Might yet enkindle you' unto the crown, And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, Win us with honest trifles, to betray us In deepest consequence. Cousins, a word, I pray you. MACB. Two truths are told, * Might yet enkindle you -] Enkindle, for to stimulate you to seek. WARBURTON. A similar expression occurs in As you like it, Act I. sc. i: "-nothing remains but that I kindle the boy thither." STEEVENS. Might fire you with the hope of obtaining the crown. HENLEY. * Two truths are told, &c.] How the former of these truths has been fulfilled, we are yet to learn. Macbeth could not become Thane of Glamis, till after his father's decease, of which there is no mention throughout the play. If the Hag only announced what Macbeth already understood to have happened, her words could scarcely claim rank as a prediction. STEEVENS. From the Scottish translation of Boethius it should seem that Sinel, the father of Macbeth, died after Macbeth's having been met by the weird sisters. "Makbeth (says the historian) revolvyng all thingis, as they wer said to be the weird sisteris, began to covat ye croun. And zit he concludit to abide, quhil he saw ye tyme ganand thereto; fermelie belevyng yt ye third weird suld cum as the first two did afore." This, indeed, is inconsistent with our author's words, "By Sinel's death, I know, I am thane of Glamis;"-but Holinshed, who was his guide, in his abridgment of the History of Boethius, has particularly mentioned that Sinel died before Macbeth met the weird sisters: we may, therefore, be sure that Shakspeare meant it to be understood that Macbeth had already acceded to his paternal title. Bellenden only says, "The first of them said to Macbeth, Hale thane of Glammis. The second said," &c. But in Holinshed the relation runs thus, conformably to the Latin original: "The first of them spake and said, All haile Mackbeth, thane of Glammis (for he had latelie entered into that dignitie and office 9 As happy prologues to the swelling act by the death of his father Sinell.) The second of them said," &c. Still, however, the objection made by Mr. Steevens remains in its full force; for since he knew that "by Sinel's death he was thane of Glamis," how can this salutation be considered as prophetic? Or why should he afterwards say, with admiration, "GLAMIS, and thane of Cawdor;" &c? Perhaps we may suppose that the father of Macbeth died so recently before his interview with the weirds, that the news of it had not yet got abroad; in which case, though Macbeth himself knew it, he might consider their giving him the title of Thane of Glamis as a proof of supernatural intelligence. I suspect our author was led to use the expressions which have occasioned the present note, by the following words of Holinshed: "The same night after, at supper, Banquo jested with him, and said, Now Mackbeth, thou hast obteined those things which the two former sisters PROPHESIED: there remaineth onelie for thee to purchase that which the third said should come to passe." MALONE. 9-swelling act-] Swelling is used in the same sense in the prologue to King Henry V: 66 princes to act, "And monarchs to behold the swelling scene." STEEVENS. This supernatural soliciting-] Soliciting for information. WARBURTON. Soliciting is rather, in my opinion, incitement, than information. JOHNSON. 2 suggestion-] i. e. temptation. So, in All's well that ends well: "A filthy officer he is in those suggestions for the young earl." STEEVENS. 3 Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair,] So Macbeth says, in the latter part of this play: And make my seated heart knock at my ribs, Are less than horrible imaginings : 5 My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, 6 Shakes so my single state of man, that function "And my fell of hair "Would, at a dismal treatise, rouse and stir, *-seated-] i. e. fixed, firmly placed. So, in Milton's Paradise Lost, B. VI. 643: 5 "From their foundations loos'ning to and fro Present fears Are less than horrible imaginings:] Present fears are fears of things present, which Macbeth declares, and every man has found, to be less than the imagination presents them while the objects are yet distant. JOHNSON. Thus, in All's well that ends well: " -when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear." Again, in The Tragedie of Cræsus, 1604, by Lord Sterline: "For as the shadow seems more monstrous still, " Than doth the substance whence it hath the being, " Seems greater than itself, whilst fears are lying." STEEVENS. By present fears is meant, the actual presence of any objects of terror. So, in The Second Part of King Henry IV. the King says: 66 All these bold fears "Thou see'st with peril I have answered." To fear is frequently used by Shakspeare in the sense of fright. In this very play, Lady Macbeth says "To alter favour ever is to fear." So, in Fletcher's Pilgrim, Curio says to Alphonso: " Mercy upon me, Sir, why are you feared thus?"be Meaning, thus affrighted. M. MASON. 6_single state of man,] The single state of man seems to be used by Shakspeare for an individual, in opposition to a commonwealth, or conjunct body. JOHNSON.C By single state of man, Shakspeare might possibly mean somewhat more than individuality. He who, in the peculiar VOL X. E Is smother'd in surmise; and nothing is, BAN. 6 Look, how our partner's rapt. MACB. If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me, Without my stir. BAN. New honours come upon him situation of Macbeth, is meditating a murder, dares not communicate his thoughts, and consequently derives neither spirit, nor advantage, from the countenance, or sagacity, of others. This state of man may properly be styled single, solitary, or defenceless, as it excludes the benefits of participation, and has no resources but in itself. It should be observed, however, that double and single anciently signified strong and weak, when applied to liquors, and perhaps to other objects. In this sense the former word may be employed by Brabantio: 66 a voice potential, "As double as the duke's;" and the latter, by the Chief Justice, speaking to Falstaff: " Is not your wit single?" The single state of Macbeth may therefore signify his weak and debile state of mind. STEEVENS. Is smother'd in surmise; and nothing is, But what is not.) All powers of action are oppressed and crushed by one overwhelming image in the mind, and nothing is present to me but that which is really future. Of things now about me I have no perception, being intent wholly on that which has yet no existence. Johnson. Surmise, is speculation, conjecture concerning the future. MALONE. Shakspeare has somewhat like this sentiment in The Merchant of Venice: " Where, every something being blent together, "Turns to a wild of nothing.” Again, in King Richard II: 66 is nought but shadows "Of what it is not." STEEVENS. Like our strange garments; cleave not to their mould, But with the aid of use. MACB. Come what come may; Time and the hour runs through the roughest day." BAN. Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.8 7 Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.] "By this, I confess I do not, with his two last commentators, imagine is meant either the tautology of time and the hour, or an allusion to time painted with an hour-glass, or an exhortation to time to hasten forward, but rather to say tempus et hora, time and occasion, will carry the thing through, and bring it to some determined point and end, let its nature be what it will." This note is taken from an Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakspeare, &c. by Mrs. Montagu. So, in the Lyfe of Saynt Radegunda, printed by Pynson, 4to. no date: "How they dispend the tyme, the day, the houre." Such tautology is common to Shakspeare. "The very head and front of my offending," is little less reprehensible. Time and the hour, is Time with his hours. STEEVENS. The same expression is used by a writer nearly contemporary with Shakspeare: "Neither can there be any thing in the world more acceptable to me than death, whose hower and time if they were as certayne," &c. Fenton's Tragical Discourses, 1579. Again, in Davison's Poems, 1621 : "Time's young howres attend her still." Again, in our author's 126th Sonnet: 8 "O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power MALONE. we stay upon your leisure.] The same phraseology occurs in the Paston Letters, Vol. III. p. 80: "-sent late to me a man ye which wuld abydin uppon my leysir," &c. E2 STEEVENS. |