Macbeth | Page 6

begun to plant thee, and will labor To make thee full of growing.--Noble Banquo, That hast no less deserv'd, nor must be known No less to have done so,let me infold thee And hold thee to my heart.
BANQUO. There if I grow, The harvest is your own.
DUNCAN. My plenteous joys, Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves In drops of sorrow.--Sons, kinsmen, thanes, And you whose places are the nearest, know, We will establish our estate upon Our eldest, Malcolm; whom we name hereafter The Prince of Cumberland: which honor must Not unaccompanied invest him only, But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine On all deservers.--From hence to Inverness, And bind us further to you.
MACBETH. The rest is labor, which is not us'd for you: I'll be myself the harbinger, and make joyful The hearing of my wife with your approach; So, humbly take my leave.
DUNCAN. My worthy Cawdor!
MACBETH. [Aside.] The Prince of Cumberland!--That is a step, On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap, For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires! Let not light see my black and deep desires: The eye wink at the hand! yet let that be, Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.
[Exit.]
DUNCAN. True, worthy Banquo!--he is full so valiant; And in his commendations I am fed,-- It is a banquet to me. Let us after him, Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome: It is a peerless kinsman.
[Flourish. Exeunt.]

SCENE V. Inverness. A Room in Macbeth's Castle.
[Enter Lady Macbeth, reading a letter.]
LADY MACBETH. "They met me in the day of success; and I have learned by the perfectest report they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who all-hailed me, 'Thane of Cawdor'; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred me to the coming on of time, with 'Hail, king that shalt be!' This have I thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness; that thou mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it to thy heart, and farewell."
Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be What thou art promis'd; yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o' the milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; Art not without ambition; but without The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst highly, That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false, And yet wouldst wrongly win: thou'dst have, great Glamis, That which cries, "Thus thou must do, if thou have it: And that which rather thou dost fear to do Than wishest should be undone." Hie thee hither, That I may pour my spirits in thine ear; And chastise with the valor of my tongue All that impedes thee from the golden round, Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem To have thee crown'd withal.
[Enter an Attendant.]
What is your tidings?
ATTENDANT. The king comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH. Thou'rt mad to say it: Is not thy master with him? who, were't so, Would have inform'd for preparation.
ATTENDANT. So please you, it is true:--our thane is coming: One of my fellows had the speed of him; Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more Than would make up his message.
LADY MACBETH. Give him tending; He brings great news.
[Exit Attendant.]
The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements. Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here; And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood, Stop up the access and passage to remorse, That no compunctious visitings of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts, And take my milk for gall, your murdering ministers, Wherever in your sightless substances You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night, And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell That my keen knife see not the wound it makes Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark To cry, "Hold, hold!"
[Enter Macbeth.]
Great Glamis! Worthy Cawdor! Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter! Thy letters have transported me beyond This ignorant present, and I feel now The future in the instant.
MACBETH. My dearest love, Duncan comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH. And when goes hence?
MACBETH. To-morrow,--as he purposes.
LADY MACBETH. O, never Shall sun that morrow see! Your face, my thane, is as a book where men May read strange matters:--to beguile the time, Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, But