And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring minif ters, Wherever in your fightlefs fubflances. You wait on nature's mifchief! 4 Come, thick night," 3 -make thick "My blood ftop all paffage to remorse; "Shake my defign, nor make it fall before "'Tis ripen'd to effect." MALONE. --take my milk for gall,] Take away my milk, and put gall into the place. JOHNSON. 4You wait on natures mifchief!] Nature's mifchief is mischief done to nature, violation of nature's order committed by wicked. nefs. JOHNSON. 5 Come, thick night, &c.] A fimilar invocation is found in A Warning for faire Women, 1599, a tragedy which was certainly prior to Macbeth: “Oh sable night, fit on the eye of heaven, "That it difcern not this black deed of darkness! My guilty foul, burnt with luft's hateful fire, "Muft wade through blood to obtain my vile defire: 6 And pall thee--] i. e. wrap thyself in a pall. MALONE. WARBURTON. A pall is a robe of state. So, in the ancient black letter romance of Syr Eglamoure of Artoys, no date; "The knyghtes were clothed in pall." Again, in Milton's Penferofo : "Sometime let gorgeous tragedy "In fcepter'd pall come fweeping by." Dr. Warburton feems to mean the covering which is thrown over the dead. To pall, however, in the prefent inftance, (as Mr. Douce obferves to me.) may fimply mean to wrap, to invest. STEEVENS. 7 That my keen knife The word knife, which at present has a familiar undignified meaning, was anciently ufed to exprefs a fword or dagger. So, in the old black letter romance of Syr Eglamoure of Artoys, no date : 8 Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark, To cry, Hold, hold!--Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor! 2 Through Goddes myght, and his knyfe, "There the gyaunte loft his lyfe." Again, in Spenfer's Faery Queen, B. I. c. vi: -the red-crofs knight was flain with paynim knife." STEEVENS. To avoid a multitude of examples, which in the prefent inftance do not feem wanted, I fhall only observe that Mr. Steevens's remark might be confirmed by quotations without end. REED. 8 --the blanket of the dark,] Drayton, in the 26th song of his Polyolbion, has an expreffion refembling this: "Thick vapours, that, like ruggs, ftill hang the troubled air." STFEVENS. Polyolbion was not published till 1612, after this play had certainly been exhibited; but in an earlier piece Drayton has the fame expreffion: "The fullen night in miftie rugge is wrapp'd." Mortimeriados, 4to. 1596. Blanket was perhaps fuggefted to our poet by the coarse woollen curtain of his own theatre, through which probably, while the houfe was yet but half-lighted, he had himself often peeped.-In King Henry VI. P. III. we have-night's coverture." A kindred thought is found in our author's Rape of Lucrece, 1594: "Were Tarquin night, (as he is but night's child,) MALONE. 9 To cry, Hold, hold!] On this paffage there is a long criticism in the Rambler, Number 168. JOHNSON. In this criticifm the epithet aun is objected to as a mean one. Milton, however, appears to have been of a different opinion, and has reprefented Satan as flying Gawin Douglas employs dun as a fynonyme to fulvus. STEEVENS. To cry, Hold, hold! The thought is taken from the old military laws which infli&ed capital punishment upon "whofoever Enter MACBETH. Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter! 3 fhall ftrike ftroke at his adversary, either in the heat or otherwise, if a third do cry hold, to the intent to part them; except that they did fight a combat in a place inclosed: and then no man fhall be fo hardy as to bid hold, but the general." P. 264 of Mr. Bellay's Inftructions for the Wars, tranflated in 1589. TOLLET. Mr. Toilet's note will likewife illuftrate beth's concluding speech: the laft line in Mac And damn'd be him who first cries, hold, enough!" STEEVENS. Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!] Shakspeare has fupported the chara&er of lady Macbeth by repeated efforts, and never omits any opportunity of adding a trait of ferocity, or a mark of the want of hunan feelings, to this monfter of his own creation. The fofter paffions are more obliterated in her than in her husband, in proportion as her ambition is greater. She meets him here on his arrival from an expedition of danger, with fuch a falutation as would have become one of his friends or vaffals; a falutation apparently fitted rather to raise his thoughts to a level with her own purposes, than to teftify her joy at his return, or manifeft an attachment to his perfon: nor does any fentiment expreffive of love or foftness fall from her throughout the play. While Macbeth himself, amidst the horrors of his guilt, ftill retains a character less fiend-like than that of his queen, talks to her with a degree of tenderness, and pours his complaints and fears into her bofom, accompanied with terms of endearment. STEEVENS. 3 This ignorant prefent,] Ignorant has here the fignification of unknowing; that is, I feel by anticipation those future honours, of which, according to the procefs of nature, the present time would be ignorant. JOHNSON. MACB. My dearest love, Duncan comes here to-night. LADY M. And when goes hence? MACB To-morrow, as he purposes. LADY M. Shall fun that morrow fee! never Your face, my thane, is as a book, where men May read ftrange matters: 4-To beguile the time, Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, 5 This ignorant prefent,] Thus the old copy. Some of our modern editors read: " -present time:" but the phraseology in the text is frequent in our author, as well as other ancient writers. So in the firft fcene of The Tempest: "If you can command these elements to filence, and work the peace of the prefent, we will not hand a rope more." The fenfe does not require the word time, and it is too much for the measure. Again, in Coriolanus: "And that you not delay the prefent; but" &c. Again, in Corinthians I. ch. xv. v. 6: "of whom the greater part remain unto this prefent." Again, in Antony and Cleopatra : "Be pleas'd to tell us "(For this is from the prefent) how you take "The offer I have fent you.' STEEVENS. Your face, my thane, is as a book, where men May read, &c.] That is, thy looks are fuch as will awaken men's curiofity, excite their attention, and make room for fufpicion. HEATH. So, in Pericles Prince of Tyre, 1609: "Her face the book of praises, where is read Nothing but curious pleafures." STEEVENS. Again, in our author's Rape of Lucrece: "Poor women's faces are their own faults' books." To beguile the time, MALONE. Look like the time;] The fame expreffion occurs in the 8th book of Daniel's Civil Wars: "He draws a traverse 'twixt his grievances; "Looks like the time: his eye made not report "Of what he felt within; nor was he lefs "Than usually he was in every part; "Wore a clear face upon a cloudy heart." STeevens. Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, But be the ferpent, under it. He that's coming you fhall put This night's great business into my despatch; Hautboys. Servants of Macbeth attending. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, BANQUO; LENOX, MACDUFF, ROSSE, ANGUS, and Attendants. DUN. This caftle hath a pleasant seat;' the air Nimbly and fweetly recommends itself The feventh and eighth books of Daniel's Civil Wars were not published till the year 1609; [fee the Epiftle Dedicatorie to that edition: fo that, if either poet copied the other, Daniel muft have been indebted to Shakspeare; for there can be little doubt that Macbeth had been exhibited before that year. MALONE. 6 To alter favour ever is to fear:] So, in Love's Labour's Loft: "For blufhing cheeks by faults are bred, "And fears by pale white shown.” Favour is-look, countenance. So, in Troilus and Creffida: "I know your favour, lord Ulyffes, well." STEEVENS. 7 This caftle hath a pleasant feat;] Seat here means fituation. Lord Bacou fays, "He that builds a faire houfe upon an ill feat, committeth himself to prison. Neither doe I reckon it an ill feat, only |