But treasons capital, confessed, and proved

Have overthrown him.

MACBETH (aside)

Glamis, and Thane of Cawdor.

The greatest is behind. (To Ross and Angus) Thanks for

your pains.

(To Banquo) Do you not hope your children shall be kings

When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me

Promised no less to them?

BANQUO

That, trusted home,

Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,

Besides the thane of Cawdor. But ’tis strange,

And oftentimes to win us to our harm

The instruments of darkness tell us truths,

Win us with honest trifles to betray’s

In deepest consequence.

(To Ross and Angus) Cousins, a word, I pray you.

MACBETH (aside) Two truths are told

As happy prologues to the swelling act

Of the imperial theme. (To Ross and Angus) I thank

you, gentlemen.

(Aside) This supernatural soliciting

Cannot be ill, cannot be good. If ill,

Why hath it given me earnest of success

Commencing in a truth? I am Thane of Cawdor.

If good, why do I yield to that suggestion

Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair

And make my seated heart knock at my ribs

Against the use of nature? Present fears

Are less than horrible imaginings.

My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,

Shakes so my single state of man that function

Is smothered in surmise, and nothing is

But what is not.

BANQUO (to Ross and Angus)

Look how our partner’s rapt.

MACBETH(aside)

If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown

me

Without my stir.

BANQUO (to Ross and Angus)

New honours come upon him,

Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould

But with the aid of use.

MACBETH (aside)

Come what come may,

Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

BANQUO

Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.

MACBETH

Give me your favour. My dull brain was wrought

With things forgotten. (To Ross and Angus) Kind

gentlemen, your pains

Are registered where every day I turn

The leaf to read them. Let us toward the King.

(Aside to Banquo) Think upon what hath chanced, and

at more time,

The interim having weighed it, let us speak

Our free hearts each to other.

BANQUO Very gladly.

MACBETH

Till then, enough. (To Ross and Angus) Come, friends.

Exeunt

1.4 Flourish. Enter King Duncan, Lennox, Malcolm, Donalbain, and attendants

KING DUNCAN

Is execution done on Cawdor? Are not

Those in commission yet returned?

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 confessed 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

As ’twere a careless trifle.

KING 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

(To Macbeth) 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,

‘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 everything

Safe toward your love and honour.

KING DUNCAN

Welcome hither.

I have begun to plant thee, and will labour

To make thee full of growing.—NoHe Banquo,

That hast no less deserved, nor must be known

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.

KING DUNCAN

My plenteous joys,

Wanton in fullness, 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,

But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine

On all deservers. (To Macbeth) 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.

KING DUNCAN

My worthy Cawdor.

MACBETH (aside)

The Prince of Cumberland—that is a step