And the late dignities heap'd up to them, Dun. Where's the thane of Cawdor? We cours'd him at the heels, and had a purpose And his great love, sharp as his spur, hath holp him Lady M. Your servants ever Have theirs, themselves, and what is theirs, in compt, Dun. Give me your hand : Conduct me to mine host; we love him highly, The same. SCENE VII. [Exeunt. A Room in the Castle. Hautboys and torches. pass over the stage, a Sewer, and divers Servants with dishes and service. Then enter MACBETH. Macb. If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well It were done quickly : If the assassination [3] That is, we as hermits shall always pray for you. STEEVENS. [4] A sewer was an officer so called from his placing the dishes upon the table. Asseour, French; from asseior, to place. Another part of the sewer's office was to bring water for the guests to wash their hands with. It may be worth while to observe, for the sake of preserving an ancient word, that the dishes served in by sewers were called sewes. STEEVENS. [5] Of this soliloquy the meaning is not very clear; I have never found the readers of Shakespeare agreeing about it. I understand it thus: "If that which I am about to do, when it is once done and executed, were done and ended without any following effects, it would then be best to do it quickly; if the murder could terminate in itself, and restrain the regular course of consequences.. if its success could secure its surcease, if, being once done successfully, without detection, it could fix a period to all vengeance and inquiry, so that this blow might be all that I have to do, and this anxiety all that I have to suffer; if this could be my condition, even here in this world, in this contracted period of temporal existence, on this narrow bank in the ocean of eternity, I would jump the life to come, I would venture upon the deed without care of any future state. But this is one of those cases in which judgment is pronounced and vengeance inflicted upon us here in our present life. We teach others to do as we have done, and are punished by our own We are told by Dryden, that "Ben Jonson, in reading some bombast speeches in Macbeth, which are not to be understood, used to say that it was horrour."Perhaps the present passage was one of those thus depreciated. Any person but this envious detractor would have dwelt with pleasure on the transcendent beauties of this sublime tragedy, which, after Othello, is perhaps our author's greatest work; and would have been more apt to have been thrown into "strong shudders" and blood-freezing agues," by its interesting and high wrought example." JOHNSON. Could trammel up the consequence, and catch, And pity, like a naked new-born babe, Enter Lady MACBETH. Lady M. He has almost supp'd; Why have you left the chamber? scenes, than to have been offended by any imaginary hardness of its language: for such it appears from the context, is what he meant by horrour. [6] Surcease is cessation, stop. STEEVENS. and the abyss of eternity. STEEVENS. MALONE. shallow ford of life, between us [8] Faculties, for office, exercise of power, &c. WARBURTON. 9 Courier is only runner. Couriers of air are winds, air in motion. Sightless is invisible. JOHNSON. The thought of the cherubin (as has been somewhere observed) seems to have been borrowed from the eighteenth Psalm: "He rode upon the cherubim, and did fly, he came flying upon the wings of the wind." Again, in Job, ch. xxx, v. 22: Thou causest me to ride upon the wind." MALONE. [1] Alluding to the remission of the wind in a shower. JOHNSON. [2] The arguments by which lady Macbeth persuades her husband to commit the murder, afford a proof of Shakespeare's knowledge of human natyre. She urges the excellence and dignity of courage, a glittering idea which has dazzled mankind from age to age, and animated sometimes the house-breaker, and some Macb. Hath he ask'd for me? Lady M. Know you not, he has ? Macb. We will proceed no further in this business : Which would be worn now in their newest gloss, Lady M. Was the hope drunk, Wherein you drest yourself? hath it slept since ? I dare do all that may become a man ; Lady M. What beast was't then, That made you break this enterprize to me? times the conqueror; but this sophism Macbeth has forever destroyed, by distinguishing true from false fortitude, in a line and a half; of which it may almost be said, that they ought to bestow immortality on the author, though all his other productions had been lost : I dare do all that may become a man; Who dares do more is none. This topic, which has been always employed with too much success, is used in this scene, with peculiar propriety, to a soldier by a woman. Courage is the distinguishing virtue of a soldier; and the reproach of cowardice cannot be borne by any man from a woman without great impatience. She then urges the oaths by which he had bound himself to murder Duncan, another art of sophistry by which men have sometimes deluded their consciences, and persuaded themselves that what would be criminal in others is virtuous in them: this argument, Shakespeare, whose plan obliged him to make Macbeth yield, has not confuted, though he might easily have shown that a former obligation could not be vacated by a latter; that obligations, laid on us by a higher power, could not be overruled by obligations which we lay upon ourselves. JOHNSON. [4] The adage alluded to is, The cat loves fish, but dares not wet her feet: Catus amat pisces, sed non vult tingere plantas. JOHNSON. How tender 'tis, to love the babe that milks me Macb. If we should fail,- But screw your courage to the sticking-place, When Duncan is asleep, (Whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey Macb. Bring forth men-children only! When we have mark'd with blood those sleepy two Lady M. Who dares receive it other, As we shall make our griefs and clamour roar Macb. I am settled, and bend up2 [5] Selden conjectures this to have been a usual ceremony among the Saxons before Hengist, as a note of health-wishing, supposing the expression to be corrupted from wish-heil. Wassel or Wassail is a word still in use in the midland counties, and signifies at present what is called Lambs'-Wool, i. e. roasted apples in strong beer, with sugar and spice. JOHNSON. [6] To convince is, in Shakespeare, to overpower or subdue. JOHNSON. [7] A warder is a guard, a sentinel. STEEVENS. [8] i. . the receptacle. MALONE. [9] That is, shall be only a vessel, to emit fumes or vapours. JOHNSON. [1] Quell is murder, manquellers being, in the old language the term for which murderers is now used. JOHNSON. The word is used in Wicliff's translation of the New Testament," and Herod sent forth manquellers," &c. STEEVENS. [2] A metaphor from the bow. Till this instant, the mind of Macbeth has been in a state of uncertainty and fluctuation. He has hitherto proved neither resolutely good, nor obstinately wicked. Though a bloody idea had arisen in his mind, after he had heard the prophecy in his favour, yet he contentedly leaves the completion of his hopes to chance. At the conclusion, however, of his interview with Duncan, be inclines to hasten the decree of fate, and quits Each corporal agent to this terrible feat. Away, and mock the time with fairest show: [Exeunt. ACT II. SCENE I.-The same. Court within the Castle. Enter BANQUO and FLEANCE, and a Servant, with a torch before them. How goes the night, boy? Banquo. Fle. The moon is down; I have not heard the clock. Ban. And she goes down at twelve. Fle. I take't, 'tis later, sir. Ban. Hold, take my sword:-There's husbandry in heaven,' Their candles are all out.-Take thee that too. Who's there? Macb. A friend. Ban. What, sir, not yet at rest? The king's a-bed : He hath been in unusual pleasure, and the stage with an apparent resolution to murder his sovereign. But no sooner is the king under his roof, than, reflecting on the peculiarities of his own relative situation, he determines not to offend against the laws of hospitality or the ties of subjection, kindred, and gratitude. His wife then assails bis constancy afresh. He yields to her suggestions, and with his integrity his happiness is destroyed. I have enumerated these particulars, because the waverings of Macbeth have, by some critics been regarded as unnatural and contradictory circumstances in his character; not remembering that nemo repente fuit turpissimus, or that (as Angelo observes,) "when once our grace we have forgot, 46 Nothing goes right; we would, and we would not" a passage which contains no unapt justification of the changes that happen in the conduct of Macbeth. STEEVENS. [3] Husbandry here means thrift, frugality. MALONE. [4] It is apparent from what Banquo says afterwards, that he had been solicited in a dream to attempt something in consequence of the prophecy of the Witches, that his waking senses were shocked at; and Shakespeare has here most exquisitely contrasted his character with that of Macbeth. Banquo is praying against being tempted to encourage thoughts of guilt even in his sleep: while Macbeth is hurrying into temptation, and revolving in his mind every scheme, however flagitious, that may assist him to complete his purpose. The one is unwilling to sleep, lest the same phantoms should assail his resolution again, while the other is depriving himself of rest through impatience to commit the murder. STEEV |