– Are you a man?

MACB.

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

Which might appall the devil.

LADY M.

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,

Authoriz'd by her grandam. Shame itself,

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

You look but on a stool.

MACB.

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.

 

[Exit Ghost.]

 

LADY M.

What? quite unmann'd in folly?

MACB.

If I stand here, I saw him.

LADY M.

Fie, for shame!

MACB.

Blood hath been shed ere now, i' th' olden time,

Ere humane statute purg'd the gentle weal;

Ay, and since too, murthers have been perform'd

Too terrible for the ear. The [time] has been,

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

And there an end; but now they rise again

With twenty mortal murthers on their crowns,

And push us from our stools. This is more strange

Than such a murther is.

LADY M.

My worthy lord,

Your noble friends do lack you.

MACB.

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.

 

Enter Ghost.

 

I drink to th' general joy o' th' 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.

MACB.

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 M.

Think of this, good peers,

But as a thing of custom. 'Tis no other;

Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.

MACB.

What man dare, I dare.

Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,

The arm'd rhinoceros, or th' 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 mock'ry, hence!

 

[Exit Ghost.]

 

Why, so; being gone,

I am a man again. Pray you sit still.

LADY M.

You have displac'd the mirth, broke the good meeting,

With most admir'd disorder.

MACB.

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 blanch'd with fear.

ROSSE.

What sights, my lord?

LADY M.

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.

LEN.

Good night, and better health

Attend his Majesty!

LADY M.

A kind good night to all!

 

Exeunt Lords [and Attendants].

MACB.

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

Stones have been known to move and trees to speak;

Augures and understood relations have

By maggot-pies and choughs and rooks brought forth

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

LADY M.

Almost at odds with morning, which is which.

MACB.

How say'st thou, that Macduff denies his person

At our great bidding?

LADY M.

Did you send to him, sir?

MACB.

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 weïrd 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 M.

You lack the season of all natures, sleep.

MACB.

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

Thunder. Enter the three Witches, meeting Hecat.

 

1. WITCH.

Why, how now, Hecat? you look angerly.

HEC.

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.