Why have you left the chamber?
MACBETH
Hath he asked for me?30
LADY MACBETH Know you not he has?
MACBETH
We will proceed no further in this business.
He hath honored me of late, and I have bought32
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 dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?
37 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
40 To be the same in thine own act and valor
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,
44 Letting “I dare not” wait upon “I would,”
45 Like the poor cat i’ th’ adage?
MACBETH Prithee peace.
I dare do all that may become a man;
47 Who dares do more is none.
LADY MACBETH What beast was’t then
48 That made you break this enterprise to me?
When you durst do it, then you were a man;
50 And to be more than what you were, you would
Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place
52 Did then adhere, and yet you would make both.
53 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 plucked my nipple from his boneless gums
And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you
59 Have done to this.
MACBETH If we should fail?
LADY MACBETH We fail?
But screw your courage to the sticking place60
And we’ll not fail. When Duncan is asleep,
Whereto the rather shall his day’s hard journey62
Soundly invite him, his two chamberlains
Will I with wine and wassail so convince64
That memory, the warder of the brain,65
Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason66
A limbeck only. When in swinish sleep67
Their drenchèd natures lies as in a death,
What cannot you and I perform upon
Th’ unguarded Duncan? what not put upon70
His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
Of our great quell?72
MACBETH Bring forth men-children only;
For thy undaunted mettle should compose73
Nothing but males. Will it not be received,
When we have marked with blood those sleepy two
Of his own chamber and used their very daggers,
That they have done’t?77
LADY MACBETH Who dares receive it other,
As we shall make our griefs and clamor roar
Upon his death?
MACBETH I am settled, and bend up
Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.80
Away, and mock the time with fairest show;81
False face must hide what the false heart doth know.
Exeunt.
II.1Enter Banquo, and Fleance, with 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
5 Hold, take my sword. There’s husbandry in heaven;
Their candles are all out. Take thee that too.
7 A heavy summons lies like lead upon me,
And yet I would not sleep. Merciful powers,
Restrain in me the cursèd thoughts that nature
10 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 abed.
He hath been in unusual pleasure and
15 Sent forth great largess to your offices.
This diamond he greets your wife withal
17 By the name of most kind hostess, and shut up
In measureless content.
MACBETH Being unprepared,
19 Our will became the servant to defect,
Which else should free have wrought.20
BANQUO All’s well.
I dreamt last night of the three weïrd sisters.
To you they have showed 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,26
It shall make honor for you.
BANQUO So I lose none
In seeking to augment it, but still keep
My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,29
I shall be counseled.30
MACBETH Good repose the while.
BANQUO
Thanks, sir. The like to you.
Exeunt Banquo [and Fleance].
MACBETH [To Servant]
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-oppressèd brain?40
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Thou marshal’st me the way that I was going,
And such an instrument I was to use.
45 Mine eyes are made the fools o’ th’ other senses,
Or else worth all the rest. I see thee still,
47 And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,
Which was not so before. There’s no such thing.
49 It is the bloody business which informs
50 Thus to mine eyes. Now o’er the one half-world
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
The curtained sleep. Witchcraft celebrates
53 Pale Hecate’s offerings; and withered murder,
54 Alarumed by his sentinel, the wolf,
Whose howl’s his watch, thus with his stealthy pace,
56 With Tarquin’s ravishing side, 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
60 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.
II.2Enter Lady [Macbeth].
LADY MACBETH
That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold;
What hath quenched them hath given me fire.
[An owl shrieks.] Hark! Peace.
It was the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman3
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 drugged their6 possets,
That death and nature do contend about them7
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. Th’ attempt, and not the deed,10
Confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready–11
He could not miss ’em. Had he not resembled
My father as he slept, I had done’t.
Enter Macbeth [with two bloody daggers]. 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.20
MACBETH Hark! Who lies i’ th’ second chamber?
LADY MACBETH Donalbain.
MACBETH This is a sorry sight.
LADY MACBETH
A foolish thought to say a sorry sight.
MACBETH
There’s one did laugh in’s sleep, and one cried “Murder!”
26 That they did wake each other. I stood and heard them.
27 But they did say their prayers and addressed them
Again to sleep.
LADY MACBETH There are two lodged together.
MACBETH
One cried “God bless us” and “Amen” the other,
30 As they had seen me with these hangman’s hands.
List’ning their fear, I could not say “Amen”
When they did say “God bless us.”
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,
40 Sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath,
42 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 murdered 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 think48
So brainsickly of things.
1 comment