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Enter MACBETH.

Len. Good-morrow, noble fir!

Macb.

Good-morrow, both!

Not yet.

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Macd. Is the king ftirring, worthy thane?
Macb.

Macd. He did command me to call timely on him

I have almost slipp'd the hour.

Macb.
I'll bring you to him.
Macd. I know, this is a joyful trouble to you;

But yet, 'tis one.

Macb. The labour we delight in, phyficks pain. This is the door.

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Macb.

He does :—he did appoint so.

Len. The night has been unruly: Where we lay, Our chimneys were blown down: and, as they fay, Lamentings heard i' the air; ftrange screams of death; And prophecying, with accents terrible,

Of dire combustion, and confus'd events,
New hatch'd to the woeful time.

The obfcure bird

Clamour'd the livelong night: fome say, the earth
Was feverous, and did shake.

Macb.

'Twas a rough night.

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

Re-enter MACDUFF.

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

Macb. Len.

What's the matter?

Macd.

Macd. Confufion now hath made his master-piece! Moft facrilegious murder hath broke ope

The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence

The life o' the building.

Macb.

What is't you fay? the life?

Len. Mean you his majesty?

Macd. Approach the chamber, and destroy your fight With a new Gorgon :-Do not bid me speak; See, and then speak yourselves.-Awake! awake!—

[Exeunt MACBETH and LENOX.

Ring the alarum-bell :-Murder! and treafon!
Banquo, and Donalbain! Malcolm! awake!
Shake off this downy fleep, 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 sprights,
To countenance this horror!

Lady M.

[Bell rings.

Enter Lady MACBETH.

What's the business,

That fuch a hideous trumpet calls to parley

The fleepers of the houfe? fpeak, fpeak,

Macd.

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.-O Banquo! Banquo!

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Dear Duff, I pr'ythee, contradict thy felf,

And fay, it is not fo.

Re enter

Re-enter MACBETH and LENOX.

Mach. Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had liv'd a bleffed 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.

Don. What is amifs?

Macb.

You are, and do not know it:

The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
Is ftopp'd; the very source of it is stopp'd.

Macd. Your royal father's murder'd.

O, by whom?

Mal.
Len. 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 trufted with them.

Macb. O, yet I do repent me of my fury,

That I did kill them.

Macd.

Wherefore did you fo?

Macb. Who can be wife, amaz'd, temperate, and furious, Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man :

The expedition of my violent love

Out-ran the pauser reason.-Here lay Duncan,
His filver (kin lac'd with his golden blood;
And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature,
For ruin's wafteful entrance: there, the murderers,
Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers
Unmannerly breech'd with gore: Who could refrain,

That

That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage, to make his love known?

Lady M.

Help me hence, ho!

Why do we hold our tongues,

Macd. Look to the lady.

Mal.

That most may claim this argument for ours?
Don. What should be spoken here,

Where our fate, hid within an augre-hole,

May rush, and feize us? Let's away; our tears
Are not yet brew'd.

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And when we have our naked frailties hid,
That fuffer 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 pretence I fight

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Mal. What will you do? Let's not confort with them:

To show an unfelt forrow, is an office

Which the falfe man does easy: I'll to England.

Don. To Ireland, I; our separated fortune

Shall keep us both the fafer: where we are,

There's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood,

The nearer bloody.

Mal.

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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.

SCENE IV.

Without the Cafile.

Enter Rosse, and an old Man.

Old M. Threefcore and ten I can remember well:
Within the volume of which time, I have feen

Hours dreadful, and things strange; but this fore night
Hath trifled former knowings.

Roffe.

Ah, good father,

Thou feeft, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody ftage: by the clock, 'tis day,
And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp :
Is it night's predominance, or the day's fhame,
That darkness does the face of earth intomb,
When living light thould kiss it?

Old M.

'Tis unnatural, Even like the deed that's done. On Tuesday last,

A faulcon, tow'ring in her pride of place,

Was by a moufing owl hawk'd at, and kill'd.

Roffe. And Duncan's horses, (a thing most strange and certain,)

Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,

Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Contending 'gainst obedience, as they would make
War with mankind.

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