Yet grace must still look so.

Macd.

I have lost my hopes.

Mal. 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.

Macd.

Bleed, bleed, poor country!

Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dares not check 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.

Mal.

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.

Macd.

What should he be?

The title is AFFEER'D!] The old copies spell the law term, "affecr'd," affeared. To affeer, in the proceedings of manor courts, is to confirm; and the meaning of the whole passage is,-"Great tyranny, be thou confident, for goodness dares not oppose thee: do what wrong thou wilt; thy title is confirmed.” Perhaps we ought also to read Thy for "The."

Mal. 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 compar'd

With my confineless harms.

Macd.

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn'd

In evils to top Macbeth.

Mal.

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'er-bear,
That did oppose my will.

Than such a one to reign.

Macd.

Better Macbeth,

Boundless intemperance

In nature is a tyranny: it hath been
Th' 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 inclin'd.

Mal.

With this, there grows

In my most ill-compos'd 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.

Macd.

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.

Mal. 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.

Macd.

O Scotland, Scotland!

Mal. If such a one be fit to govern, speak: I am as I have spoken.

Macd.

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 accurs'd,

And does blaspheme his breed?—Thy royal father Was a most sainted king: the queen, that bore thee, Oft'ner upon her knees than on her feet,

Died every day she lived. Fare thee well.

9 Than SUMMER-SEEMING lust ;] i. e. probably, "summer-beseeming." Warburton proposed to read, "summer-teeming;" but the change seems unnecessary. Blackstone recommended " summer-seeding," and Steevens took " summerseeming lust" to mean, "lust that seems as hot as summer."

1 Scotland hath FOISONS—] i. e. Plenty. It is generally used in the singular. We have had "teeming foison," Vol. ii. p. 21.

These evils thou repeat'st upon thyself

Have banish'd me from Scotland.-O, my breast!

Thy hope ends here.

Mal.

Macduff, this noble passion,

Child of integrity, hath from my soul

Wip'd the black scruples, reconcil'd 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?
Macd. Such welcome and unwelcome things at once,
"Tis hard to reconcile.

Enter a Doctor.

Mal. Well; more anon.-Comes the king forth, I pray you?

Doct. Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched souls, That stay his cure: their malady convinces

2 their malady CONVINCES] i. e. overcomes. See Vol. ii. p. 377. To "convince" is sometimes to convict. See Vol. vi. p. 49.

The great assay of art; but at his touch,
Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand,
They presently amend.

Mal.

I thank you, doctor.

Macd. What's the disease he means?
Mal.

[Exit Doctor.

"Tis call'd the evil?:

A most miraculous work in this good king,
Which often, since my here remain in England,
I have seen him do. How he solicits heaven,
Himself best knows; but strangely-visited people,
All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery, he cures;
Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,
Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken,
To the succeeding royalty he leaves

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,
He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy,

And sundry blessings hang about his throne,

That speak him full of grace.

Macd.

Enter ROSSE.

See, who comes here?

Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not. Macd. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither. Mal. I know him now. Good God, betimes remove The means that make us strangers!

Rosse.

Sir, amen.

Macd. Stands Scotland where it did?
Rosse.

Alas, poor country!

Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
Be call'd our mother, but our grave; where nothing,

3 'Tis call'd the evil;] It is said that Edward the Confessor was the first who touched for the cure of the king's evil, and the power was supposed to descend with the crown. It is certain that Elizabeth and James exercised it, especially the latter; in compliment to whom Shakespeare seems to have inserted this part of the scene, not necessary to the action of the tragedy.