to be baited with the rabble’s curse.

Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane,

And thou opposed, being of no woman born,

Yet I will try the last. Before my body

I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff,

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

I would the friends we miss were safe arrived.

SIWARD

Some must go off: and yet, by these I see,

So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

MALCOLM

Macduff is missing, and your noble son.

ROSS

Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier’s debt:

He only lived but till he was a man;

The which no sooner had his prowess confirm’d

In the unshrinking station where he fought,

But like a man he died.

SIWARD

Then he is dead?

ROSS

Ay, and brought off the field: your cause of sorrow

Must not be measured by his worth, for then

It hath no end.

SIWARD

                  Had he his hurts before?

ROSS

Ay, on the front.

SIWARD

                  Why then, God’s soldier be he!

Had I as many sons as I have hairs,

I would not wish them to a fairer death:

And so, his knell is knoll’d.

MALCOLM

He’s worth more sorrow,

And that I’ll spend for him.

SIWARD

He’s worth no more

They say he parted well, and paid his score:

And so, God be with him! Here comes newer comfort.

Re-enter MACDUFF, with MACBETH’s head

MACDUFF

Hail, king! for so thou art: behold, where stands

The usurper’s cursed head: the time is free:

I see thee compass’d with thy kingdom’s pearl,

That speak my salutation in their minds;

Whose voices I desire aloud with mine:

Hail, King of Scotland!

ALL

Hail, King of Scotland!

Flourish

MALCOLM

We shall not spend a large expense of time

Before we reckon with your several loves,

And make us even with you. My thanes and kinsmen,

Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland

In such an honour named. What’s more to do,

Which would be planted newly with the time,

As calling home our exiled friends abroad

That fled the snares of watchful tyranny;

Producing forth the cruel ministers

Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen,

Who, as ‘tis thought, by self and violent hands

Took off her life; this, and what needful else

That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace,

We will perform in measure, time and place:

So, thanks to all at once and to each one,

Whom we invite to see us crown’d at Scone.

Flourish. Exeunt

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