SCENE II.
The Same. Another Room.
Enter Lady Macbeth and a Servant.
Lady M.
Is Banquo gone from court?
Serv.
Ay, madam, but returns again to-night:
Lady M.
Say to the king, I would attend his leisure
For a few words.
Serv.
Madam, I will.
[Exit.
Lady M.
Nought's had, all's spent5 note
,
Where our desire is got without content:
'Tis safer to be that which we destroy,
Than, by destruction, dwell in doubtful joy.
Enter Macbeth.
How now, my lord? why do you keep alone,
Of sorriest fancies6 note
your companions making?
-- 152 --
Using those thoughts, which should indeed have died
With them they think on? Things without all remedy7 note
,
Should be without regard: what's done, is done.
Macb.
We have scotch'd8 note
the snake, not kill'd it;
She'll close, and be herself; whilst our poor malice
Remains in danger of her former tooth.
But let the frame of things disjoint,
Both the worlds suffer9 note
,
Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep
In the affliction of these terrible dreams,
That shake us nightly: Better be with the dead,
Whom we, to gain our place, have sent to peace1 note
,
-- 153 --
Than on the torture of the mind to lie
In restless ecstacy2 note
. Duncan is in his grave;
After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well;
Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison,
Malice domestick, foreign levy, nothing,
Can touch him further!
Lady M.
Come on; gentle my lord,
Sleek o'er your rugged looks; be bright and jovial
Among your guests to-night.
Macb.
So shall I, love;
And so, I pray, be you: let your remembrance3 note
Apply to Banquo: present him eminence4 note, both
With eye and tongue: unsafe the while, that we
Must lave our honours in these flattering streams;
And make our faces vizards to our hearts,
Disguising what they are5 note
.
-- 154 --
Lady M.
You must leave this.
Macb.
O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!
Thou know'st, that Banquo, and his Fleance, lives.
Lady M.
But in them nature's copy's not eterne6 note
.
-- 155 --
Macb.
There's comfort yet; they are assailable;
Then be thou jocund: Ere the bat hath flown
His cloister'd flight7 note
; ere, to black Hecate's summons,
The shard-borne beetle8 note
, with his drowsy hums,
-- 156 --
Hath rung night's yawning peal, there shall be done
A deed of dreadful note.
-- 157 --
Lady M.
What's to be done?
Macb.
Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck9 note
,
-- 158 --
Till thou applaud the deed. Come, seeling night1 note
,
Skarf up the tender eye of pitiful day;
And, with thy bloody and invisible hand,
Cancel, and tear to pieces, that great bond
Which keeps me pale2 note
!—Light thickens; and the crow3 note
-- 159 --
Makes wing to the rooky wood4 note
:
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse;
Whiles night's black agents to their preys do rouse5 note
.
-- 160 --
Thou marvell'st at my words: but hold thee still;
Things, bad begun, make strong themselves by ill:
So, pr'ythee, go with me.
[Exeunt.
-- 161 --
James Boswell [1821], The plays and poems of William Shakspeare, with the corrections and illustrations of various commentators: comprehending A Life of the Poet, and an enlarged history of the stage, by the late Edmond Malone. With a new glossarial index (J. Deighton and Sons, Cambridge) [word count] [S10201].
