Son. If he were dead, you'd weep for him; if you would not, it were a good sign that I should quickly have a new father. L. Macd. Poor prattler! how thou talk'st!

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. Bless you, fair dame! I am not to you known, Though in your state of honor I am perfect.

I doubt, some danger does approach you nearly:
If you will take a homely man's advice,

Be not found here; hence, with your little ones.
To fright you thus, methinks, I am too savage;
To do worse to you, were fell cruelty,

Which is too nigh your person. Heaven preserve you!
I dare abide no longer.
[Exit Messenger.

L. Macd.

Whither should I fly?

I have done no harm. But I remember now
I am in this earthly world; where, to do harm,
Is often laudable; to do good, sometime,

Accounted dangerous folly. Why, then, alas!
Do I put up that womanly defence,

То say, I have done no harm? -What are these faces?
Enter Murderers.

Mur. Where is your husband?

L. Macd. I hope, in no place so unsanctified, Where such as thou may'st find him.

Mur.

Son. Thou ly'st, thou shag-eared villain.

Mur.

He's a traitor.

What, you egg!

[Stabbing him.

Son.

He has killed me, mother;

pray you.

[Dies.

Young fry of treachery!

[Exit LADY MACDUFF, crying murder, and pursued by the Murderers.

SCENE III. England. A Room in the King's Palace.

Enter MALCOLM and MACduff.

Mal. Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there Weep our sad bosoms empty.

Let us rather

Macd.
Hold fast the mortal sword; and, like good men,
Bestride our downfallen birthdom. Each new morn,
New widows howl; new orphans cry; new sorrows
Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds.

As if it felt with Scotland, and yelled out

Like syllable of dolor.

Mal.
What I believe, I'll wail;
What know, believe; and, what I can redress,
As I shall find the time to friend, I will.

What you have spoke, it may be so, perchance.
This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,
Was once thought honest; you have loved him well;
He hath not touched you yet. I am young; but something
You may deserve of him through me; and wisdom
To offer up a weak, poor, innocent lamb,

To appease an angry god.

Macd. I am not treacherous.

Mal.

But Macbeth is.

A good and virtuous nature may recoil,

In an imperial charge. But I shall crave your pardon;
That which you are, my thoughts cannot transpose:
Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell:
Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace,
Yet grace must still look so.

Macd.

I have lost my hopes.

Mal. Perchance, even there, where I did find my doubts. Why in that rawness left you wife and child,

(Those precious motives, those strong knots of love,) Without leave-taking?—I pray you,

Let not my jealousies be your dishonors,

But mine own safeties.-You may be rightly just,
Whatever I shall think.

Macd.

Bleed, bleed, poor country!

Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dares not check thee!-Wear thou thy

wrongs;

Thy title is affeered!-Fare thee well, lord.

I would not be the villain that thou think'st

For the whole space that's in the tyrant's grasp,
And the rich East to boot.

Mal.
Be not offended;
I speak not as in absolute fear of you.
I think our country sinks beneath the yoke.
It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds. I think, withal,
There would be hands uplifted in my right:
And here, from gracious England, have I offer
Of goodly thousands. But, for all this,
When I shall tread upon the tyrant's head,
Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country
VOL. II.-16

V

Shall have more vices than it had before;
More suffer, and more sundry ways than ever,
By him that shall succeed.

Macd.

What should he be? Mal. It is myself I mean; in whom I know All the particulars of vice so grafted,

That, when they shall be opened, black Macbeth
Will seem as pure as snow; and the poor state
Esteem him as a lamb, being compared

With my confineless harms.

Macd.

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell, can come a devil more damned
In evils, to top Macbeth.

Mal.

I grant him bloody, Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,

Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin

That has a name. But there's no bottom, none,
In my voluptuousness; your wives, your daughters,
Your matrons, and your maids, could not fill up
The cistern of my lust; and my desire

All continent impediments would o'erbear,
That did oppose my will. Better Macbeth,
Than such a one to reign.

Macd.

Boundless intemperance
In nature is a tyranny; it hath been
The untimely emptying of the happy throne,
And fall of many kings. But fear not yet
To take upon you what is yours: you may
Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty,
And yet seem cold, the time you may so hoodwink.
We have willing dames enough; there cannot be
That vulture in you, to devour so many

As will to greatness dedicate themselves,
Finding it so inclined.

Mal.
With this, there grows,
In my most ill-composed affection, such
A stanchless avarice, that, were I king,
I should cut off the nobles for their lands;
Desire his jewels, and this other's house:
And my more-having would be as a sauce
To make me hunger more; that I should forge
Quarrels unjust against the good, and loyal,
Destroying them for wealth.

Macd.

This avarice

Sticks deeper; grows with more pernicious root
Than summer-seeming lust: and it hath been

The sword of our slain kings. Yet do not fear;
Scotland hath foysons to fill up your will,

Of your mere own. All these are portable,
With other graces weighed.

Mal. But I have none. The king-becoming graces,
As justice, verity, temperance, stableness,
Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,
I have no relish of them; but abound
In the division of each several crime,

Acting in many ways. Nay, had I power, I should Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,

Uproar the universal peace, confound

All unity on earth.

Macd.

O Scotland! Scotland!

Mal. If such a one be fit to govern, speak. I am as I have spoken.

Macd.

Fit to govern!

No, not to live.- O nation miserable,

With an untitled tyrant bloody-sceptred,

When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again?
Since that the truest issue of thy throne

By his own interdiction stands accursed,

And does blaspheme his breed? - Thy royal father
Was a most sainted king; the queen, that bore thee,
Oftener upon her knees than on her feet,

Died every day she lived. Fare thee well!
These evils, thou repeat'st upon thyself,
Have banished me from Scotland.

That hope ends here!

O, my breast,

Mal. Macduff, this noble passion, Child of integrity, hath from my soul Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts To thy good truth and honor. Devilish Macbeth By many of these trains hath sought to win me Into his power; and modest wisdom plucks me From over-credulous haste; but God above Deal between thee and me! For even now I put myself to thy direction, and Unspeak mine own detraction; here abjure The taints and blames I laid upon myself, For strangers to my nature. I am yet Unknown to woman; never was forsworn; Scarcely have coveted what was mine own; At no time broke my faith; would not betray The devil to his fellow; and delight

No less in truth, than life: my first false speaking
Was this upon myself. What I am truly,
Is thine, and my poor country's to command;
Whither, indeed, before thy here-approach,
Old Siward, with ten thousand warlike men,
All ready at a point, was setting forth.

Now we'll together; and the chance of goodness,
Be like our warranted quarrel! Why are you silent?
Macd. Such welcome and unwelcome things at once,
'Tis hard to reconcile.

Enter a Doctor.

Mal. Well; more anon.- Comes the king forth, I pray you?

Doct. Ay, sir; there are a crew of wretched souls, That stay his cure. Their malady convinces

.

The great assay of art; but at his touch,
Such sanctity hath Heaven given his hand,
They presently amend.

Mal.

I thank you, doctor.

Macd. What's the disease he means?
Mal.

[Exit Doctor.

'Tis called the evil;

A most miraculous work in this good king;
Which often, since my here-remain in England,
I have seen him do. How he solicits Heaven,
Himself best knows: but strangely-visited people
All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery, he cures;
Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,
Put on with holy prayers; and 'tis spoken,

To the succeeding royalty he leaves

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,
He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy;

And sundry blessings hang about his throne,

To speak him full of grace.

Macd.

Enter RossE.

See, who comes here?

Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not. Macd. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither. Mal. I know him now. Good God, betimes remove The means that make us strangers!

Rosse.

Sir, Amen.

Alas, poor country!

Macd. Stands Seotland where it did?
Rosse.

9