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  • William Shakespeare: Macbeth, Act III, Scene IV

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Scene IVThe same. Hall in the palaceA banquet prepared. Enter Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Ross, Lennox, Lords, and AttendantsMacbethYou know your own degrees; sit down: at first And last the hearty welcome.LordsThanks to your majesty.MacbethOurself will mingle with society, And play the humble host. Our hostess keeps her state, but in best time We will require her welcome.Lady MacbethPronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends; For my heart speaks they are welcome.First Murderer appears at the doorMacbethSee, 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 doorThere’s blood on thy face.First Murderer’Tis Banquo’s then.Macbeth’Tis better thee without than he within. Is he dispatch’d?First MurdererMy lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him.MacbethThou 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 MurdererMost royal sir, Fleance is ‘scaped.MacbethThen 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 MurdererAy, my good lord: safe in a ditch he bides, With twenty trenched gashes on his head; The least a death to nature.MacbethThanks 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 MurdererLady MacbethMy 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.MacbethSweet remembrancer! Now, good digestion wait on appetite, And health on both!LennoxMay’t please your highness sit.The Ghost of Banquo enters, and sits in Macbeth’s placeMacbethHere 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!RossHis absence, sir, Lays blame upon his promise. Please’t your highness To grace us with your royal company.MacbethThe table’s full.LennoxHere is a place reserved, sir.MacbethWhere?LennoxHere, my good lord. What is’t that moves your highness?MacbethWhich of you have done this?LordsWhat, my good lord?MacbethThou canst not say I did it: never shake Thy gory locks at me.RossGentlemen, rise: his highness is not well.Lady MacbethSit, 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?MacbethAy, and a bold one, that dare look on that Which might appal the devil.Lady MacbethO 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.MacbethPrithee, 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 vanishesLady MacbethWhat, quite unmann’d in folly?MacbethIf I stand here, I saw him.Lady MacbethFie, for shame!MacbethBlood 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 MacbethMy worthy lord, Your noble friends do lack you.MacbethI 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.LordsOur duties, and the pledge.Re-enter Ghost of BanquoMacbethAvaunt! 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 MacbethThink of this, good peers, But as a thing of custom: ’tis no other; Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.MacbethWhat 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 vanishesWhy, so: being gone, I am a man again. Pray you, sit still.Lady MacbethYou have displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting, With most admired disorder.MacbethCan 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.RossWhat sights, my lord?Lady MacbethI 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.LennoxGood night; and better health Attend his majesty!Lady MacbethA kind good night to all!Exeunt all but Macbeth and Lady MacbethMacbethIt 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 MacbethAlmost at odds with morning, which is which.MacbethHow say’st thou, that Macduff denies his person At our great bidding?Lady MacbethDid you send to him, sir?MacbethI 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 MacbethYou lack the season of all natures, sleep.MacbethCome, 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

William Shakespeare: Macbeth, Act III

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William Shakespeare: Macbeth, Act III

  • William Shakespeare: Macbeth, Act III

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