Chapter: ACT II. SCENE I.

Inverness. Court within the Castle.

[Enter Banquo, preceeded by Fleance with a torch.]

BANQUO.
How goes the night, boy?

FLEANCE.
The moon is down; I have not heard the clock.

BANQUO.
And she goes down at twelve.

FLEANCE.
I take't, 'tis later, sir.

BANQUO.
Hold, take my sword.--There's husbandry in heaven;
Their candles are all out:--take thee that too.--
A heavy summons lies like lead upon me,
And yet I would not sleep:--merciful powers,
Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature
Gives way to in repose!--Give me my sword.
Who's there?

[Enter Macbeth, and a Servant with a torch.]

MACBETH.
A friend.

BANQUO.
What, sir, not yet at rest? The king's a-bed:
He hath been in unusual pleasure and
Sent forth great largess to your officers:
This diamond he greets your wife withal,
By the name of most kind hostess; and shut up
In measureless content.

MACBETH.
Being unprepar'd,
Our will became the servant to defect;
Which else should free have wrought.

BANQUO.
All's well.
I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters:
To you they have show'd some truth.

MACBETH.
I think not of them:
Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,
We would spend it in some words upon that business,
If you would grant the time.

BANQUO.
At your kind'st leisure.

MACBETH.
If you shall cleave to my consent,--when 'tis,
It shall make honor for you.

BANQUO.
So I lose none
In seeking to augment it, but still keep
My bosom franchis'd, and allegiance clear,
I shall be counsell'd.

MACBETH.
Good repose the while!

BANQUO.
Thanks, sir: the like to you!

[Exeunt Banquo and Fleance.]

MACBETH.
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 toward 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 marshall'st me the way that I was going;
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest: I see thee still;
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,
Which was not so before.--There's no such thing:
It is the bloody business which informs
Thus to mine eyes.--Now o'er the one half-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 strides, towards his design
Moves like a ghost.--Thou sure and firm-set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
Thy very stones prate of my whereabout,
And take the present horror from the time,
Which now suits with it.--Whiles I threat, he lives;
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.

[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.]

[Enter Lady Macbeth.]

LADY MACBETH.
That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold:
What hath quench'd them hath given me fire.--Hark!--Peace!
It was the owl that shriek'd, the fatal bellman,
Which gives the stern'st good night. He is about it:
The doors are open; and the surfeited grooms
Do mock their charge with snores: I have drugg'd their possets
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live or die.

MACBETH.
[Within.] Who's there?--what, ho!

LADY MACBETH.
Alack! I am afraid they have awak'd,
And 'tis not done: the attempt, and not the deed,
Confounds us.--Hark!--I laid their daggers ready;
He could not miss 'em.--Had he not resembled
My father as he slept, I had done't.--My husband!

[Re-enter Macbeth.]

MACBETH.
I have done the deed.--Didst thou not hear a noise?

LADY MACBETH.
I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.
Did not you speak?

MACBETH.
When?

LADY MACBETH.
Now.

MACBETH.
As I descended?

LADY MACBETH.
Ay.

MACBETH.
Hark!--
Who lies i' the second chamber?

LADY MACBETH.
Donalbain.

MACBETH.
This is a sorry sight.

[Looking on his hands.]

LADY MACBETH.
A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.

MACBETH.
There's one did laugh in's sleep, and one cried, "Murder!"
That they did wake each other: I stood and heard them:
But they did say their prayers, and address'd them
Again to sleep.

LADY MACBETH.
There are two lodg'd together.

MACBETH.
One cried, "God bless us!" and, "Amen," the other;
As they had seen me with these hangman's hands.
Listening their fear, I could not say "Amen,"
When they did say, "God bless us."

LADY MACBETH.
Consider it not so deeply.

MACBETH.
But wherefore could not I pronounce "Amen"?
I had most need of blessing, and "Amen"
Stuck in my throat.

LADY MACBETH.
These deeds must not be thought
After these ways; so, it will make us mad.

MACBETH.
I heard a voice cry, "Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep,"--the innocent sleep;
Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast.

LADY MACBETH.
What do you mean?

MACBETH.
Still it cried, "Sleep no more!" to all the house:
"Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor
Shall sleep no more,--Macbeth shall sleep no more!"

LADY MACBETH.
Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,
You do unbend your noble strength to think
So brainsickly of things.--Go get some water,
And wash this filthy witness from your hand.--
Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
They must lie there: go carry them; and smear
The sleepy grooms with blood.

MACBETH.
I'll go no more:
I am afraid to think what I have done;
Look on't again I dare not.

LADY MACBETH.
Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal,
For it must seem their guilt.

[Exit. Knocking within.]

MACBETH.
Whence is that knocking?
How is't with me, when every noise appals me?
What hands are here? Ha, they pluck out mine eyes!
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
Clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red.

[Re-enter Lady Macbeth.]

LADY MACBETH.
My hands are of your color, but I shame
To wear a heart so white. [Knocking within.] I hear knocking
At the south entry:--retire we to our chamber.
A little water clears us of this deed:
How easy is it then! Your constancy
Hath left you unattended.--[Knocking within.] Hark, more
knocking:
Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us
And show us to be watchers:--be not lost
So poorly in your thoughts.

MACBETH.
To know my deed, 'twere best not know myself. [Knocking within.]
Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!

[Exeunt.]

[Enter a Porter. Knocking within.]

PORTER.
Here's a knocking indeed! If a man were porter of hell-gate, he
should have old turning the key. [Knocking.] Knock, knock, knock.
Who's there, i' the name of Belzebub? Here's a farmer that hanged
himself on the expectation of plenty: come in time; have napkins
enow about you; here you'll sweat for't.--[Knocking.] Knock,
knock! Who's there, in the other devil's name? Faith, here's an
equivocator, that could swear in both the scales against either
scale, who committed treason enough for God's sake, yet could not
equivocate to heaven: O, come in, equivocator. [Knocking.] Knock,
knock, knock! Who's there? Faith, here's an English tailor come
hither, for stealing out of a French hose: come in, tailor; here
you may roast your goose.-- [Knocking.] Knock, knock: never at
quiet! What are you?--But this place is too cold for hell.
I'll devil-porter it no further: I had thought to have let in
some of all professions, that go the primrose way to the
everlasting bonfire. [Knocking.] Anon, anon! I pray you, remember
the porter.

[Opens the gate.]

[Enter Macduff and Lennox.]

MACDUFF.
Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed,
That you do lie so late?

PORTER.
Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second cock: and
drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things.

MACDUFF.
What three things does drink especially provoke?

PORTER.
Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery, sir,
it provokes and unprovokes; it provokes the desire, but it
takes away the performance: therefore much drink may be said to
be an equivocator with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it
sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him, and
disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to: in
conclusion, equivocates him in a sleep, and giving him the lie,
leaves him.

MACDUFF.
I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.

PORTER.
That it did, sir, i' the very throat o' me; but I requited
him for his lie; and, I think, being too strong for him,
though he took up my legs sometime, yet I made a shift to cast
him.

MACDUFF.
Is thy master stirring?--
Our knocking has awak'd him; here he comes.

[Enter Macbeth.]

LENNOX.
Good morrow, noble sir!

MACBETH.
Good morrow, both!

MACDUFF.
Is the king stirring, worthy thane?

MACBETH.
Not yet.

MACDUFF.
He did command me to call timely on him:
I have almost slipp'd the hour.

MACBETH.
I'll bring you to him.

MACDUFF.
I know this is a joyful trouble to you;
But yet 'tis one.

MACBETH.
The labour we delight in physics pain.
This is the door.

MACDUFF.
I'll make so bold to call.
For 'tis my limited service.

[Exit Macduff.]

LENNOX.
Goes the king hence to-day?

MACBETH.
He does: he did appoint so.

LENNOX.
The night has been unruly: where we lay,
Our chimneys were blown down: and, as they say,
Lamentings heard i' the air, strange screams of death;
And prophesying, with accents terrible,
Of dire combustion and confus'd events,
New hatch'd to the woeful time: the obscure bird
Clamour'd the live-long night; some say the earth
Was feverous, and did shake.

MACBETH.
'Twas a rough night.

LENNOX.
My young remembrance cannot parallel
A fellow to it.

[Re-enter Macduff.]

MACDUFF.
O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart
Cannot conceive nor name thee!

MACBETH, LENNOX.
What's the matter?

MACDUFF.
Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!
Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence
The life o' the building.

MACBETH.
What is't you say? the life?

LENNOX.
Mean you his majesty?

MACDUFF.
Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight
With a new Gorgon:--do not bid me speak;
See, and then speak yourselves.

[Exeunt Macbeth and Lennox.]

Awake, awake!--
Ring the alarum bell:--murder and treason!
Banquo and Donalbain! Malcolm! awake!
Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit,
And look on death itself! up, up, and see
The great doom's image! Malcolm! Banquo!
As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites
To countenance this horror!

[Alarum-bell rings.]

[Re-enter Lady Macbeth.]

LADY MACBETH.
What's the business,
That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!

MACDUFF.
O gentle lady,
'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:
The repetition, in a woman's ear,
Would murder as it fell.

[Re-enter Banquo.]

O Banquo, Banquo!
Our royal master's murder'd!

LADY MACBETH.
Woe, alas!
What, in our house?

BANQUO.
Too cruel any where.--
Dear Duff, I pr'ythee, contradict thyself,
And say it is not so.

[Re-enter Macbeth and Lennox, with Ross.]

MACBETH.
Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had liv'd a blessed time; for, from this instant
There's nothing serious in mortality:
All is but toys: renown and grace is dead;
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of.

[Enter Malcolm and Donalbain.]

DONALBAIN.
What is amiss?

MACBETH.
You are, and do not know't:
The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
Is stopp'd; the very source of it is stopp'd.

MACDUFF.
Your royal father's murder'd.

MALCOLM.
O, by whom?

LENNOX.
Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done't:
Their hands and faces were all badg'd with blood;
So were their daggers, which, unwip'd, we found
Upon their pillows:
They star'd, and were distracted; no man's life
Was to be trusted with them.

MACBETH.
O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
That I did kill them.

MACDUFF.
Wherefore did you so?

MACBETH.
Who can be wise, amaz'd, temperate, and furious,
Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:
The expedition of my violent love
Outrun the pauser reason. Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin lac'd with his golden blood;
And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature
For ruin's wasteful entrance: there, the murderers,
Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers
Unmannerly breech'd with gore: who could refrain,
That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make's love known?

LADY MACBETH.
Help me hence, ho!

MACDUFF.
Look to the lady.

MALCOLM.
Why do we hold our tongues,
That most may claim this argument for ours?

DONALBAIN.
What should be spoken here, where our fate,
Hid in an auger hole, may rush, and seize us?
Let's away;
Our tears are not yet brew'd.

MALCOLM.
Nor our strong sorrow
Upon the foot of motion.

BANQUO.
Look to the lady:--

[Lady Macbeth is carried out.]

And when we have our naked frailties hid,
That suffer in exposure, let us meet,
And question this most bloody piece of work
To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us:
In the great hand of God I stand; and thence,
Against the undivulg'd pretense I fight
Of treasonous malice.

MACDUFF.
And so do I.

ALL.
So all.

MACBETH.
Let's briefly put on manly readiness,
And meet i' the hall together.

ALL.
Well contented.

[Exeunt all but Malcolm and Donalbain.]

MALCOLM.
What will you do? Let's not consort with them:
To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.

DONALBAIN.
To Ireland, I; our separated fortune
Shall keep us both the safer: where we are,
There's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood,
The nearer bloody.

MALCOLM.
This murderous shaft that's shot
Hath not yet lighted; and our safest way
Is to avoid the aim. Therefore to horse;
And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
But shift away: there's warrant in that theft
Which steals itself, when there's no mercy left.

[Exeunt.]

 Banquo and his son Fleance walk in the torch-lit hall of Macbeth's castle. Fleance says that it is after midnight, and his father responds that although he is tired, he wishes to stay awake because his sleep has lately inspired "cursed thoughts". Macbeth enters, and Banquo is surprised to see him still up. Banquo says that the king is asleep and mentions that he had a dream about the "three weird sisters. When Banquo suggests that the witches have revealed "some truth" to Macbeth, Macbeth claims that he has not thought of them at all since their encounter in the woods. He and Banquo agree to discuss the witches' prophecies at a later time. Banquo and Fleance leave, and suddenly, in the darkened hall, Macbeth has a vision of a dagger floating in the air before him, its handle pointing toward his hand and its tip aiming him toward Duncan. Macbeth tries to grasp the weapon and fails. He wonders whether what he sees is real or a "dagger of the mind, a false creation / Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain". Continuing to gaze upon the dagger, he thinks he sees blood on the blade, then abruptly decides that the vision is just a manifestation of his unease over killing Duncan. The night around him seems thick with horror and witchcraft, but Macbeth stiffens and resolves to do his bloody work. A bell tolls--Lady Macbeth's signal that the chamberlains are asleep--and Macbeth strides toward Duncan's chamber

