Macb.
Go, bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,
She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed. [Exit Servant.
Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle tow'rd my hand? come let me clutch thee—
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling, as to sight? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw—
Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going,
And such an instrument I was to use.

Mine eyes are made the fools o'th' other senses,
Or else worth all the rest—I see thee still,
And on thy blade and dudgeon, † ^notegouts of blood
Which was not so before.—There's no such thing—
It is the bloody business which informs
This to mine eyes—Now o'er one half the world
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
The curtain'd sleep; now Witchcraft celebrates
Pale Hecate's offerings: and wither'd Murder,
(Alarum'd by his sentinel, the wolf,
Whose howl's his watch) thus with his stealthy pace,
With Tarquin's ravishing ^{a note}strides, tow'rds his design
Moves like a ghost—Thou ^{b note}sound and firm-set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
Thy very stones prate of my where-about,
And take the present horror from the time,
Which now suits with it—Whilst I threat, he lives—* ^note


[A Bell rings.
I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.
Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven, or to hell. [Exit.

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