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LADY M.

MACB. But wherefore could not I

Consider it not so deeply.

pronounce Amen?

I had most need of blessing, and Amen
Stuck in my throat.

LADY M.

These deeds must not be thought

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

MACB. Methought, I heard a voice cry, Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep!-the innocent sleep;
Sleep, that knits up the ravell'd sleavea 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 M.

What do you mean?

MACB. 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 M. 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.

MACB.

I'll go no more: I am afraid to think what I have done;

Look on 't again I dare not.

LADY M.
Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: 't is the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I'll gild the aces of the grooms withal;
For it must seem their guilt.

50

[Exit. Knocking without.

MACB.
How is 't with me, when every noise appals me?

Whence is that knocking?

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 incarnadine,

Making the green-one red.

Re-enter LADY MACBETH.

LADY M. My hands are of your colour; but I shame

To wear a heart so white. [Knocking without.] 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 without.] Hark! more knocking:

Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us,

sleave-] Unwrought silk, flos silk.

And show us to be watchers :-be not lost

So poorly in your thoughts.

MACB. To know my deed, 't were best not know myself.

[Knocking without. Wake Duncan with thy knocking! Ay, would thou couldst! [Exeunt.

SCENE II-The same. A Hall in the Castle.

Enter a Porter. [Knocking without.]

PORTER. Here's a knocking, indeed! If a man were porter of hell-gate, he should have old turning the key. [Knocking without.] 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; a have napkins enow about you; here you'll sweat for 't. [Knocking without.] Knock, knock! Who's there, i' 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 Gods sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven.-O, come in, Equivocator. [Knocking without.] 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 without.] 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 without.] Anon, anon! I pray you, remember the porter. [Opens the gate.

Enter MACDUFF and LENNOX.

MACD. Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed, That you do lie so late?

PORT. Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second cock: and drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things.

MACD. What three things does drink especially provoke?

PORT. 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. 40

MACD. I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.

PORT. 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.

MACD. Is thy master stirring?

Our knocking has awak'd him; here he comes.

• Come in, Time ;] The editors concur in printing this, "Come in time;" but what meaning they attach to it none has yet explained. As we have subsequently, "Come in, Equivocator," and "Come in, Tailor," "Time" is probably intended as a whimsical appellation for the "farmer that hanged himself."

LEN. Good morrow, noble sir!

MACB.

Enter MACBETH.

Good morrow,

both.

Not yet.

MACD. Is the king stirring, worthy thane?

MACB.

MACD. He did command me to call timely on him;

I have almost slipp'd the hour.

MACB.

I'll bring you to him.

MACD. I know this is a joyful trouble to you;

But yet 't is one.

MACB. The labour we delight in physics pain. This is the door.

MACD.

I'll make so bold to call,

For 't is my limited service.

LEN. Goes the king hence to-day?
MACB.

[Exit.

He does he did appoint so.

:

• LEN. 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 confus'd events,

New hatch'd to the woeful time.

The obscure bird clamour'd the live-long night:

Some say, the earth was feverous and did shake.
MACB. 'Twas a rough night.

LEN. My young remembrance cannot parallel
A fellow to it.

Re-enter MACDUFF.

MACD. O, horror! horror! horror!

Tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee!
MACB., LEN. What's the matter?

MACD. 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!

MACB.

-70

What is 't you say? the life?

LEN. Mean you his majesty?

MACD. 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.

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Enter LADY MACBETH.

LADY M. What's the business,
That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!

MACD.

"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, gentle lady,

O, Banquo! Banquo! our royal master's murder'd!
LADY M. Woe, alas! what, in our house?
BAN.

Dear Duff, I pr'ythee, contradict thyself,

And say

it is not so.

Too cruel anywhere.

Re-enter MACBETH and LENNOX.

MACB. Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had liv'd 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.

DON. What is amiss?

MACE.

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.

MACD. Your royal father's murder'd.

MAL.

O, by whom?

LEN. Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done't:
Their hands and faces were all badg'd with blood;
So were their daggers, which, unwip'd, we found
Upon their pillows: they star'd, and were distracted;
No man's life was to be trusted with them.

MACB. O, yet, I do repent me of my fury, 112
That I did kill them.

MACD. Wherefore did you so?

MACB. Who can be wise, amaz'd, temperate and furious, Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:

The expedition of my violent love

Outrun the pauser reason.-Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin lac'd 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 known?

LADY M.

MACD. Look to the lady.

Help me hence, ho!

MAL. [Aside to DON.] Why do we hold our tongues, That most may claim this argument for ours?

DON. [Aside to MAL.] 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.

MAL. [Aside to DON.] Nor our strong sorrow Upon the foot of motion.

BAN.

Look to the lady :

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[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 undivulg'd pretence I fight

Of treasonous malice!

MACD.

ALL.

And so do I!

So all!

MACB. Let's briefly put on manly readiness, And meet i' the hall together.

ALL.

Well contented.

[Exeunt all except MALCOLM and DONALBAIN.

MAL. 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.

DON. 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.

MAL.
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.

JV

SCENE III-The same.

950

[Exeunt.

Without the Castle.

Enter Ross and an Oia Man.

OLD M. 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.

Ah, good father,

Ross.
Thou seest the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, 't is day,
And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp:

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