MALCOLM Let us seek out some desolate...

MALCOLM

Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there

Weep our sad bosoms empty.

MACDUFF

Let us rather

Hold fast the mortal sword, and like good men

Bestride our down-fall'n birthdom: each new morn

New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows

Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds

As if it felt with Scotland and yell'd out

Like syllable of dolour.

MALCOLM

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 touch'd you yet. I am young;

but something

You may deserve of him through me, and wisdom

To offer up a weak poor innocent lamb

To appease an angry god.

MACDUFF

I am not treacherous.

MALCOLM

But Macbeth is.

A good and virtuous nature may recoil

In an imperial charge. But I shall crave

your pardon;

That which you are my thoughts cannot transpose:

Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell;

Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace,

Yet grace must still look so.

MACDUFF

I have lost my hopes.

MALCOLM

Perchance even there where I did find my doubts.

Why in that rawness left you wife and child,

Those precious motives, those strong knots of love,

Without leave-taking? I pray you,

Let not my jealousies be your dishonours,

But mine own safeties. You may be rightly just,

Whatever I shall think.

MACDUFF

Bleed, bleed, poor country!

Great tyranny! lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dare not cheque thee: wear thou

thy wrongs;

The title is affeer'd! Fare thee well, lord:

I would not be the villain that thou think'st

For the whole space that's in the tyrant's grasp,

And the rich East to boot.

MALCOLM

Be not offended:

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.

MACDUFF

What should he be?

MALCOLM

It is myself I mean: in whom I know

All the particulars of vice so grafted

That, when they shall be open'd, black Macbeth

Will seem as pure as snow, and the poor state

Esteem him as a lamb, being compared

With my confineless harms.

MACDUFF

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn'd

In evils to top Macbeth.

MALCOLM

I grant him bloody,

Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,

Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin

That has a name: but there's no bottom, none,

In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daughters,

Your matrons and your maids, could not fill up

The cistern of my lust, and my desire

All continent impediments would o'erbear

That did oppose my will: better Macbeth

Than such an one to reign.

MACDUFF

Boundless intemperance

In nature is a tyranny; it hath been

The untimely emptying of the happy throne

And fall of many kings. But fear not yet

To take upon you what is yours: you may

Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty,

And yet seem cold, the time you may so hoodwink.

We have willing dames enough: there cannot be

That vulture in you, to devour so many

As will to greatness dedicate themselves,

Finding it so inclined.

MALCOLM

With this there grows

In my most ill-composed affection such

A stanchless avarice that, were I king,

I should cut off the nobles for their lands,

Desire his jewels and this other's house:

And my more-having would be as a sauce

To make me hunger more; that I should forge

Quarrels unjust against the good and loyal,

Destroying them for wealth.

MACDUFF

This avarice

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 weigh'd.

MALCOLM

But I have none: the king-becoming graces,

As justice, verity, temperance, stableness,

Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,

Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,

I have no relish of them, but abound

In the division of each several crime,

Acting it many ways. Nay, had I power, I should

Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,

Uproar the universal peace, confound

All unity on earth.

MACDUFF

O Scotland, Scotland!

MALCOLM

If such a one be fit to govern, speak:

I am as I have spoken.

MACDUFF

Fit to govern!

No, not to live. O nation miserable,

With an untitled tyrant bloody-scepter'd,

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 banish'd me from Scotland. O my breast,

Thy hope ends here!

MALCOLM

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,

Already at a point, was setting forth.

Now we'll together; and the chance of goodness

Be like our warranted quarrel! Why are you silent?

MACDUFF

Such welcome and unwelcome things at once

'Tis hard to reconcile.

Shakespeare, William, Macbeth, Act 4, Scene 3, 1-140