Macbeth: Time, Language, Equivocation and the ‘juggling of the fiend’ that ‘lies like truth’

If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well If it were done quickly. If the assassination Could trammel up the consequence, and catch With his surcease success – that but this blow Might be the be-all and the end-all! – here, But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, We’d jump the life to come. But in these cases We still have judgement here – that we but teach Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return To plague the inventor. This even-handed justice Commends the ingredience of our poisoned chalice To our own lips. He’s here in double trust … (1.7.1-12)

Doctor: You see her eyes are open. Gentlewoman: Ay, but their sense are shut. Doctor: What is it she does now. Look how she rubs her hands. Gentlewoman: 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 Macbeth: Yet here’s a spot. Doctor: Hark! She speaks. I will set down what comes from her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly. Lady Macbeth: Out, damned spot! Out I say! – One, two: why then, ’tis time to do it. 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 accompt? Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him? Doctor: Do you mark that? Lady Macbeth: The Thane of Fife had a wife; where is she now? – What, will these hands n’er be clean? – No more o’that, my lord, no more o’that. You mar all with this starting. Doctor: Go to, go to: you have known what you should not. Gentlewoman: She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that. Heaven knows what she has known. Lady Macbeth: Here’s the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh! … Wash your hands; put on your nightgown; look not so pale. I tell you again Banquo’s buried. He cannot come out on’s grave…. To bed, to bed! There’s knocking at the gate. Come, come, come come, give me your hand. What’s done cannot be undone. To bed, to bed, to bed. (5.1.25-64)

Weird Sisters: Fair is foul, and foul is fair (1.1.9). Duncan: Is execution done on Cawdor?... There’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face. He was a gentleman on whom I built An absolute trust (1.4.1, 12-14). Banquo: This guest of summer, The temple-haunting martlet, does approve By his loved mansionry that the heaven’s breath Smells wooingly here… Where they most breed and haunt I have observed The air is delicate (1.6.3-10). Macduff: I am not treacherous. Malcolm: But Macbeth is… …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 (4.3.18-24)

Captain: … The merciless Macdonwald – Worthy to be a rebel, for to that The multiplying villainies of nature Do swarm upon him – from the Western isles Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied… (1.2.9-13).

Macbeth: My dearest love, Duncan comes here tonight. Lady Macbeth: And when goes hence? Macbeth: Tomorrow, as he purposes. Lady Macbeth: O never Shall sun that morrow see! (1.5.56-59) * * * * * Macbeth: I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise? Lady Macbeth: I heard the owl-scream and the cricket’s cry. Did you not speak? Macbeth: When? Lady Macbeth: Now. Macbeth: As I descended? Lady Macbeth: Ay. Macbeth: Hark! (2.2.14-17)

Lady Macbeth: Say to the king I would attend his leisure For a few words… How now, my lord, why do you keep alone? …You must leave this. Macbeth: O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife! Thou know’st that Banquo and his Fleance lives. Lady Macbeth: But in them nature’s copy’s not eterne. Macbeth: There’s comfort yet. They are assailable…[tonight] there shall be done A deed of dreadful note. Lady Macbeth: What’s do be done? Macbeth: Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck, Till thou applaud the deed… Thou marvell’st at my words, but hold thee still. Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill. So, prithee, go with me (3.2.

Macbeth: … I am in blood Stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more, Returning were as tedious as go o’er. Strange things I have in head, that will to hand; Which must be acted ere they may be scanned. Lady Macbeth: You lack the season of all natures, sleep. Macbeth: Come, we’ll to sleep. My strange and self-abuse Is the initiate fear that wants hard use. We are yet but young in deed (3.4.135-144)

Messenger: The queen, my lord, is dead. Macbeth: She should have died hereafter. There would have been a time for such a word – Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing (5.5.15-28).

Macbeth: I bear a charmèd life which must not yield To one of woman born. Macduff: Despair thy charm, And let the angel whom thou still hast served Tell thee Macduff was from his mother’s womb Untimely ripped. Macbeth: Accursèd be that tongue that tells me so; For it hath cowed my better part of man; And be these juggling fiends no more believed That palter with us in a double sense, That keep the word of promise to our ear And break it to our hope (5.6.51-61).

Banquo: How goes the night, boy? … There’s husbandry in heaven: Their candles are all out… A heavy summons lies like lead upon me And yet I would not sleep. Merciful powers Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature Gives way to in repose (2.1.1-9). * * * * * * Ross: Your castle is surprised, your wife and babes Savagely slaughtered… Macduff: My children too? … My wife killed too? … He has no children. All my pretty ones? Did you say all? O hell-kite! All? What, all my pretty chickens And their dam at one fell swoop? … Did heaven look on And would not take their part? (4.3.204 – 223).