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The Same. | |
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Enter LADY MACBETH. | |
| Lady M. That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold, | |
| What hath quench’d them hath given me fire. Hark! | |
| Peace! | 5 |
| It was the owl that shriek’d, the fatal bellman, | |
| Which gives the stern’st good-night. He is about it: | |
| The doors are open, and the surfeited grooms | |
| Do mock their charge with snores: I have drugg’d their possets, | |
| That death and nature do contend about them, | 10 |
| Whether they live or die. | |
| Macb. [Within.] Who’s there? what, ho! | |
| Lady M. Alack! I am afraid they have awak’d, | |
| And ’tis not done; the attempt and not the deed | |
| Confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready; | 15 |
| He could not miss them. Had he not resembled | |
| My father as he slept I had done ’t. My husband! | |
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Enter MACBETH. | |
| Macb. I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise? | |
| Lady M. I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry. | 20 |
| Did not you speak? | |
| Macb. When? | |
| Lady M. Now. | |
| Macb. As I descended? | |
| Lady M. Ay. | 25 |
| Macb. Hark! | |
| Who lies i’ the second chamber? | |
| Lady M. Donalbain. | |
| Macb. [Looking on his hands.] This is a sorry sight. | |
| Lady M. A foolish thought to say a sorry sight. | 30 |
| Macb. There’s one did laugh in ’s sleep, and one cried ‘Murder!’ | |
| That they did wake each other: I stood and heard them; | |
| But they did say their prayers, and address’d them | |
| Again to sleep. | |
| Lady M. There are two lodg’d together. | 35 |
| Macb. One cried ‘God bless us!’ and ‘Amen’ the other: | |
| As they had seen me with these hangman’s hands. | |
| Listening their fear, I could not say ‘Amen,’ | |
| When they did say ‘God bless us!’ | |
| Lady M. Consider it not so deeply. | 40 |
| Macb. But wherefore could not I pronounce ‘Amen?’ | |
| I had most need of blessing, and ‘Amen’ | |
| Stuck in my throat. | |
| Lady M. These deeds must not be thought | |
| After these ways; so, it will make us mad. | 45 |
| Macb. Methought I heard a voice cry ‘Sleep no more! | |
| Macbeth does murder sleep,’ the innocent sleep, | |
| Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleave of care, | |
| The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath, | |
| Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, | 50 |
| Chief nourisher in life’s feast,— | |
| Lady M. What do you mean? | |
| Macb. Still it cried, ‘Sleep no more!’ to all the house: | |
| ‘Glamis hath murder’d sleep, and therefore Cawdor | |
| Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more!’ | 55 |
| Lady M. Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane, | |
| You do unbend your noble strength to think | |
| So brainsickly of things. Go get some water, | |
| And wash this filthy witness from your hand. | |
| Why did you bring these daggers from the place? | 60 |
| They must lie there: go carry them, and smear | |
| The sleepy grooms with blood. | |
| Macb. I’ll go no more: | |
| I am afraid to think what I have done; | |
| Look on ’t again I dare not. | 65 |
| Lady M. Infirm of purpose! | |
| Give me the daggers. The sleeping and the dead | |
| Are but as pictures; ’tis the eye of childhood | |
| That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed, | |
| I’ll gild the faces of the grooms withal; | 70 |
| For it must seem their guilt. [Exit. Knocking within. | |
| Macb. Whence is that knocking? | |
| How is ’t with me, when every noise appals me? | |
| What hands are here! Ha! they pluck out mine eyes. | |
| Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood | 75 |
| Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather | |
| The multitudinous seas incarnadine, | |
| Making the green one red. | |
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Re-enter LADY MACBETH. | |
| Lady M. My hands are of your colour, but I shame | 80 |
| To wear a heart so white.—[Knocking within.] I hear a knocking | |
| At the south entry; retire we to our chamber; | |
| A little water clears us of this deed; | |
| How easy is it, then! Your constancy | |
| Hath left you unattended. [Knocking within.] Hark! more knocking. | 85 |
| Get on your night-gown, lest occasion call us, | |
| And show us to be watchers. Be not lost | |
| So poorly in your thoughts. | |
| Macb. To know my deed ’twere best not know myself. [Knocking within. | |
| Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst! [Exeunt. | 90 |
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