ACT 1
Scene 3

...charm’s wound up.
Enter Macbeth and Banquo.
So foul and fair a day I have not seen.

...you are so.
Speak if you can. What are you?

...Macbeth, all hail!
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.

...are they vanished?
Into the air, and what seemed corporal melted,
As breath into the wind. Would they had stayed!

...the reason prisoner?
Your children shall be kings.

...shall be king.
And Thane of Cawdor too. Went it not so?

...devil speak true?
The Thane of Cawdor lives. Why do you dress me
In borrowed robes?

...Have overthrown him.
aside
Glamis and Thane of Cawdor!
The greatest is behind. To Ross and Angus.
Thanks for your pains.
Aside 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?

...you.They step aside.
aside
Two truths are told
As happy prologues to the swelling act
Of the imperial theme.—I thank you, gentlemen.
Aside.
This supernatural soliciting
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 smothered in surmise,
And nothing is but what is not.

...our partner’s rapt.
aside
If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me
Without my stir.

...aid of use.
aside
Come what come may,
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

...upon your leisure.
Give me your favor. My dull brain was wrought
With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains
Are registered where every day I turn
The leaf to read them. Let us toward the King.
Aside to Banquo.
Think upon what hath chanced, and at more time,
The interim having weighed it, let us speak
Our free hearts each to other.

... Very gladly.
Till then, enough.—Come, friends.
They exit.

Scene 4

...An absolute trust.
Enter Macbeth, Banquo, Ross, and Angus.

...all can pay.
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 everything
Safe toward your love and honor.

...further to you.
The rest is labor 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.

...My worthy Cawdor.
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.
He exits.

Scene 5

...with a letter.
LADY MACBETH: reading the letter
They met me in the
day of success, and I have learned by the perfect’st
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 Weïrd 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
might’st 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’ th’ 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 ’dst 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 valor of my tongue
All that impedes thee from the golden round,
Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
To have thee crowned withal.

Enter Messenger.
What is your tidings?

...comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH: Thou ’rt mad to say it.
Is not thy master with him, who, were ’t so,
Would have informed for preparation?

...up his message.
LADY MACBETH: Give him tending.
He brings great news. 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 th’ access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
Th’ effect and it. Come to my woman’s breasts
And take my milk for gall, you murd’ring 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.
My dearest love,
Duncan comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH: And when goes hence?
Tomorrow, 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 th’ 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.
We will speak further.
LADY MACBETH: Only look up clear.
To alter favor ever is to fear.
Leave all the rest to me.
They exit.

Scene 6

...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 honors deep and broad wherewith
Your Majesty loads our house. For those of old,
And the late dignities heaped up to them,
We rest your hermits.

...your guest tonight.
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.

Scene 7

...your leave, hostess.
Then enter Macbeth.
If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well
It were done quickly. If th’ 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’d 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 th’ inventor. This even-handed justice
Commends th’ ingredience of our poisoned 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 newborn babe
Striding the blast, or heaven’s cherubin 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 th’ other—

Enter Lady Macbeth.
How now, what news?
LADY MACBETH: He has almost supped. Why have you left the chamber?
Hath he asked for me?
LADY MACBETH: Know you not he has?
We will proceed no further in this business.
He hath honored 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 dressed 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 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,
Letting “I dare not” wait upon “I would,”
Like the poor cat i’ th’ adage?
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 plucked my nipple from his boneless gums
And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this.
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 drenchèd natures lies as in a death,
What cannot you and I perform upon
Th’ unguarded Duncan? What not put upon
His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
Of our great quell?
Bring forth men-children only,
For thy undaunted mettle should compose
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?
LADY MACBETH: Who dares receive it other,
As we shall make our griefs and clamor roar
Upon his death?
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.
They exit.

ACT 2
Scene 1

...to in repose.
Enter Macbeth, and a Servant with a torch.

...sword.—Who’s there?
A friend.

...In measureless content.
He gives Macbeth a jewel.
Being unprepared,
Our will became the servant to defect,
Which else should free have wrought.

...showed some truth.
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.

...your kind’st leisure.
If you shall cleave to my consent, when ’tis,
It shall make honor for you.

...shall be counseled.
Good repose the while.

...like to you.
Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,
She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.
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?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.He draws his dagger.
Thou marshal’st me the way that I was going,
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o’ th’ 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-half world
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
The curtained sleep. Witchcraft celebrates
Pale Hecate’s off’rings, and withered murder,
Alarumed 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 whereabouts
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.
He exits.

Scene 2

...Enter Lady Macbeth.
LADY MACBETH: That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold.
What hath quenched them hath given me fire. Hark!—Peace.
It was the owl that shrieked, 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 drugged their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them
Whether they live or die.
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
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 with bloody daggers.
My husband?
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?
When?
LADY MACBETH: Now.
As I descended?
LADY MACBETH: Ay.
Hark!—Who lies i’ th’ second chamber?
LADY MACBETH: Donalbain.
This is a sorry sight.
LADY MACBETH: A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.
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 addressed them
Again to sleep.
LADY MACBETH: There are two lodged together.
One cried “God bless us” and “Amen” the other,
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.
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.
Methought I heard a voice cry “Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep”—the innocent sleep,
Sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.
LADY MACBETH: What do you mean?
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 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.
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.
Whence is that knocking?
How is ’t with me when every noise appalls 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 incarnadine,
Making the green one red.

...Enter Lady Macbeth.
LADY MACBETH: My hands are of your color, but I shame
To wear a heart so white.

Knock.
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.

Knock.
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.
To know my deed ’twere best not know myself.

Knock.
Wake Duncan with thy knocking. I would thou couldst.
They exit.

Scene 3

...thy master stirring?
Enter Macbeth.

...morrow, noble sir.
Good morrow, both.

...stirring, worthy thane?
Not yet.

...slipped the hour.
I’ll bring you to him.

...yet ’tis one.
The labor we delight in physics pain.
This is the door.

...King hence today?
He does. He did appoint so.

...and did shake.
’Twas a rough night.

...nor name thee!
What’s the matter?

...o’ th’ building.
What is ’t you say? The life?

...then speak yourselves.
Macbeth and Lennox exit.

...Enter Lady Macbeth.
LADY MACBETH: What’s the business,
That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
The sleepers of the house? Speak, speak!

...royal master’s murdered.
LADY MACBETH: Woe, alas!
What, in our house?

...is not so.
Enter Macbeth, Lennox, and Ross.
Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had lived a blessèd 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.

...What is amiss?
You are, and do not know ’t.
The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
Is stopped; the very source of it is stopped.

...trusted with them.
O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
That I did kill them.

...did you so?
Who can be wise, amazed, temp’rate, and furious,
Loyal, and neutral, in a moment? No man.
Th’ expedition of my violent love
Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin laced with his golden blood,
And his gashed stabs looked like a breach in nature
For ruin’s wasteful entrance; there the murderers,
Steeped in the colors of their trade, their daggers
Unmannerly breeched with gore. Who could refrain
That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make ’s love known?
LADY MACBETH: Help me hence, ho!

...so do I.
So all.
Let’s briefly put on manly readiness
And meet i’ th’ hall together.

... Well contented.
All but Malcolm and Donalbain exit.

ACT 3
Scene 1

...hush, no more.
Sennet sounded. Enter Macbeth as King, Lady Macbeth, Lennox, Ross, Lords, and Attendants.
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.
Tonight we hold a solemn supper, sir,
And I’ll request your presence.

...tie Forever knit.
Ride you this afternoon?

...my good lord.
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 tomorrow.
Is ’t far you ride?

...hour or twain.
Fail not our feast.

...I will not.
We hear our bloody cousins are bestowed
In England and in Ireland, not confessing
Their cruel parricide, filling their hearers
With strange invention. But of that tomorrow,
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?

...call upon ’s.
I wish your horses swift and sure of foot,
And so I do commend you to their backs.
Farewell.
Let every man be master of his time
Till seven at night. To make society
The sweeter welcome, we will keep ourself
Till suppertime alone. While then, God be with you.
Sirrah, a word with you. Attend those men
Our pleasure?

...the palace gate.
Bring them before us. 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 feared. ’Tis much he dares,
And to that dauntless temper of his mind
He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valor
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 hailed him father to a line of kings.
Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown
And put a barren scepter in my grip,
Thence to be wrenched 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 murdered,
Put rancors 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 seeds of Banquo kings.
Rather than so, come fate into the list,
And champion me to th’ utterance.—Who’s there?

Enter Servant and two Murderers.
To the Servant.
Now go to the door, and stay there till we call.
Was it not yesterday we spoke together?

...please your Highness.
Well then, now
Have you considered 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, passed in probation with you
How you were borne in hand, how crossed, 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.”

...known to us.
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 gospeled
To pray for this good man and for his issue,
Whose heavy hand hath bowed you to the grave
And beggared yours forever?

...men, my liege.
Ay, in the catalogue you 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’ th’ 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.

...rid on ’t.
Both of you
Know Banquo was your enemy.

...True, my lord.
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.

...Though our lives—
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’ th’ time,
The moment on ’t, for ’t must be done tonight
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.

...resolved, my lord.
I’ll call upon you straight. Abide within.
It is concluded. Banquo, thy soul’s flight,
If it find heaven, must find it out tonight.
He exits.

Scene 2

...and a Servant.
LADY MACBETH: Is Banquo gone from court?

...returns again tonight.
LADY MACBETH: Say to the King I would attend his leisure
For a few words.

...Madam, I will.
LADY MACBETH: Naught’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.
We have scorched the snake, not killed 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 tonight.
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 honors in these flattering streams
And make our faces vizards to our hearts,
Disguising what they are.
LADY MACBETH: You must leave this.
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.
There’s comfort yet; they are assailable.
Then be thou jocund. Ere the bat hath flown
His cloistered flight, ere to black Hecate’s summons
The shard-born 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?
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 th’ rooky wood.
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse,
Whiles night’s black agents to their preys do rouse.—
Thou marvel’st at my words, but hold thee still.
Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill.
So prithee go with me.
They exit.

Scene 4

...much is done.
Banquet prepared. Enter Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Ross, Lennox, Lords, and Attendants.
You know your own degrees; sit down. At first
And last, the hearty welcome.
They sit.

...to your Majesty.
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.

...to the door.
See, they encounter thee with their hearts’ thanks.
Both sides are even. Here I’ll sit i’ th’ midst.
Be large in mirth. Anon we’ll drink a measure
The table round. He approaches the Murderer.
There’s blood upon thy face.

...’Tis Banquo’s then.
’Tis better thee without than he within.
Is he dispatched?

...did for him.
Thou art the best o’ th’ cutthroats,
Yet he’s good that did the like for Fleance.
If thou didst it, thou art the nonpareil.

...Fleance is ’scaped.
aside
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 cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears.—But Banquo’s safe?

...death to nature.
Thanks for that.
There the grown serpent lies. The worm that’s fled
Hath nature that in time will venom breed,
No teeth for th’ present. Get thee gone. Tomorrow
We’ll hear ourselves again.
LADY MACBETH: My royal lord,
You do not give the cheer. The feast is sold
That is not often vouched, 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.

...in Macbeth’s place.
to Lady Macbeth
Sweet remembrancer!—
Now, good digestion wait on appetite
And health on both!

...your Highness sit.
Here had we now our country’s honor roofed,
Were the graced person of our Banquo present,
Who may I rather challenge for unkindness
Than pity for mischance.

...your royal company?
The table’s full.

...place reserved, sir.
Where?

...your Highness?
Which of you have done this?

...my good lord?
to the Ghost
Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake
Thy gory locks at me.

...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.Drawing Macbeth aside.
Are you a man?
Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that
Which might appall 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.
Prithee, see there. Behold, look! To the Ghost.
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.
LADY MACBETH: What, quite unmanned in folly?
If I stand here, I saw him.
LADY MACBETH: Fie, for shame!
Blood hath been shed ere now, i’ th’ olden time,
Ere humane statute purged the gentle weal;
Ay, and since too, murders have been performed
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 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.
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.

...their drinking cups.
to the Ghost
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.
to the Ghost
What man dare, I dare.
Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
The armed 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! 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.
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.

...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.

...Attend his Majesty.
LADY MACBETH: A kind good night to all.
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 maggot 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.
How say’st thou that Macduff denies his person
At our great bidding?
LADY MACBETH: Did you send to him, sir?
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 tomorrow
(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
Stepped 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 scanned.
LADY MACBETH: You lack the season of all natures, sleep.
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.
They exit.

ACT 4
Scene 1

...locks, Whoever knocks.
Enter Macbeth.
How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags?
What is ’t you do?

...without a name.
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 yeasty 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.

...from our masters’.
Call ’em. Let me see ’em.

...an Armed Head.
Tell me, thou unknown power—

...Dismiss me. Enough.
Whate’er thou art, for thy good caution, thanks.
Thou hast harped my fear aright. But one word more—

...Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth!—
Had I three ears, I’d hear thee.

...Shall harm 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?

...come against him.
That will never be.
Who can impress the forest, bid the tree
Unfix his earthbound root? Sweet bodements, good!
Rebellious dead, 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?

...know no more.
I will be satisfied. Deny me this,
And an eternal curse fall on you! Let me know!

Cauldron sinks. Hautboys.
Why sinks that cauldron? And what noise is this?

...and Banquo last.
Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo. Down!
Thy crown does sear mine eyeballs. 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 th’ 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 twofold balls and treble scepters carry.
Horrible sight! Now I see ’tis true,
For the blood-boltered Banquo smiles upon me
And points at them for his. What, is this so?

...his welcome pay.
Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour
Stand aye accursèd in the calendar!—
Come in, without there.

...your Grace’s will?
Saw you the Weïrd Sisters?

...No, my lord.
Came they not by you?

...indeed, my lord.
Infected be the air whereon they ride,
And damned all those that trust them! I did hear
The galloping of horse. Who was ’t came by?

...fled to England.
Fled to England?

...my good lord.
aside
Time, thou anticipat’st 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 th’ edge o’ th’ 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.
They exit.

ACT 5
Scene 1

...of an hour.
LADY MACBETH: Yet here’s a spot.

...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?

...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.

...she has known.
LADY MACBETH: Here’s the smell of the blood still. All
the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
hand. O, O, O!

...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.

... 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.

Scene 3

...march towards Birnam.
Enter Macbeth, the Doctor, and Attendants.
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 Servant.
The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
Where got’st thou that goose-look?

...is ten thousand—
Geese, villain?

... Soldiers, sir.
Go prick thy face and over-red thy fear,
Thou lily-livered boy. What soldiers, patch?
Death of thy soul! Those linen cheeks of thine
Are counselors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?

...so please you.
Take thy face hence. 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 sere, the yellow leaf,
And that which should accompany old age,
As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have, but in their stead
Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honor, breath
Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare not.—
Seyton!

...your gracious pleasure?
What news more?

...which was reported.
I’ll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked.
Give me my armor.

...not needed yet.
I’ll put it on.
Send out more horses. Skirr the country round.
Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine armor.—
How does your patient, doctor?

...from her rest.
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 stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart?

...minister to himself.
Throw physic to the dogs. I’ll none of it.—
Come, put mine armor on. Give me my staff. Attendants begin to arm him.
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, senna, or what purgative drug
Would scour these English hence? Hear’st thou of them?

...us hear something.
Bring it after me.—
I will not be afraid of death and bane
Till Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane.

...draw me here.
They exit.

Scene 5

...advance the war.
Enter Macbeth, Seyton, and Soldiers, with Drum and Colors.
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 within of women.
What is that noise?

...my good lord.
I have almost forgot the taste of fears.
The time has been my senses would have cooled
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 supped full with horrors.
Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts,
Cannot once start me.

Enter Seyton.
Wherefore was that cry?

...lord, is dead.
She should have died hereafter.
There would have been a time for such a word.
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
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 com’st to use thy tongue: thy story quickly.

...to do ’t.
Well, say, sir.

...began to move.
Liar and slave!

...a moving grove.
If thou speak’st false,
Upon the next tree shall 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 th’ 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 th’ estate o’ th’ world were now undone.—
Ring the alarum bell!—Blow wind, come wrack,
At least we’ll die with harness on our back.
They exit.

Scene 7

... Alarums continued.
Enter 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.

...is thy name?
Thou ’lt be afraid to hear it.

...is in hell.
My name’s Macbeth.

...to mine ear.
No, nor more fearful.

...lie thou speak’st.
They fight, and young Siward is slain.
Thou wast born of woman.
But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,
Brandished by man that’s of a woman born.
He exits.

Scene 8

...sir, the castle.
Enter Macbeth.
Why should I play the Roman fool and die
On mine own sword? Whiles I see lives, the gashes
Do better upon them.

...Turn, hellhound, turn!
Of all men else I have avoided thee.
But get thee back. My soul is too much charged
With blood of thine already.

...give thee out.
Fight. Alarum.
Thou losest labor.
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 charmèd life, which must not yield
To one of woman born.

...womb Untimely ripped.
Accursèd be that tongue that tells me so,
For it hath cowed 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.

...see the tyrant.”
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 damned be him that first cries “Hold! Enough!”
They exit fighting. Alarums.
They enter fighting, and Macbeth is slain. Macduff exits carrying off Macbeth’s body. Retreat and flourish. Enter, with Drum and Colors, Malcolm, Siward, Ross, Thanes, and Soldiers.