That have with two pernicious daughters join'd That keep this dreadful pudder o'er our heads, SHAKESPEARE. CHA P. XXII. Macbeth's Soliloquy. Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle tow'rd my hand? come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still, Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going; Mine eyes are made the fools o' th' other senses, thing It is the bloody business which informs Thus to mine eyes.-Now, o'er one half the world Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse The curtain'd sleep; now Witchcraft celebrates Pale Hecate's offerings: and wither'd Murther, (Alarm'd by his sentinel, the wolf, Whose howl's his watch) thus with his stealthy Hear not my steps, which way they walk for fear lives I go, and 'tis done; the bell invites me, he SHAKESPEARE. CHA P. XXIII. Macduff, Malcolm, and Rosse. Macd.Sez, 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 re move The means that makes us strangers! Rosse. Sir, Amen. Macd. Stands Scotland where it did? 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 rend 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 whom: and good men's lives caps; Expire before the flowers in their Dying or e'er they sicken. Macd. Oh, relation Too nice, and yet too true! Mal. What's the newest grief? Rosse. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker, Each minute teems a new one. Macd. How does my wife? Macd. And all my children? Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace? 'em. Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech: how goes it? Rosse. When I came hither to transport the tidings, Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour Mal. Be't their comfort We're goming thither: gracious England hath That Christendom gives out. Rosse. Would I could answer This comfort with the like; but I have words The gen'ral cause? or is it a free grief, Rosse. No mind that's honest, But in it shares some woe; tho' the main part 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. Hum! I guess at it. Rosse. Your castle is surpris'd, your wife and babes Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, of these murther'd deer Mal Merciful Heav'n! What man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows, Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak, Whispers the o'erfraught heart, and bids it break. Macd. My children too! Rosse. Wife, children, servants, all that could be found. Macd. And I must be from thence! My wife kill'd too! Rosse I've said. Mal. Be comforted. Let's make us med'cines of our great revenge, To cure this deadly grief. Macd. He has no children. ones! All my pretty Did you say all? What all? Oh, hell-kite! All? Mal. Endure 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, on, And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff, now! Mal. Be this the whetstone of your sword, let grief Book viij. Convert to wrath; blunt not the heart, enrage it. Macd. O,I could play the woman with mineeyes, And braggart with my tongue. But gentle heav'n! 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, Then Heav'n forgive him too! Mal. This tune goes manly. Come, go we to the king, our power is ready; may; The night is long that never finds the day. CHAP. SHAKESPEARE. XXIV. Antony's Soliloquy over Caesar's body, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth! That I am meek and gentle with these butchers. Thou art the ruins of the noblest man That ever lived in the tide of times. Woe to the hand that shed this costly blood! That mothers shall but smile, when they behold SHAKESPEARE. |