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DIFFICULT POINTS AND PASSAGES OF
SHAKSPERE'S PLAYS.

No. IV.-MACBETH.

THE difficult passages in this play are comparatively but few in number. Our author in this sublime tragedy appears to be more than usually clear. It contains, however, a few passages on which it may be as well to remark, more especially as Dr. Johnson has, by his notes on this play, made many passages obscure which before were plain, and in endeavouring to unravel the knot, has only succeeded in drawing it tighter.

In Act I. Sc. 2, the following passage occurs :—

"If I say sooth, I must report they were

As cannons overcharged with double cracks;
So they

Doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe."

As Dr. Johnson justly observes, "cracks" is used here for "thunders," as in Act IV. Sc. 1, we find "the crack of doom," meaning the thunder of the last day. The passage signifies that Macbeth and Banquo fought so fiercely, that they appeared like cannons doubly charged; and the tautological expression "doubly redoubled," is used, by a Latin idiom, to express great force. So in Richard the Second, Act. I. Sc. 3, we find,

On this

"Be swift like lightning in the execution,
And at thy blows, doubly redoubled," &c.

passage

-"Nothing in his life

Became him like the leaving on't. He died
As one that had been studied in his death
To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
As 'twere a careless trifle,"

Dr. Johnson has the following extraordinary note.
66 As the
word 'owed' affords here no sense but such as is forced and un-
natural, it cannot be doubted that it was originally written, the
dearest thing he owned; ' a reading which required neither defence
nor explanation." Really I think if the Doctor had ever read

Shakspere through, he must have met with this word in this sense an hundred times. For a few examples, see this play, Act III. Sc. 4:

"You make me strange

E'en to the disposition that I owe.”

Also the Tempest, Act I. Sc. 2:

"This is no mortal business, nor no sound

That the world OWES."

Also the Comedy of Errors, Act III. Sc. 1 :

"What art thou that keep'st me out from the house I owe?"

Also Sonnet 18:

"Nor lose possession of that fair thou OWEST ;”

and a thousand examples, which would cost the reader more trouble to refer to than me to find.

In Act I. Sc. 5, we meet with that remarkable expression which has been received as unintelligible by some, and absurd by others; among which latter class we again encounter the erudite Doctor.

"That my keen knife see not the wound it makes;

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry, 'Hold! hold!'"

Upon this passage, Dr. Johnson, in the Rambler, No. 168, remarks thus:-"Lady Macbeth proceeds to wish, in the madness of guilt, that the inspection of Heaven may be intercepted, and that she may, in the involutions of infernal darkness, escape the eye of Providence. This is the utmost extravagance of determined wickedness; yet this is so debased by two unfortunate words, that, while I endeavour to impress on my reader the energy of the sentiment, I can scarce check my risibility, when the expression forces itself on my mind; for who, without some relaxation of his gravity, can hear of the avengers of guilt peeping through a blanket?" And Mr. Beckett, in his "Shakspere's Himself Again," says, "To make Heaven peep through a blanket, is, to say as little as possible in its disfavour, highly ridiculous." However, let us see what the result of a patient investigation of the passage will be. When Shakspere speaks of "the blanket of the dark," he evidently alludes to the curtain of a theatre, which was for the purpose of concealing the performers from the audience before and after the performance of the play. And as Lady Macbeth is about to do that which she would not have to be seen, she invokes the Night

to spread a blanket, or curtain, between her and heaven. There is in the latter part of this passage, an allusion, as Mr. Tollett informs us, to an old military custom, which inflicted death on any man, "whosoever shall strike stroke at his adversary, either in the heat, or otherwise, if a third do cry 'Hold!' to the intent to part them, except that they did fight in a combat in a place enclosed; and then no man shall be so hardy as to bid hold but the general." The soliloquy, Act I. Sc. 7, requires a little explanation.

"If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well.

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."

That is, "If it" (viz. the gaining of the crown) "were done," (completed) "when 'tis done," (when the murder is performed) "then 'twere well." "It were done quickly if the assassination could at once catch success upon Duncan's surcease-so that this single blow might be all that could happen here so that I should have nothing to do but to stab him and be king.-As to a future,-I would put that out of the question."

Dr. Johnson has a very ridiculous note on "Tarquin's ravishing strides." He seems to think that a "ravishing stride" "expresses great violence. Macbeth, however, compares the "stealthy pace" with which Murder creeps towards his design, with the strides taken by Tarquin on his way to the chamber of Lucrece. How Tarquin crept we find from our author himself:

"Away he steals with open, listening ear,

Full of foul hope, and full of fond mistrust."

Rape of Lucrece. (Stanza 41.)

Johnson also believes the conclusion of this soliloquy to be, if not wholly unintelligible, at least obscure. I confess I do not perceive anything unintelligible in the passage.

"Thou sure and firmset 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,

That now suits with it."

The meaning is this. He cries out to the earth not to hear him,

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lest the very stones should speak, as he afterwards says in Act III. Sc. 4:

"Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak."

The meaning of taking "the present horror from the time" is evident. If the stones were to speak, the silence, which, to the mind of the regicide, was a "present horror," and which is a fit accompaniment to the time, which may either signify the hour, or the time of the murder, would be broken.

It may be well to correct an error which I have found to be very common, that of supposing that the two who cried "God bless us," and " Amen," were the two grooms who slept in the king's apartment. This is not the case. These two were Malcolm and Donalbain, as is evident from the following conversation:

"MACB. Hark! who lies i'the second chamber?
"LADY M.

Donalbain.

"MACB. This is a sorry sight.

"LADY M. A foolish thought to say a sorry sight.

"MACB. There's one did laugh in his sleep, and one cried Murder,'

That they did wake each other. I stood and heard them;

But they did say their prayers and addressed them

Again to sleep.

"LADY M.

There are two lodged together.

"MACB. One cried 'God bless us,' and 'Amen' the other,

As they had seen me with these hangman's hands.

Listening their fear I could not say 'Amen,'

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These could not have been the grooms. Lady Macbeth had so "drugged their possets," that they were nearly dead. When Lady Macbeth has said that Donalbain sleeps in the second chamber, Macbeth proceeds to tell how he heard two voices. She says then that there were 66 two lodged together." These two we find were Malcolm and Donalbain; for when the whole is roused by the cries of Macduff, we find these two entering together from the same chamber. Moreover it is probable that their proximity to the king on the night of his murder, as well as their sudden flight, gave license for suspecting them of the regicide.

In Act III. Sc. 2, the following passage occurs:—

"Come, seeling Night,

Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day;
And, with thy bloody and invisible hand,
Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond
Which keeps me pale."

This passage has been much commented upon, but, to my thinking it is not difficult. "Seeling" is a term used in falconry; the eyes of the wild hawk are for a time closed, or, as the technical term is, "seeled." (See Johnson's Dictionary.) From the words "tender eye," and "scarf-up," I am inclined to believe that Shakspere, who often runs from one metaphor to another, alludes to the bandaging up of an eye, for the purpose of blinding it. The latter part of this passage needs no explanation-" the great bond which keeps me pale" is, of course, the life of Banquo.

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"His flight was madness. When our actions do not,

Our fears do make us traitors."-ACT IV, Scene 2.

Lady Macduff evidently alludes here to the flight of Malcolm, and Donalbain, and supposes that her husband's flight will be construed in the same way.

"He has no children!"-ACT IV. Scene 3.

This has been much disputed. Some assert that "he" refers to Macbeth; and means either, " IIe, having no children for me to kill, I cannot adequately revenge my own;" or, "Had he been a father, he could never have robbed a father of his children." It however refers to Malcolm, and means-" He has no children, or he would not think that a grief like mine can be cured by revenge." "Bring me no more reports Let them fly all;

Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,

I cannot taint with fear."-ACT v. Scene 3.

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The "reports" are evidently those of the "minutely revolts mentioned in the preceding scene; and the force of the passage is, "Tell me no more of their revolting; even if they all fly, I cannot fear till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane;" a speech highly characteristic of Macbeth, and exhibiting in a strong light his reliance on supernatural protection, when every hope is going from him.

Dr. Johnson, in commenting on that beautiful passage,

"my way of life

Is fallen into the sear and yellow leaf,"

says: "As there is no relation between the " 'way of life" and "fallen into the sear," I am inclined to think that the W is only an M inverted, and that it was originally written, "my May of life." What does the Doctor mean by there being no relation between the two expressions? He evidently does not understand the metaphor. Macbeth is not comparing himself to a tree, which the autumn has

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