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

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ACT V. SCENE I. Dunsinane. Anteroom in the castle.

Enter a Doctor of Physic and a Waiting Gentlewoman.

  DOCTOR. I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive no
    truth in your report. When was it she last walked?
  GENTLEWOMAN. Since his Majesty went into the field, have seen
her
    rise from her bed, throw her nightgown upon her, unlock her
    closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon't, read it,
    afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this
while
    in a most fast sleep.
  DOCTOR. A great perturbation in nature, to receive at once the
    benefit of sleep and do the effects of watching! In this
slumbery
    agitation, besides her walking and other actual performances,
    what, at any time, have you heard her say?
  GENTLEWOMAN. That, sir, which I will not report after her.
  DOCTOR. You may to me, and 'tis most meet you should.
  GENTLEWOMAN. Neither to you nor anyone, having no witness to
    confirm my speech.

Enter Lady Macbeth with a taper.

    Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise, and, upon my
    life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.
  DOCTOR. How came she by that light?
  GENTLEWOMAN. Why, it stood by her. She has light by her
     continually; 'tis her command.
  DOCTOR. You see, her eyes are open.
  GENTLEWOMAN. Ay, but their sense is shut.
  DOCTOR. What is it she does now? Look how she rubs her hands.
  GENTLEWOMAN. It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus
    washing her hands. I have known her continue in this a
quarter of
    an hour.
  LADY MACBETH. Yet here's a spot.
  DOCTOR. Hark, she speaks! I will set down what comes from her,
to
    satisfy my remembrance 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?
  DOCTOR. Do you mark that?
  LADY MACBETH. The Thane of Fife had a wife; where is she now?
What,
    will these hands neer be clean? No more o' that, my lord, no
more
    o' that. You mar all with this starting.
  DOCTOR. Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.
  GENTLEWOMAN. She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of
that.
    Heaven knows what she has known.
  LADY MACBETH. Here's the smell of the blood still. All the
perfumes
    of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!
  DOCTOR. What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.
  GENTLEWOMAN. I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the
    dignity of the whole body.
  DOCTOR. Well, well, well-
  GENTLEWOMAN. Pray God it be, sir.
  DOCTOR. This disease is beyond my practice. Yet I have known
those
    which have walked in their sleep who have died holily 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.
  DOCTOR. 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.
Exit.
  DOCTOR. Will she go now to bed?
  GENTLEWOMAN. Directly.
  DOCTOR. Foul whisperings are abroad. Unnatural deeds
    Do breed unnatural troubles; infected minds
    To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
    More needs she the divine than the physician.
    God, God, forgive us all! Look after her;
    Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
    And still keep eyes upon her. So good night.
    My mind she has mated and amazed my sight.
    I think, but dare not speak.
  GENTLEWOMAN. Good night, good doctor.
                                                         Exeunt.

SCENE II. The country near Dunsinane. Drum and colors.

Enter Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox, and Soldiers.

  MENTEITH. The English power is near, led on by Malcolm,
    His uncle Siward, and the good Macduff.
    Revenges burn in them, for their dear causes
    Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm
    Excite the mortified man.
  ANGUS. Near Birnam Wood
    Shall we well meet them; that way are they coming.
  CAITHNESS. Who knows if Donalbain be with his brother?
  LENNOX. For certain, sir, he is not; I have a file
    Of all the gentry. There is Seward's son
    And many unrough youths that even now
    Protest their first of manhood.
  MENTEITH. What does the tyrant?
  CAITHNESS. Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies.
    Some say he's mad; others, that lesser hate him,
    Do call it valiant fury; but, for certain,
    He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause
    Within the belt of rule.
  ANGUS. Now does he feel
    His secret murthers sticking on his hands,
    Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;
    Those he commands move only in command,
    Nothing in love. Now does he feel his title
    Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
    Upon a dwarfish thief.
  MENTEITH. Who then shall blame
    His pester'd senses to recoil and start,
    When all that is within him does condemn
    Itself for being there?
  CAITHNESS. Well, march we on
    To give obedience where 'tis truly owed.
    Meet we the medicine of the sickly weal,
    And with him pour we, in our country's purge,
    Each drop of us.
  LENNOX. Or so much as it needs
    To dew the sovereign flower and drown the weeds.
    Make we our march towards Birnam. Exeunt marching.

SCENE III. Dunsinane. A room in the castle.

Enter Macbeth, Doctor, and Attendants.

  MACBETH. 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 a Servant.

    The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
    Where got'st thou that goose look?
  SERVANT. There is ten thousand-
  MACBETH. Geese, villain?
  SERVANT. Soldiers, sir.
  MACBETH. Go prick thy face and over-red thy fear,
    Thou lily-liver'd boy. What soldiers, patch?
    Death of thy soul! Those linen cheeks of thine
    Are counselors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?
  SERVANT. The English force, so please you.
  MACBETH. Take thy face hence. Exit Servant.
    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 sear, 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!

Enter Seyton.

  SEYTON. What's your gracious pleasure?
  MACBETH. What news more?
  SEYTON. All is confirm'd, my lord, which was reported.
  MACBETH. I'll fight, 'til from my bones my flesh be hack'd.
    Give me my armor.
  SEYTON. 'Tis not needed yet.
  MACBETH. 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?
  DOCTOR. Not so sick, my lord,
    As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies,
    That keep her from her rest.
  MACBETH. 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 stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
    Which weighs upon the heart?
  DOCTOR. Therein the patient
    Must minister to himself.
  MACBETH. Throw physic to the dogs, I'll none of it.
    Come, put mine armor on; give me my staff.
    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, cyme, or what purgative drug
    Would scour these English hence? Hearst thou of them?
  DOCTOR. Ay, my good lord, your royal preparation
    Makes us hear something.
  MACBETH. Bring it after me.
    I will not be afraid of death and bane
    Till Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane.
  DOCTOR. [Aside.] Were I from Dunsinane away and clear,
    Profit again should hardly draw me here. Exeunt.

SCENE IV. Country near Birnam Wood. Drum and colors.

Enter Malcolm, old Seward and his Son, Macduff, Menteith,
Caithness,
Angus, Lennox, Ross, and Soldiers, marching.

  MALCOLM. Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand
    That chambers will be safe.
  MENTEITH. We doubt it nothing.
  SIWARD. What wood is this before us?
  MENTEITH. The Wood of Birnam.
  MALCOLM. Let every soldier hew him down a bough,
    And bear't before him; thereby shall we shadow
    The numbers of our host, and make discovery
    Err in report of us.
  SOLDIERS. It shall be done.
  SIWARD. We learn no other but the confident tyrant
    Keeps still in Dunsinane and will endure
    Our setting down before't.
  MALCOLM. 'Tis his main hope;
    For where there is advantage to be given,
    Both more and less have given him the revolt,
    And none serve with him but constrained things
    Whose hearts are absent too.
  MACDUFF. Let our just censures
    Attend the true event, and put we on
    Industrious soldiership.
  SIWARD. The time approaches
    That will with due decision make us know
    What we shall say we have and what we owe.
    Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate,
    But certain issue strokes must arbitrate.
    Towards which advance the war.
                                                Exeunt Marching.

SCENE V. Dunsinane. Within the castle.

Enter Macbeth, Seyton, and Soldiers, with drum and colors.

  MACBETH. 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 of women within.
    What is that noise?
  SEYTON. It is the cry of women, my good lord. Exit.
  MACBETH. I have almost forgot the taste of fears:
    The time has been, my senses would have cool'd
    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 supp'd full with horrors;
    Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts,
    Cannot once start me.

                  Re-enter Seyton.
     Wherefore was that cry?
  SEYTON. The Queen, my lord, is dead.
  MACBETH. 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 comest to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.
  MESSENGER. Gracious my lord,
    I should report that which I say I saw,
    But know not how to do it.
  MACBETH. Well, say, sir.
  MESSENGER. As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
    I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought,
    The Wood began to move.
  MACBETH. Liar and slave!
  MESSENGER. Let me endure your wrath, if't be not so.
    Within this three mile may you see it coming;
    I say, a moving grove.
  MACBETH. If thou speak'st false,
    Upon the next tree shalt 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 the 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