Dun.

Give me your hand:

Conduct me to mine host; we love him highly,
And shall continue our graces towards him.
By your leave, hostess.

[Exeunt.

SCENE VII. The same. A Room in the Castle.

Hautboys and Torches. Enter, and pass over the Stage, a Sewer1, 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
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 poison'd chalice

1 A sewer, an officer so called from his placing the dishes on the table, Asseour, French; from asseoir, to place.

2 This passage has been variously explained. I have attempted briefly to express what I conceive to be its meaning:-'Twere well it were done quickly, if, when 'tis done, it were done (or at an end); and that no sinister consequences would ensue. If the assassination, at the same time that it puts an end to Duncan's life, could make success certain, and that I might enjoy the crown unmolested, we'd jump the life to come, i. e. hazard or run the risk of what may happen in a future state. To trammel up was to confine or tie up. The legs of horses were trammeled to teach them to amble. There was also a trammel-net,' which was a long net to take great and small fowl with by night,' Surcease is cessation. To surcease or to cease from doing something; supersedeo, Lat.; cesser, Fr.' BARET.

3 To commend was anciently used in the sense of the Latin commendo, to commit, to address, to direct, to recommend. Thus in All's Well that Ends Well:-

To our own lips.

First, as I am his

He's here in double trust:
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 cherubin, hors'd
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-How now, what news?

And in King Henry VIII.:- The king's majesty commends his good opinion to you.' In a subsequent scene of this play we have:

'I wish your horses swift and sure of foot,

And so I do commend you to their backs.'

The pricke of conscience (says Holinshed) caused him ever to feare, lest he should be served of the same cup as he had ministered to his predecessor.'

4 6 The sightless couriers of the air' are what the poet elsewhere calls the viewless winds. Thus in Warner's Albion's England:The scouring winds that sightless in the sounding air do fly.' b. ii. c. xi.

5 So in the Tragedy of Cæsar and Pompey, 1607 :Why think you, lords, that 'tis ambition's spur That pricketh Cæsar to these high attempts?'

Malone has observed that 'there are two distinct metaphors in this passage. I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent; I have nothing to stimulate me to the execution of my purpose but ambition, which is apt to overreach itself; this he expresses by the second image, of a person meaning to vault into his saddle, who, by taking too great a leap, will fall on the other side.'

Enter LADY MACBETH.

Lady M. He has almost supp'd: Why have you

left the chamber?

Macb. Hath he ask'd for me?
Lady M.

Know you not, he has? Macb. We will proceed no further in this business: He hath honour'd 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 dress'd yourself? hath it slept since?
And wakes it now, to look so green and pale
At what it did so freely? From this time,
Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard
To be the same in thine own act and valour,
As thou art in desire? Would'st 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.

Pr'ythee, peace:

I dare do all that may become a man;
Who dares do more, is none.
Lady M.

What beast was 't then,

6 This passage is perhaps sufficiently intelligible; but as Johnson and Steevens thought otherwise, I must offer a brief explanation. Would'st thou have the crown, that which thou esteem'st the ornament of life, and yet live a coward in thine own esteem,' &c. The adage of the cat is among Heywood's Proverbs, 1566:-'The cat would eate fishe, and would not wet her feete.'

7. Who dares do more is none.' The old copy, instead of 'do more,' reads 'no more:' the emendation is Rowe's. A similar passage occurs in Measure for Measure, Act ii. Sc. 2:—

be that you are,

That is a woman: if you're more, you're none.'

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 adhere3, 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 pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash'd 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 10 Will I with wine and wassel 11 so convince 12, That memory, the warder of the brain,

8 Adhere, in the same sense as cohere.

9 But screw your courage to the sticking-place.' Shakspeare seems to have taken his metaphor from the screwing up the chords of stringed instruments to their proper degree of tension, when the peg remains fast in its sticking-place; i. e. in the place from which it is not to recede, or go back.

10 The circumstance relative to Macbeth's slaughter of Duncan's chamberlains is copied from Holinshed's account of King Duffe's murder by Donwald.

11 Wassel is thus explained by Bullokar in his Expositor, 1616: 6 Wassaile, a term usual heretofore for quaffing and carowsing; but more especially signifying a merry cup (ritually composed, deckt and fill'd with country liquor) passing about amongst neighbours, meeting and entertaining one another on the vigil or eve of the new year, and commonly called the wassail-bol.' See Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 4.

12 To convince is to overcome. this play.

See p. 301, Act iv. Sc. 3, of

Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
A limbeck 13 only: When in swinish sleep
Their drenched 14 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 15?

Macb.

Bring forth men-children only! For thy undaunted mettle should compose Nothing but males. Will it not be receiv'd 16, When we have mark'd with blood those sleepy two Of his own chamber, and us'd their very daggers, That they have don't?

Lady M.

Who dares receive it other,

As we shall make our griefs and clamour roar
Upon his death?

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.

[Exeunt.

13 A limbeck is a vessel through which distilled liquors pass into the recipient. So shall the receipt (i. e. receptacle) of reason be like this empty vessel.

14 i. e. drowned in drink.

15 Quell is murder; from the Saxon quellan, to kill. 16 i. e. apprehended, understood.

.