Table of Contents
ACT 1, SCENE 3
Setting: A heath near Forres.
Thunder. Enter the three Witches.
| First Witch | Where hast thou been, sister? | |
| Second Witch | Killing swine. | |
| Third Witch | Sister, where thou? | |
| First Witch | A sailor's wife had chestnuts in her lap, | |
| And munch'd, and munch'd, and munch'd:–– | 5 | |
| Give me,' quoth I: | ||
| Aroint thee, witch!' the rump–fed ronyon cries. | ||
| Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger: | ||
| But in a sieve I'll thither sail, | ||
| And, like a rat without a tail, | 10 | |
| I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do. | ||
| Second Witch | I'll give thee a wind. | |
| First Witch | Thou'rt kind. | |
| Third Witch | And I another. | |
| First Witch | I myself have all the other, | 15 |
| And the very ports they blow, | ||
| All the quarters that they know | ||
| I' the shipman's card. | ||
| I will drain him dry as hay: | ||
| Sleep shall neither night nor day | 20 | |
| Hang upon his pent–house lid; | ||
| He shall live a man forbid: | ||
| Weary se'n nights nine times nine | ||
| Shall he dwindle, peak and pine: | ||
| Though his bark cannot be lost, | 25 | |
| Yet it shall be tempest–tost. | ||
| Look what I have. | ||
| Second Witch | Show me, show me. | |
| First Witch | Here I have a pilot's thumb, | |
| Wreck'd as homeward he did come. | 30 | |
| Drum within. | ||
| Third Witch | A drum, a drum! | |
| Macbeth doth come. | ||
| ALL | The weird sisters, hand in hand, | |
| Posters of the sea and land, | ||
| Thus do go about, about: | 35 | |
| Thrice to thine and thrice to mine | ||
| And thrice again, to make up nine. | ||
| Peace! the charm's wound up. | ||
| Enter MACBETH and BANQUO. | ||
| MACBETH | So foul and fair a day I have not seen. | |
| BANQUO | How far is't call'd to Forres? What are these | 40 |
| So wither'd and so wild in their attire, | ||
| That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth, | ||
| And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught | ||
| That man may question? You seem to understand me, | ||
| By each at once her choppy finger laying | 45 | |
| Upon her skinny lips: you should be women, | ||
| And yet your beards forbid me to interpret | ||
| That you are so. | ||
| MACBETH | Speak, if you can: what are you? | |
| First Witch | All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis! | 50 |
| Second Witch | All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, thane of Cawdor! | |
| Third Witch | All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter! | |
| BANQUO | Good sir, why do you start; and seem to fear | |
| Things that do sound so fair? I' the name of truth, | ||
| Are ye fantastical, or that indeed | 55 | |
| Which outwardly ye show? My noble partner | ||
| You greet with present grace and great prediction | ||
| Of noble having and of royal hope, | ||
| That he seems rapt withal: to me you speak not. | ||
| If you can look into the seeds of time, | 60 | |
| And say which grain will grow and which will not, | ||
| Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear | ||
| Your favours nor your hate. | ||
| First Witch | Hail! | |
| Second Witch | Hail! | 65 |
| Third Witch | Hail! | |
| First Witch | Lesser than Macbeth, and greater. | |
| Second Witch | Not so happy, yet much happier. | |
| Third Witch | Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none: | |
| So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo! | 70 | |
| First Witch | Banquo and Macbeth, all hail! | |
| MACBETH | Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more: | |
| By Sinel's death I know I am thane of Glamis; | ||
| But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives, | ||
| A prosperous gentleman; and to be king | 75 | |
| Stands not within the prospect of belief, | ||
| No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence | ||
| You owe this strange intelligence? or why | ||
| Upon this blasted heath you stop our way | ||
| With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you. | 80 | |
| Witches vanish. | ||
| BANQUO | The earth hath bubbles, as the water has, | |
| And these are of them. Whither are they vanish'd? | ||
| MACBETH | Into the air; and what seem'd corporal melted | |
| As breath into the wind. Would they had stay'd! | ||
| BANQUO | Were such things here as we do speak about? | 85 |
| Or have we eaten on the insane root | ||
| That takes the reason prisoner? | ||
| MACBETH | Your children shall be kings. | |
| BANQUO | You shall be king. | |
| MACBETH | And thane of Cawdor too: went it not so? | |
| BANQUO | To the selfsame tune and words. Who's here? | |
| Enter ROSS and ANGUS. | ||
| ROSS | The king hath happily received, Macbeth, | |
| The news of thy success; and when he reads | ||
| Thy personal venture in the rebels' fight, | ||
| His wonders and his praises do contend | 95 | |
| Which should be thine or his: silenced with that, | ||
| In viewing o'er the rest o' the selfsame day, | ||
| He finds thee in the stout Norweyan ranks, | ||
| Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make, | ||
| Strange images of death. As thick as tale | ||
| Came post with post; and every one did bear | ||
| Thy praises in his kingdom's great defence, | ||
| And pour'd them down before him. | ||
| ANGUS | We are sent | |
| To give thee from our royal master thanks; | 105 | |
| Only to herald thee into his sight, | ||
| Not pay thee. | ||
| ROSS | And, for an earnest of a greater honour, | |
| He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor: | ||
| In which addition, hail, most worthy thane! | ||
| For it is thine. | ||
| BANQUO | What, can the devil speak true? | |
| MACBETH | The thane of Cawdor lives: why do you dress me | |
| In borrow'd robes? | ||
| ANGUS | Who was the thane lives yet; | 115 |
| But under heavy judgment bears that life | ||
| Which he deserves to lose. Whether he was combined | ||
| With those of Norway, or did line the rebel | ||
| With hidden help and vantage, or that with both | ||
| He labour'd in his country's wrack, I know not; | ||
| But treasons capital, confess'd and proved, | ||
| Have overthrown him. | ||
| MACBETH | Aside. | |
| Glamis, and Thane of Cawdor: | ||
| The greatest is behind. | ||
| To ROSS and ANGUS. | ||
| Thanks for your pains. | ||
| To BANQUO. | 125 | |
| Do you not hope your children shall be kings, | ||
| When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me | ||
| Promised no less to them? | ||
| BANQUO | That trusted home | |
| Might yet enkindle you unto the crown, | ||
| Besides the thane of Cawdor. But 'tis strange: | ||
| And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, | ||
| The instruments of darkness tell us truths, | ||
| Win us with honest trifles, to betray's | ||
| In deepest consequence. | ||
| Cousins, a word, I pray you. | 135 | |
| MACBETH | Aside. | |
| Two truths are told, | ||
| As happy prologues to the swelling act | ||
| Of the imperial theme. –– I thank you, gentlemen. | ||
| Aside. | ||
| This supernatural soliciting | ||
| Cannot be ill, cannot be good: if ill, | ||
| Why hath it given me earnest of success, | ||
| Commencing in a truth? I am thane of Cawdor: | 140 | |
| If good, why do I yield to that suggestion | ||
| Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair | ||
| And make my seated heart knock at my ribs, | ||
| Against the use of nature? Present fears | ||
| Are less than horrible imaginings: | ||
| My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, | ||
| Shakes so my single state of man that function | ||
| Is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is | ||
| But what is not. | ||
| BANQUO | Look, how our partner's rapt. | 150 |
| MACBETH | Aside. | |
| If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me, | ||
| Without my stir. | ||
| BANQUO | New honors come upon him, | |
| Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould | ||
| But with the aid of use. | ||
| MACBETH | Aside. | 155 |
| Come what come may, | ||
| Time and the hour runs through the roughest day. | ||
| BANQUO | Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure. | |
| MACBETH | Give me your favour: my dull brain was wrought | |
| With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains | ||
| Are register'd where every day I turn | ||
| The leaf to read them. Let us toward the king. | 160 | |
| Think upon what hath chanced, and, at more time, | ||
| The interim having weigh'd it, let us speak | ||
| Our free hearts each to other. | ||
| BANQUO | Very gladly. | |
| MACBETH | Till then, enough. Come, friends. | |
| [Exeunt] |