Shall have more vices than it had before; Macd. What should he be? Mal. It is myself I mean: in whom I know That, when they shall be open'd, black Macbeth With my confineless harms. Macd. Not in the legion Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn'd 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, All continent impediments would o'erbear, Macd. Boundless intemperance As will to greatness dedicate themselves, Mal. Macd. This avarice Sticks deeper; grows with more pernicious root The sword of our slain kings: yet do not fear; Mal. But I have none: the king-becoming graces, Acting it 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-scepter'd, When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again, By his own interdiction stands accurs'd, And does blaspheme his breed?-Thy royal father Have banish'd me from Scotland.-O my breast, Mal. Wip'd the black scruples, reconcil'd my thoughts No less in truth than life: my first false speaking Now we'll together; and the chance of goodness Enter a Doctor. Mal. Well; more anon.-Comes the king forth, I pray Doct. Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched souls [you? 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? [Exit Doctor. 'Tis called the evil: A most miraculous work in this good king; The healing benediction. With this strange virtue, And sundry blessings hang about his throne, That speak him full of grace. Macd. See, who comes here? Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not. Enter Ross. Macd. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither. Mal. I know him now. Good God, betimes remove The means that makes us strangers! Ross. Sir, amen. Macd. Stands Scotland where it did? Alas, poor country, Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot Be call'd our mother, but our grave: where nothing, Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks, that rent the air, A modern ecstacy; the dead man's knell Is there scarce ask'd for who; and good men's lives Macd. O, relation Too nice, and yet too true! Mal. What's the newest grief? Ross. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker; Each minute teems a new one. Macd. Ross. Why, well. Macd. Ross. How does my wife? Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace? Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour Of many worthy fellows that were out; Mal. That Christendom gives out. Ross. Would I could answer This comfort with the like! But I have words Where hearing should not latch them. Macd. What concern they? No mind that's honest The general cause? or is it a fee-grief Ross. But in it shares some woe; though the main part Macd. If it be mine, Keep it not from me; quickly let me have it. Ross. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever, Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound That ever yet they heard. Macd. Hum! I guess at it. Ross. Your castle is surpris'd; your wife and babes Mal. Let's make us medicines of our great revenge, Macd. He has no children.-All my pretty ones What, all my pretty chickens and their dam Mal. Dispute it like a man. Macd. I shall do so; But I must also feel it as a man: I cannot but remember such things were, That were most precious to me.-Did heaven look on, am, They were all struck for thee! naught that I Macd. O, I could play the woman with mine eyes, Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and myself; Mal. This tune goes manly. Come, go we to the king; our power is ready; Our lack is nothing but our leave: Macbeth Is ripe for shaking, and the powers above Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you may; The night is long that never finds the day. [Exeunt. |