That which cries 'Thus thou must do, if thou have it ;
And that which rather thou dost fear to do

Than wishest should be undone.' Hie thee hither,
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear;
And chastise with the valour of my tongue
All that impedes thee from the golden round,
Which fate and metaphysical* aid doth seem
To have thee crowned withal.

Enter a Messenger.

What is your tidings?

Thou'rt mad to say it :

Mess. The king comes here to-night.

Lady M.

Is not thy master with him? who, were't so,

Would have informed for preparation.

Mess. So please you, it is true: our thane is coming :

One of my fellows had the speed of him,

Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more

Than would make up his message.

Lady M.

He brings great news.

Give him tending;

[Exit Messenger.

The raven himself is hoarse

That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it ! Come to my woman's breasts,
And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,
Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry 'Hold, hold!'

Enter MACBETH.

Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!

Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter !
Thy letters have transported me beyond
This ignorant present, and I feel now
The future in the instant.

Macb.

Duncan comes here to-night.

Lady M.

My dearest love,

And when goes hence?

O, never

Macb. To-morrow, as he purposes.

Lady M.

Shall sun that morrow see!

Your face, my thane, is as a book where men

May read strange matters. To beguile the time,
Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye,

Your hand, your tongue : look like the innocent flower,
But be the serpent under't. He that's coming
Must be provided for: and you shall put

This night's great business into my dispatch ;
Which shall to all our nights and days to come
Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.
Mach. We will speak further.
Lady M.

To alter favour ever is to fear :
Leave all the rest to me.

Only look up clear;

W. Shakespeare.

Macb.

CXCVI.

MACBETH.

ACT I. SCENE VII.-Macbeth's Castle.

Enter MACBETH.

F it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere
well

It were done quickly: if the assassination
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch
With his surcease success; that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all here,
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
We'd jump the life to come. But in these cases
We still have judgment here; that we but teach
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice
To our own lips. He's here in double trust;
First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,
Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,
Who should against his murderer shut the door,
Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking-off;

And pity, like a naked new-born babe,

Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, horsed
Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur

To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
And falls on the other.

Enter LADY MACBETH.

How now! what news?

Lady M. He has almost supped: why have you left

the chamber?

Macb. Hath he asked for me?

Lady M.

Know you not he has ?

Mach. We will proceed no further in this business : He hath honoured me of late; and I have bought Golden opinions from all sorts of people,

Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,
Not cast aside so soon.

Lady M.

Was the hope drunk

Wherein you dressed yourself? hath it slept since?
And wakes it now, to look so green and pale

At what it did so freely?

Such I account thy love.

From this time

Art thou afeard

To be the same in thine own act and valour
As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that
Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life,
And live a coward in thine own esteem,
Letting 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would,'
Like the poor cat i' the adage?

Macb.

Prithee, peace :

I dare do all that may become a man ;

Who dares do more is none.

What beast was't, then,

Lady M. That made you break this enterprise to me? When you durst do it, then you were a man ; And, to be more than what you were, you would Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place Did then adhere, and yet you would make both : They have made themselves, and that their fitness

now

Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know
How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me :
I would, while it was smiling in my face,

Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums,

And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you

Have done to this.

Macb.
Lady M.

If we should fail,—

We fail!

But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
And we'll not fail. When Duncan is asleep-
Whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey
Soundly invite him-his two chamberlains
Will I with wine and wassail* so convince
That memory, the warder of the brain,
Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
A limbeck † only: when in swinish sleep
Their drenchéd natures lie as in a death,
What cannot you and I perform upon
The unguarded Duncan? what not put upon
His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
Of our great quell?

Macb.

I am settled, and bend up

Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.

Away, and mock the time with fairest show:

False face must hide what the false heart doth know.

Macb.

W. Shakespeare.

CXCVII.

MACBETH.

ACT II. SCENE I.-Court of Macbeth's Castle.

Enter MACBETH.

S this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let
me clutch thee.

I have thee not, and yet I see thee still,

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible

* Wassail, festivity.

Limbeck, an alembic, a still,