Table of Contents
ACT 1, SCENE 4
Setting: Forres. The palace.
Flourish. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, LENNOX, and Attendants.
| DUNCAN | Is execution done on Cawdor? Are not | |
| Those in commission yet return'd? | ||
| MALCOLM | My liege, | |
| They are not yet come back. But I have spoke | ||
| With one that saw him die: who did report | ||
| That very frankly he confess'd his treasons, | ||
| Implored your highness' pardon and set forth | ||
| A deep repentance: nothing in his life | ||
| Became him like the leaving it; he died | ||
| As one that had been studied in his death | ||
| To throw away the dearest thing he owed, | 10 | |
| As 'twere a careless trifle. | ||
| DUNCAN | There's no art | |
| To find the mind's construction in the face: | ||
| He was a gentleman on whom I built | ||
| An absolute trust. | ||
| Enter MACBETH, BANQUO, ROSS, and ANGUS. | ||
| O worthiest cousin! | ||
| The sin of my ingratitude even now | ||
| Was heavy on me: thou art so far before | ||
| That swiftest wing of recompense is slow | ||
| To overtake thee. Would thou hadst less deserved, | ||
| That the proportion both of thanks and payment | ||
| Might have been mine! Only I have left to say, | 20 | |
| More is thy due than more than all can pay. | ||
| MACBETH | The service and the loyalty I owe, | |
| In doing it, pays itself. Your highness' part | ||
| Is to receive our duties; and our duties | ||
| Are to your throne and state children and servants, | ||
| Which do but what they should, by doing every thing | ||
| Safe toward your love and honour. | ||
| DUNCAN | Welcome hither: | |
| I have begun to plant thee, and will labour | ||
| To make thee full of growing. Noble Banquo, | ||
| That hast no less deserved, nor must be known | 30 | |
| No less to have done so, let me enfold thee | ||
| And hold thee to my heart. | ||
| BANQUO | There if I grow, | |
| The harvest is your own. | ||
| DUNCAN | My plenteous joys, | |
| Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves | ||
| In drops of sorrow. Sons, kinsmen, thanes, | ||
| And you whose places are the nearest, know | ||
| We will establish our estate upon | ||
| Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter | ||
| The Prince of Cumberland; which honour must | ||
| Not unaccompanied invest him only, | 40 | |
| But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine | ||
| On all deservers. From hence to Inverness, | ||
| And bind us further to you. | ||
| MACBETH | The rest is labour, which is not used for you: | |
| I'll be myself the harbinger and make joyful | ||
| The hearing of my wife with your approach; | ||
| So humbly take my leave. | ||
| DUNCAN | My worthy Cawdor! | |
| MACBETH | Aside. | |
| The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step | ||
| On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap, | ||
| For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires; | 50 | |
| Let not light see my black and deep desires: | ||
| The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be, | ||
| Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see. | ||
| Exit | ||
| DUNCAN | True, worthy Banquo; he is full so valiant, | |
| And in his commendations I am fed; | ||
| It is a banquet to me. Let's after him, | ||
| Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome: | ||
| It is a peerless kinsman. | ||
| [Flourish. Exeunt.] | ||