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Doct. Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched souls, | Due to some single breast?

That stay his cure: their malady convinces
The great assay of art; but, at his touch,
Such sanctity hath heaven given in his hand,
They presently amend.

Mal. I thank you, doctor.

[Erit Doctor.

Macd. What's the disease he means? Mal. 'Tis call'd 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,
That speak him full of grace.

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Macd. Stands Scotland where it did?
Rosse.
Alas, poor country;
Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot
Be call'd our mother, but our grave: where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks that rent the air,
Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstacy; the dead man's knell
Is there scarce ask'd, for who; and good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying, or ere they sicken.
Macd.

Too nice, and yet too true!
Mal.

O, relation,

What is the newest grief? Rosse. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker; Each minute teems a new one. Macd.

Rosse. Why, well. Macd.

Rosse.

leave them.

Well too.

How does my wife?
And all my children?
Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace?
Rosse. No; they were well at peace, when I did
[it?
Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech; How goes
Rosse. When I came hither to transport the tidings,
Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour
Of many worthy fellows that were out;
Which was to my belief witness'd the rather,
For that I saw the tyrant's power a-foot :
Now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland
Would create soldiers, make our women fight
To doff their dire distresses.

Mal.
Be it their comfort,
We are coming thither: gracious England hath
Lent us good Siward, and ten thousand men ;
An older, and a better soldier, none
That Christendom gives out.

Rosse.

Rosse.

No mind, that's honest, But in it shares some woe; though the main part Pertains to you alone.

Macd.

If it be mine,

Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it.

Rosse. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever, Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound, That ever yet they heard.

Macd. Humph! I guess at it. Rosse. Your castle is surpriz'd; your wife, and Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, [babes, Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer, To add the death of you. Mal.

Merciful heaven!-

What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;
Give sorrow words: the grief, that does not speak,
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break.
Macd. My children too?
Rosse.

That could be found.
Macd.

My wife kill'd too?
Rosse.
Mal.

Wife, children, servants, all

And I must be from thence! I have said.

Be comforted: Let's make us med'cines of our great revenge, To cure this deadly grief.

Macd. He has no children.-All my pretty ones?
Did you say, all ?-O, hell-kite!-All?
What, all my pretty chickens, and their dam,
At one fell swoop?

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,
And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,
They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,
Not for their own demerits, but for mine,
Fell slaughter on their souls: Heaven rest them now!
Mal. Be this the whetstone of your sword: let grief
Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

Macd. O, I could play the woman with mine eyes,
And braggart with my tongue!- -But gentle heaven,
Cut short all intermission; front to front,
Bring thou this fiend of Scotland, and myself;
Within my sword's length set him; if he 'scape,
Heaven forgive him too!

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 [may; Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you The night is long, that never finds the day. [Exeunt.

ACT V.

SCENE I.-Dunsinane. A Room in the Castle. Enter a Doctor of Physic, and a waiting Gentlewoman. Doct. I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive no truth in your report. When was it she last walked ?

Gent. Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, throw her night-gown upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon it, read it, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep. Doct. A great perturbation in nature! to receive What concern they? at once the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of watching. In this slumbry agitation, besides her

'Would I could answer This comfort with the like! But I have words, That would be howl'd out in the desert air, Where hearing should not latch them. Macd.

The general cause? or is it a fee-grief,

walking and other actual performances, what, at any time, have you heard her say?

Gent. That, sir, which I will not report after her. Doct. You may, to me; and 'tis most meet you should.

Gent. Neither to you, nor any one; having no witness to confirm my speech.

Enter Lady MACBETH, with a taper.

Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise; and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her: stand close. Doct. How came she by that light?

Gent. Why, it stood by her: she has light by her continually; 'tis her command.

Doct. You see, her eyes are open.
Gent. Ay, but their sense is shut.

Doct. What is it she does now; Look how she rubs her hands.

Gent. It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus washing her hands; I have known her continue in this a quarter of an hour.

Lady M. Yet here's a spot.

Doct. Hark, she speaks: I will set down what comes from her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.

Lady M. Out, damned spot! out, I say!-One; Two: Why, then 'tis time to do't:- -Hell is murky!-Fye, my lord, fye! a soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account!-Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him? Doct. Do you mark that?

Lady M. The thane of Fife had a wife; Where is she now?What, will these hands ne'er be clean?-No more o'that, my lord, no more o'that: you mar all with this starting.

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Doct. Go to, go to; you have known what you

should not.

Gent. She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that: Heaven knows what she has known.

Lady M. Here's the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh!

Doct. What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.

Gent. I would not have such a heart in my bosom, for the dignity of the whole body.

Doct. Well, well, well,—

Gent. 'Pray God, it be, sir.

Doct. This disease is beyond my practice: Yet I have known those which have walked in their sleep, who have died holily in their beds.

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What does the tyrant?

Cath. Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies : Some say he's mad; others, that lesser hate him, Do call it valiant fury: but, for certain. He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause Within the belt of rule.

Ang. Now does he feel His secret murders sticking on his hands; Now minutely revolts upbraid bis faith-breach; Those he commands, move only in command, Nothing in love: now does he feel his title Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe Upon a dwarfish thief. Ment. Who then shall blame His pester'd senses to recoil, and start, When all that is within him does condenın Itself, for being there? Well, march we on, To give obedience where 'tis truly ow'd: Meet we the medicin of the sickly weal: And with him pour we, in our country's purge, Each drop of us. Len. Or so much as it needs, To dew the sovereign flower, and drown the weeds. Make we our march towards Birnam. [Ex. marching. SCENE III.-Dunsinane. A Room in the Castle.

Cath.

Enter MACBETH, Doctor, and Attendants. Macb. Bring me no more reports; let them fly all; Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,

I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm? Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know All mortal consequents pronounc'd me thus: Fear not, Macbeth; no man, that's born of woman, Shall e'er have power on thee. Then fly, false thanes, And mingle with the English epicures: Lady M. Wash your hands, put on your night- The mind I sway by, and the heart I bear, gown; look not so pale.-I tell you yet again, Ban-Shall never sagg with doubt, nor shake with fear. quo's buried; he cannot come out of his grave. Doct. Even so?

Lady M. To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come, come, come, come, give me your hand; What's done, cannot be undone; To bed, to bed, to bed. [Exit Lady MACBETH.

Doct. Will she go now to bed?
Gent. Directly.

[deeds
Doct. Foul whisperings are abroad: Unnatural
Do breed unnatural troubles: Infected minds
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
More needs she the divine, than the physician.-
God, God, forgive us all! Look after her;
Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
And still keep eyes upon her :-So, good night:
My mind she has mated, and amaz'd my sight:
I think, but dare not speak.

Gent. Good night good doctor.

[Exeunt.

Enter a Servant.

The devil damn thee black, thou cream-fac'd loon.
Where got'st thou that goose look ?
Serv. There is ten thousand-
Macb.

Serv.

Geese, villain?
Soldiers, sir.
Mach. Go, prick thy face, and over-red thy fear,
Thou lily-liver'd boy. What soldiers, patch?
Death of thy soul! those linen cheeks of thine
Are counsellors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?
Serv. The English force, so please you.
Macb. Take thy face hence.-Seyton!-I am sick at
When I behold-Seyton, I say!-This push [heart,
Will cheer me ever, or disseat me now.

I have liv'd long enough: my way of life
Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf:
And that which should accompany old age,

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Macb. I'll put it on.

'Tis not needed yet.

Send out more horses, skirr the country round;
Hang those that talk of fear.-Give me mine armour,-
How does your patient, doctor?
Doct.
Not so sick, my lord,
As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies,
That keep her from her rest.
Macb.
Cure her of that:
Canst thou not minister to a mind diseas'd;
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow;
Raze out the written troubles of the brain;
And, with some sweet oblivious antidote,
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff,
Which weighs upon the heart?
Doct.

Must minister to himself.

Therein the patient

Macb. Throw physic to the dogs, I'll none of it.Come, put mine armour on; give me my staff :Seyton, send out.-Doctor, the thanes fly from me:Come, sir, despatch:-If thou could'st, doctor, cast The water of my land, find her disease, And purge it to a sound and pristine health, I would applaud thee to the very echo, That should applaud again.-Pull't off, I say.What rhubarb, senna, or what purgative drug, [them? Would scour these English hence? Hearest thou of Doct. Ay, my good lord; your royal preparation Makes us hear something.

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Enter, with drums and colours, MACBETH, SEYTON, and Soldiers.

Macb. Hang out our banners on the outward walls; The cry is still, They come: Our castle's strength Will laugh a siege to scorn: here let them lie, Till famine, and the ague, eat them up; Were they not forc'd with those that should be ours, We might have met them dareful, beard to beard, And beat them backward home. What is that noise? [A cry within, of women.

Sey. It is the cry of women, my good lord. Macb. I have almost forgot the taste of fears: The time has been, my senses would have cool'd To hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair Would at a dismal treatise rouse, and stir As life were in't: I have supp'd full with horrors; Direness, familiar to my slaught'rous thoughts, Cannot once start me.-Wherefore was that cry? Sey. The queen, my lord, is dead.

Mac. She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.-
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.-

Country near Dunsinane: A Wood in view.
Enter, with drums and colours, MALCOLM, old SIWARD,
and his Son, MACDUFF, MENTETH, CATHNESS, AN-I
GUS, LENOX, ROSSE, and Soldiers, marching.
Mal. Cousins, I hope, the days are near at hand,
That chambers will be safe.

Ment.

We doubt it nothing. Siw. What wood is this before us? Ment.

The wood of Birnam. Mal. Let every soldier hew him down a bough, And bear't before him; thereby shall we shadow The numbers of our host, and make discovery Err in report of us.

Sold.

It shall be done.

Enter a Messenger.

Thou com'st to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.
Mess. Gracious my lord,

I shall report that which I say I saw,
But know not how to do it.

Macb.
Well, say, sir.
Mess. As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought,
The wood began to move.

Mach. Liar, and slave!
[Striking him.
Mess. Let me endure your wrath, if 't be not so;
Within this three mile may you see it coming;
I say, a moving grove.
Macb.
If thou speak'st false,
Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive,
Till famine cling thee: if thy speech be sooth,
I care not if thou dost for me as much.—

I pull in resolution; and begin

To doubt the equivocation of the fiend,

Siw. We learn no other, but the confident tyrant That lies like truth: Fear not, till Birnam wood Keeps still in Dunsinane, and will endure

Our setting down before't.

Mal.

'Tis his main hope:

For where there is advantage to be given,
Both more and less have given him the revolt;
And none serve with him but constrained things,
Whose hearts are absent too.

Macd.

Let our just censures

Do come to Dunsinane ;-and now a wood
Comes toward Dunsinane.-Arm, arm, and out!-
If this, which he avouches, does appear,
There is nor flying hence, nor tarrying here.
I 'gin to be a-weary of the sun,

And wish the estate o'the world were now undone.-
Ring the alarum bell:-Blow wind! come, wrack!
At least we'll die with harness on our back. [Exeunt.

SCENE VI.-The same. A Plain before the Castle.
Enter, with drums and colours, MALCOLM, old SIWARD,
MACDUFF, &c. and their Army, with boughs.

Mal. Now, near enough; your leavy screens throw
down,

And shew like those you are:-You, worthy uncle,
Shall, with my cousin, your right-noble son,
Lead our first battle: worthy Macduff, and we,
Shall take upon us what else remains to do,
According to our order.

Siw.

Fare you well.—

Do we but find the tyrant's power to night,
Let us be beaten, if we cannot fight. [breath,
Macd. Make all our trumpets speak; give them all
Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.
[Exeunt. Alarums continued.

SCENE VII.-The same. Another part of the Plain.

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Yo. Siw. The devil himself could not pronounce a [title

More hateful to mine ear.

Macb.
No, nor more fearful.
Yo. Siw. Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my sword
I'll prove the lie thou speak'st.

[They fight, and young SIWARD is slain.
Macb.
Thou wast born of woman.-
But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,
Brandish'd by man that's of a woman born. [Exit.

Alarums. Enter MACDUFf.

Macd. That way the noise is: Tyrant, shew thy face:

If thou be'st slain, and with no stroke of mine,
My wife and children's ghosts will haunt me still.
I cannot strike at wretched kernes, whose arms
Are hir'd to bear their staves; either thou, Macbeth,
Or else my sword, with an unbatter'd edge,

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Despair thy charm ;

And let the angel, whom thou still hast serv'd,
Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb
Untimely ripp'd.

Mach. Accursed be that tongue that tells me so,
For it hath cow'd my better part of man!
And be these juggling fiends no more believ'd,
That palter with us in a double sense;
That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope.-I'll not fight with thee.
Macd. Then yield thee, coward,

We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
And live to be the show and gaze o'the time.
Painted upon a pole; and underwrit,
Here may you see the tyrant.

Macb.
I'll not yield,
To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet,
And to be baited with the rabble's curse.
Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane,
And thou oppos'd, being of no woman born,
Yet I will try the last: Before my body
I throw my warlike shield: lay on, Macduff;
And damn'd be him that first cries, Hold, enough."
[Exeunt, fighting.

Retreat. Flourish. Re-enter with drum and colours,
MALCOLM, old SIWARD, ROSSE, LENOX, ANGUS,
CATHNESS, MENTETH, and Soldiers.

Mal. I would, the friends we miss were safe arriv'd.
Siw. Some must go off; and yet, by these I see,
So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

Mal. Macduff is missing, and your noble son.
He only liv'd but till he was a man;
Rosse. Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt :

The which no sooner had his powers confirm'd
In the unshrinking station where he fought,
But like a man he died.

Siw. Then he is dead?

[sorrow Rosse. Ay, and brought off the field: your case of

I sheathe again undeeded. There thou should'st be; Must not be measur'd by his worth, for then
By this great clatter, one of greatest note
Seems bruited. Let me find him, fortune!
And more I beg not.
[Exit. Alarum.

Enter MALCOLM and old SIWARD.
Siw. This way, my lord; the castle's gently render'd:
The tyrant's people on both sides do fight:
The noble thanes do bravely in the war;
The day almost itself professes yours,

And little is to do.

Mal.

We have met with foes

That strike beside us.
Siw. Enter, sir, the castle.

It hath no end.

Siw.

Had he his hurts before?
Rosse. Ay, on the front.

Siw.

Why, then, God's soldier be he!
Had I as many sons as I have hairs,

I would not wish them to a fairer death:
And so his knell is knoll'd.
Mal.

And that I'll spend for him.
Siw.

He's worth more sorrow,

He's worth no more;
They say, he parted well, and paid his score:
[Exeunt. Alarum. So, God be with him!-Here comes newer comfort.
Re-enter MACDUFF, with MACBETH's head on a pole.

Re-enter MACBETH.
Macb. Why should I play the Roman fool, and die
On mine own sword? whiles I see lives, the gashes
Do better upon them.

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THIS play appears to have been written in 1596, but was not published till 1623. It was founded on the old play called The troublesome reign of King John, which was printed in 1591, and is attributed by Pope, though he does not state his authority, to the joint efforts of Shakspeare and Rowley.-The elder play was twice published with the initials of Shakspeare on the title page. Shakspeare has preserved the greatest part of the conduct of it, as well as some of the lines. The number of quotations from Horace, and similar scraps of learning scattered over this piece, ascertain it to have been the work of a scholar. It contains likewise a quantity of rhyming Latin, and ballad metre; and in a scene where the Bastard is repre

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

KING JOHN.

PRINCE HENRY, his son; afterwards King Henry III.
ARTHUR, Duke of Bretagne, son of Geffrey, late Duke
of Bretagne, the elder brother of King John.
WILLIAM MARESHALL, Earl of Pembroke.
GEFFREY FITZ-PETER, Earl of Essex, chief justiciary
of England.

WILLIAM LONGSWORD, Earl of Salisbury.
ROBERT BIGOT, Earl of Norfolk.

HUBERT DE BURGH, chamberlain to the King.
ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, son of Sir Robert Faulcon-
bridge.

PHILIP FAULCONBRIDGE, his half-brother, bastard son
to King Richard the First.

JAMES GURNEY, servant to Lady Faulconbridge,
PETER of Pomfret, a prophet.

PHILIP, King of France.

LEWIS, the Dauphin.

ARCHDUKE of AUSTRIA.

Cardinal PANDULPH, the Pope's legate.
MELUN, a French lord.

CHATILLON, ambassador from France to King John.

ELINOR, the widow of King Henry II., and mother of
King John.

CONSTANCE, mother to Arthur.
BLANCH, daughter to Alphonso, King of Castile, and
niece to King John.

Lady FAULCONBRIDGE, mother to the Bastard and
Robert Faulconbridge.

Lords, Ladies, Citizens of Angiers, Sheriff, Heralds,
Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants.

SCENE,-sometimes in ENGLAND, and
sometimes in FRANCE.

sented as plundering a monastery, there are strokes of humour, which seem, from their particular turn, to have been most evidently produced by another hand than that of our author. Of this historical drama there is a subsequent edition in 1611, printed for John Helme, whose name appears before none of the genuine pieces of Shakspeare. Mr. Steevens admitted this play as our author's own, among the twenty which he published from the old editions: he afterwards, perhaps with out sufficient grounds, receded from that opinion.

The action of the present tragedy occupies a space of about seventeen years; beginning at the thirty-fourth year of king John's life.

ACT I.

SCENE I.

Northampton.-A Room of State in the Palace. Enter KING JOHN, QUEEN ELINOR, PEMBROKE, ESSEX, SALISBUBY, and others, with CHATILLON.

King John. Now, say, Chatillon, what would France with us?

Chat. Thus, after greeting, speaks the king of France, In my behaviour, to the majesty,

The borrow'd majesty of England here.

Eli. A strange beginning;-borrow'd majesty!
K. John. Silence, good mother; hear the embassy.
Chat. Philip of France, in right and true behalf
Of thy deceased brother Geffrey's son,
Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim.
To this fair island, and the territories;
To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine:
Desiring thee to lay aside the sword,
Which sways usurpingly these several titles ;
And put the same into young Arthur's hand,
Thy nephew and right royal sovereign.

K. John. What follows, if we disallow of this?
Chat. The proud controul of fierce and bloody war,
To enforce these rights so forcibly withheld. [blood,
K. John. Here have we war for war, and blood for

Controlment for controlment: so answer France.

Chat. Then take my king's defiance from my mouth,
The furthest limit of my embassy.

K. John. Bear mine to him, and so depart in peace :
Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France;
For ere thou canst report I will be there,
The thunder of my cannon shall be heard:
So, hence Be thou the trumpet of our wrath,
And sudden presage of your own decay,—
An honourable conduct let him have :-

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