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L. Macd. Yes, he is dead; how wilt thou do for a father?

Son. Nay, how will you do for a husband?
L. Macd. Why, I can buy me twenty at any

market.

Son. Then you'll buy 'em to sell again.

L. Macd. Thou speak 'st with all thy wit; and yet, i' faith,

With wit enough for thee.

Son. Was my father a traitor, mother?

L. Macd. Ay, that he was.

Son. What is a traitor?

L. Macd. Why, one that swears and lies.
Son. And be all traitors that do so?

L. Macd. Every one that does so is a traitor, and must be hanged.

Son. And must they all be hanged that swear and lie?

L. Macd. Every one.

Son. Who must hang them?

L. Macd. Why, the honest men.

Son. Then the liars and swearers are fools: for there are liars and swearers enough to beat the honest men, and hang up them.

L. Macd. Now God help thee, poor monkey! But how wilt thou do for a father?

Son. If he were dead, you 'd weep for him: if you would not, it were a good sign that I should quickly have a new father.

L. Macd. Poor prattler? how thou talk'st.

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Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds
As if it felt with Scotland, and yelled out
Like syllable of dolour.

Mal.
What I believe, I'll wail;
What know, believe; and what I can redress,
As I shall find the time to friend, I will.
What you have spoke, it may be so perchance.
This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,
Was once thought honest: you have loved him
well;

He hath not touched you yet. I am young; but something

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I speak not as in absolute fear of you.

I think our country sinks beneath the yoke;
It weeps; it bleeds; and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds: I think, withal,
There would be hands uplifted in my right;
And here, from gracious England, have I offer
Of goodly thousands. But, for all this,
When I shall tread upon the tyrant's head,
Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country
Shall have more vices than it had before;
More suffer, and more sundry ways than ever,
By him that shall succeed.

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Sticks deeper; grows with more pernicious root
Than summer-seeming lust; and it hath been
The sword of our slain kings: yet do not fear;
Scotland hath foisons to fill up your will,
Of your mere own. All these are portable,
With other graces weighed.

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No, not to live.-O, nation miserable,
With an untitled tyrant bloody-sceptered,
When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again;
Since that the truest issue of thy throne
By his own interdiction stands accursed,
And does blaspheme his breed?-Thy royal father
Was a most sainted king; the queen that bore thee,
Oftener upon her knees than on her feet,
Died every day she lived. Fare thee well!
These evils thou repeat'st upon thyself
Have banished me from Scotland.—O, my breast,
Thy hope ends here!

Mal.
Macduff, this noble passion,
Child of integrity, hath from my soul
Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts
To thy good truth and honour. Devilish Macbeth
By many of these trains hath sought to win me
Into his power; and modest wisdom plucks me
From over-credulous haste: but God above
Deal between thee and me! for even now
I put myself to thy direction, and
Unspeak mine own detraction; here abjure
The taints and blames I laid upon myself,
For strangers to my nature. I am yet
Unknown to woman; never was forsworn;
Scarcely have coveted what was mine own;
At no time broke my faith; would not betray

The devil to his fellow; and delight
No less in truth than life: my first false speaking
Was this upon myself: what I am truly,
Is thine, and my poor country's, to command:
Whither, indeed, before thy here-approach,
Old Siward, with ten thousand warlike men,
All ready at a point, was setting forth :
Now we'll together: and the chance of goodness
Be like our warranted quarrel!-Why are you
silent?

Macd. Such welcome and unwelcome things

at once,

"Tis hard to reconcile.

Enter a Doctor.

Mal. Well; more anon.-Comes the king forth, I pray you?

Doct. Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched
souls

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. [Exit Doctor.
Macd. What's the disease he means?
Mal.
"Tis called 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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This comfort with the like! But I have words That would be howled out in the desert air, Where hearing should not latch them.

Macd. The general cause? or is it a fee-grief, Due to some single breast?

What concern they?

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But in it shares some woe; though the main part Pertains to you alone.

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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.

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Savagely slaughtered: to relate the manner,

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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 at once the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of watching. In this slumbry agitation, besides her 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 't is 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 't is time to do 't:-Hell is murky!-Fie, my lord, fie! 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.

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.

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