Macbeth by William Shakespeare (top 100 books to read TXT) 📕

  LADY MACBETH. That which hath made them drunk hath made me
bold;
    What hath quench'd them hath given me fire. Hark! Peace!
    It was the owl that shriek'd, 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 drugg'd their
possets
    That death and nature do contend about them,
    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. The 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,

    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.
  MACBETH. Hark!
    Who lies i' the second chamber?
  LADY MACBETH. Donalbain.
  MACBETH. This is a sorry sight. [Looks on his hands.
  LADY MACBETH. A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.
  MACBETH. There's one did laugh in 's sleep, and one cried,
      "Murther!"
    That they did wake each other. I stood and heard them,
    But they did say their prayers and address'd them
    Again to sleep.
  LADY MACBETH. There are two lodged together.
  MACBETH. One cried, "God bless us!" and "Amen" the other,
    As they had seen me with these hangman's hands.
    Listening 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. I heard a voice cry, "Sleep no more!
    Macbeth does murther sleep" -the innocent sleep,
    Sleep that knits up the ravel'd 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?
  MACBETH. Still it cried, "Sleep no more!" to all the house;
    "Glamis hath murther'd 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.
  MACBETH. 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. Exit. Knocking within.
  MACBETH. Whence is that knocking?
    How is't with me, when every noise appals 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.

Re-enter Lady Macbeth.

  LADY MACBETH. My hands are of your color, but I shame
    To wear a heart so white. [Knocking within.] I hear 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. [Knocking within.] 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.
  MACBETH. To know my deed, 'twere best not know myself.
                                                Knocking within.
    Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!
                                                         Exeunt.

Enter a Porter. Knocking within.

  PORTER. Here's a knocking indeed! If a man were porter of Hell
    Gate, he should have old turning the key. [Knocking within.]
    Knock, knock, knock! Who's there, i' the name of Belzebub?
Here's
    a farmer that hanged himself on th' expectation of plenty.
Come
    in time! Have napkins enow about you; here you'll sweat fort.
    [Knocking within.] Knock, knock! Who's there, in th' other
    devil's name? Faith, here's an equivocator that could swear
in
    both the scales against either scale, who committed treason
    enough for God's sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven. O,
    come in, equivocator. [Knocking within.] Knock, knock, knock!
    Who's there? Faith, here's an English tailor come hither, for
    stealing out of a French hose. Come in, tailor; here you may
    roast your goose. [Knocking within.] Knock, knock! Never at
    quiet! What are you? But this place is too cold for hell.
I'll
    devil-porter it no further. I had thought to have let in some
of
    all professions, that go the primrose way to the everlasting
    bonfire. [Knocking within.] Anon, anon! I pray you, remember
the
    porter.
                                                 Opens the gate.

Enter Macduff and Lennox.

  MACDUFF. Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed,
    That you do lie so late?
  PORTER. Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second cock; and
    drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things.
  MACDUFF. What three things does drink especially provoke?
  PORTER. Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery,
sir,
    it provokes and unprovokes: it provokes the desire, but it
takes
    away the performance. Therefore much drink may be said to be
an
    equivocator with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it
sets
    him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him and
disheartens
    him; makes him stand to and not stand to; in conclusion,
    equivocates him in a sleep, and giving him the lie, leaves
him.
  MACDUFF. I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.
  PORTER. That it did, sir, i' the very throat on me; but
requited
    him for his lie, and, I think, being too strong for him,
though
    he took up my legs sometime, yet I made shift to cast him.
  MACDUFF. Is thy master stirring?

Enter Macbeth.

    Our knocking has awaked him; here he comes.
  LENNOX. Good morrow, noble sir.
  MACBETH. morrow, both.
  MACDUFF. Is the King stirring, worthy Thane?
  MACBETH. Not yet.
  MACDUFF. He did command me to call timely on him;
    I have almost slipp'd the hour.
  MACBETH. I'll bring you to him.
  MACDUFF. I know this is a joyful trouble to you,
    But yet 'tis one.
  MACBETH. The labor we delight in physics pain.
    This is the door.
  MACDUFF I'll make so bold to call,
    For 'tis my limited service. Exit.
  LENNOX. Goes the King hence today?
  MACBETH. He does; he did appoint so.
  LENNOX. The night has been unruly. Where we lay,
    Our chimneys were blown down, and, as they say,
    Lamentings heard i' the air, strange screams of death,
    And prophesying with accents terrible
    Of dire combustion and confused events
    New hatch'd to the woeful time. The obscure bird
    Clamor'd the livelong night. Some say the earth
    Was feverous and did shake.
  MACBETH. 'Twas a rough fight.
  LENNOX. My young remembrance cannot parallel
    A fellow to it.

Re-enter Macduff.

  MACDUFF. O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart
    Cannot conceive nor name thee.
  MACBETH. LENNOX. What's the matter?
  MACDUFF. Confusion now hath made his masterpiece.
    Most sacrilegious murther hath broke ope
    The Lord's anointed temple and stole thence
    The life o' the building.
  MACBETH. What is't you say? the life?
  LENNOX. Mean you his Majesty?
  MACDUFF. Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight
    With a new Gorgon. Do not bid me speak;
    See, and then speak yourselves.
                                      Exeunt Macbeth and Lennox.
    Awake, awake!
    Ring the alarum bell. Murther and treason!
    Banquo and Donalbain! Malcolm, awake!
    Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit,
    And look on death itself! Up, up, and see
    The great doom's image! Malcolm! Banquo!
    As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites
    To countenance this horror! Ring the bell. Bell rings.

Enter Lady Macbeth.

  LADY MACBETH. What's the business,
    That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
    The sleepers of the house? Speak, speak!
  MACDUFF. O gentle lady,
    'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:
    The repetition in a woman's ear
    Would murther as it fell.

Enter Banquo.

    O Banquo, Banquo!
    Our royal master's murther'd.
  LADY MACBETH. Woe, alas!
    What, in our house?
  BANQUO. Too cruel anywhere.
    Dear Duff, I prithee, contradict thyself,
    And say it is not so.

Re-enter Macbeth and Lennox, with Ross.

  MACBETH. Had I but died an hour before this chance,
    I had lived a blessed 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.

Enter Malcolm and Donalbain.

  DONALBAIN. What is amiss?
  MACBETH. You are, and do not know't.
    The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
    Is stopped, the very source of it is stopp'd.
  MACDUFF. Your royal father's murther'd.
   MALCOLM. O, by whom?
  LENNOX. Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done't.
    Their hands and faces were all badged with blood;
    So were their daggers, which unwiped we found
    Upon their pillows.
    They stared, and were distracted; no man's life
    Was to be trusted with them.
  MACBETH. O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
    That I did kill them.
  MACDUFF. Wherefore did you so?
  MACBETH. Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,
    Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man.
    The expedition of my violent love
    Outrun the pauser reason. Here lay Duncan,
    His silver skin laced with his golden blood,
    And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature
    For ruin's wasteful entrance; there, the murtherers,
    Steep'd in the colors of their trade, their daggers
    Unmannerly breech'd 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!
  MACDUFF. Look to the lady.
  MALCOLM. [Aside to Donalbain.] Why do we hold our tongues,
    That most may claim this argument for ours?
  DONALBAIN. [Aside to Malcolm.] What should be spoken here,
where
      our fate,
    Hid in an auger hole, may rush and seize us?
    Let's away,
    Our tears are not yet brew'd.
  MALCOLM. [Aside to Donalbain.] Nor our strong sorrow
    Upon the foot of motion.
  BANQUO. Look to the lady.
                                    Lady Macbeth is carried out.
    And when we have our naked frailties hid,
    That suffer in exposure, let us meet
    And question this most bloody piece of work
    To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us.
    In the great hand of God I stand, and thence
    Against the undivulged pretense I fight
    Of treasonous malice.
  MACDUFF. And so do I.
  ALL. So all.
  MACBETH. Let's briefly put on manly readiness
    And meet i' the hall together.
  ALL. Well contented.
                           Exeunt all but Malcolm and Donalbain.
  MALCOLM. What will you do? Let's not consort with them.
    To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
    Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.
  DONALBAIN. To Ireland, I; our separated fortune
    Shall keep us both the safer. Where we are
    There's daggers in men's smiles; the near in blood,
    The nearer bloody.
  MALCOLM. This murtherous shaft that's shot
    Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way
    Is to avoid the aim. Therefore to horse;
    And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
    But shift away. There's warrant in that theft
    Which steals itself when there's no mercy left.
                                                         Exeunt.

Enter Ross with an Old Man.

  OLD MAN. Threescore and ten I can remember well,
    Within the volume of which time I have seen
    Hours dreadful and things strange, but this sore night
    Hath trifled former knowings.
  ROSS. Ah, good father,
    Thou seest the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
    Threaten his bloody stage. By the clock 'tis day,
    And yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp.
    Is't night's predominance, or