Get this No Fear to go!
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20 |
BANQUO
All’s
well.
I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters:
To you they have showed some truth.
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BANQUO
Everything’s OK. I had a dream last night about the three
witches. At least part of what they said about you was true.
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MACBETH
I
think not of them.
Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,
We would spend it in some words upon that business,
If you would grant the time.
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MACBETH
I don’t think about them now. But when we have an hour to
spare we can talk more about it, if you’re willing.
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BANQUO
At
your kind’st leisure.
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BANQUO
Whenever you like.
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25 |
MACBETH
If you shall cleave to my consent, when ’tis,
It shall make honor for you.
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MACBETH
If you stick with me, when the time comes, there will be something
in it for you.
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BANQUO
So
I lose none
In seeking to augment it, but still keep
My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,
I shall be counselled.
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BANQUO
I’ll do whatever you say, as long as I can do it with a
clear conscience.
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MACBETH
Good repose the while!
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MACBETH
Rest easy in the meantime.
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30 |
BANQUO
Thanks, sir: the like to you!
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BANQUO
Thank you, sir. You do the same.
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Exeunt BANQUO and
FLEANCE
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BANQUO and FLEANCE
exit. |
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MACBETH
(to the SERVANT) Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is
ready,
She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.
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MACBETH
(to the SERVANT) Go and tell your mistress to strike
the bell when my drink is ready. Get yourself to bed.
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Exit SERVANT
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The SERVANT
exits. |
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35 40 45 50 55 60 |
Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressèd brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Thou marshall’st me the way that I was going,
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' th' other
senses,
Or else worth all the rest. I see thee still,
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,
Which was not so before. There’s no such thing.
It is the bloody business which informs
Thus to mine eyes. Now o'er the one half-world
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
The curtained sleep. Witchcraft celebrates
Pale Hecate’s offerings, and withered murder,
Alarumed by his sentinel, the wolf,
Whose howl’s his watch, thus with his stealthy pace,
With Tarquin’s ravishing strides, towards his design
Moves like a ghost. Thou sure and firm-set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
Thy very stones prate of my whereabout,
And take the present horror from the time,
Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives.
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.
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Is this a dagger I see in front of me, with its handle pointing
toward my hand? (to the dagger) Come,
let me hold you. (he grabs at the air in
front of him without touching anything) I don’t
have you but I can still see you. Fateful apparition, isn’t
it possible to touch you as well as see you? Or are you nothing more
than a dagger created by the mind, a hallucination from my fevered
brain? I can still see you, and you look as real as this other
dagger that I’m pulling out now. (he
draws a dagger) You’re leading me toward the
place I was going already, and I was planning to use a weapon just
like you. My eyesight must either be the one sense that’s
not working, or else it’s the only one that’s
working right. I can still see you, and I see blood splotches on
your blade and handle that weren’t there before. (to himself) There’s no dagger
here. It’s the murder I’m about to do
that’s making me think I see one. Now half the world is
asleep and being deceived by evil nightmares. Witches are offering
sacrifices to their goddess Hecate. Old man murder, having been
roused by the howls of his wolf, walks silently to his destination,
moving like Tarquin, as quiet as a ghost. (speaking to the ground) Hard ground, don’t
listen to the direction of my steps. I don’t want you to
echo back where I am and break the terrible stillness of this
moment, a silence that is so appropriate for what I’m about
to do. While I stay here talking, Duncan lives. The more I talk, the
more my courage cools.
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