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МАСВЕТΗ.

SCENE I.

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SCENE I.

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SCENE II.

Macb. Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo;
down!

Thy crown does sear mine eye-balls:-and thy air,
Thou other gold-bound brow, is like the first :
A third is like the former :-Filthy hags!
Why do you shew me this?-A fourth? Start,
eyes!

What! will the line stretch out to the crack of
doom?

Another yet? A seventh? - I'll see no more :-
And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass
Which shews me many more; and some I see
That twofold balls and treble sceptres carry:
Horrible sight!-Ay, now I see 'tis true;

For the blood-boltered Banquo smiles upon me,
And points at them for his. What, is this so?

1st Witch. Ay, sir, all this is so: but why
Stands Macbeth thus amazédly?
Come, sisters, cheer we up his sprights,
And shew the best of our delights;
I'll charm the air to give a sound,
While you perform your antique round:
That this great king may kindly say,
Our duties did his welcome pay.

[Music. The Witches dance, and vanish. Mach. Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour

Stand aye accurséd in the calendar !-
Come in, without there!

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But no more sights!- Where are these gentlemen?
Come, bring me where they are.
[Exeunt.

SCENE II. Fife. A Room in MACDUFF's Castle.
Enter LADY MACDUFF, her Son, and Rosse.

Lady Macd. What had he done, to make him
fly the land?

Rosse. You must have patience, madam.
L. Macd.

He had none:

His flight was madness: When our actions do not,
Our fears do make us traitors.
Rosse.
You know not
Whether it was his wisdom, or his fear.

L. Macd. Wisdom! to leave his wife, to leave
his babes,

His mansion, and his titles, in a place
From whence himself does fly? He loves us not;
He wants the natural touch: for the poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds, will fight

(Her young ones in her nest) against the owl.

All is the fear, and nothing is the love;

As little is the wisdom, where the flight

So runs against all reason.

Rosse.

My dearest coz,

I pray you, school yourself: but, for your husband,
He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows
The fits o'the season. I dare not speak much

further:

But cruel are the times when we are traitors,
And do not know ourselves; when we hold rumour
From what we fear, yet know not what we fear;
But float upon a wild and violent sea,
Each way, and move.-I take my leave of you:
Shall not be long but I'll be here again:

Things at the worst will cease, or else climb up-
ward

To what they were before. --My pretty cousin,
Blessing upon you!

L. Macd. Fathered he is, and yet he's father-
less.

Rosse. I am so much a fool, should I stay longer,
It would be my disgrace, and your discomfort:
I take my leave at once.
[Exit ROSSE.

L. Macd. Sirrah, your father's dead :
And what will you do now? how will you live?
Son. As birds do, mother.

L. Macd. What, with worms and flies?
Son. With what I get, I mean; and so do they.

L. Macd. Poor bird! thou 'dst never fear the

net, nor lime,

The pit-fall, nor the gin.

Son. Why should I, mother? Poor birds they
are not set for.-

My father is not dead, for all your saying.

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L. Macd. Every one.

Son. Who must hang them?

L. Macd. Why, the honest men.

Son. Then the liars and swearers are fools: for there are liars and swearers enough to beat the honest men, and hang up them.

L. Macd. Now God help thee, poor monkey! But how wilt thou do for a father?

Son. If he were dead, you'd weep for him: if you would not, it were a good sign that I should quickly have a new father.

L. Macd. Poor prattler? how thou talk'st.

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SCENE III.-England. A Room in the King's

Palace.

Enter MALCOLM and MACDUFF.

Mal. Let us seek out some desolate shade, and

there

Weep our sad bosoms empty. Macd.

Let us rather

Hold fast the mortal sword; and, like good men, Bestride onr down-fall'n birthdom: each new

morn,

New widows howl; new orphans cry; new sor

rows

Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds As if it felt with Scotland, and yelled out Like syllable of dolour.

Mal.

What I believe, I'll wail; What know, believe; and what I can redress, As I shall find the time to friend, I will. What you have spoke, it may be so perchance. This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues, Was once thought honest: you have loved him well;

He hath not touched you yet. I am young; but something

You may deserve of him through me : and wisdom
To offer up a weak, poor, innocent lamb,
To appease an angry god.

Macd. I am not treacherous.
Mal.

But Macbeth is.

A good and virtuous nature may recoil,
In an imperial charge. But I shall crave your

pardon;

That which you are, my thoughts cannot trans

pose:

Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell: Though all things foul would wear the brows of

grace,

Yet grace must still look so.

Macd. I have lost my hopes.

Mal. Perchance even there where I did find

my doubts.

Why in that rawness left you wife and child

(Those precious motives, those strong knots of

love),

Without leave-taking?-I pray you,

Let not my jealousies be your dishonours,

SCENE 111.

L

But mine own safeties: you may be rightly just,
Whatever I shall think.

Macd. Bleed, bleed, poor country!
Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dares not check thee! wear thou
thy wrongs;

Thy title is affeered! - Fare thee well, lord :
I would not be the villain that thou think'st

For the whole space that's in the tyrant's grasp,

And the rich East to boot.

Mal.

Be not offended:

I speak not as in absolute fear of you.

I think our country sinks beneath the yoke;
It weeps; it bleeds; and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds: I think, withal,
There would be hands uplifted in my right;
And here, from gracious England, have I offer
Of goodly thousands. But, for all this,
When I shall tread upon the tyrant's head,
Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country
Shall have more vices than it had before;

More suffer, and more sundry ways than ever,
By him that shall succeed.
Macd.

What should he be?

Mal. It is myself I mean: in whom I know

All the particulars of vice so grafted,

That, when they shall be opened, black Macbeth

Will seem as pure as snow; and the poor state

Esteem him as a lamb, being compared

With my confineless harms.

Macd.

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell, can come a devil more damned

In evils, to top Macbeth.

Mal. I grant him bloody,

Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,

Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin
That has a name: but there's no bottom, none,

In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daugh

ters,

Your matrons, and your maids, could not fill up
The cistern of my lust; and my desire
All continent impediments would o'erbear,

That did oppose my will. Better Macbeth,

Than such a one to reign.

Macd.

Boundless intemperance

In nature is a tyranny; it hath been

The untimely emptying of the happy throne, And fall of many kings. But fear not yet To take upon you what is yours: you may Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty, And yet seem cold, the time you may so hood

wink.

We have willing dames enough; there cannot be
That vulture in you, to devour so many
As will to greatness dedicate themselves,
Finding it so inclined.

Mal. With this, there grows,

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Fit to govern!

No, not to live.----O, nation miserable,

With an untitled tyrant bloody-sceptered,

When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again;

Since that the truest issue of thy throne

By his own interdiction stands accursed,

And does blaspheme his breed? - Thy royal father
Was a most sainted king; the queen that bore thee,
Oftener upon her knees than on her feet,
Died every day she lived. Fare thee well!
These evils thou repeat'st upon thyself
Have banished me from Scotland.-O, my breast,
Thy hope ends here!

Mal.

Macduff, this noble passion,

Child of integrity, hath from my soul Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts To thy good truth and honour. Devilish Macbeth By many of these trains hath sought to win me Into his power; and modest wisdom plucks me From over-credulous haste: but God above Deal between thee and me! for even now I put myself to thy direction, and Unspeak mine own detraction; here abjure The taints and blames I laid upon myself, For strangers to my nature. I am yet Unknown to woman; never was forsworn; Scarcely have coveted what was mine own; At no time broke my faith; would not betray

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