Macbeth quotes

What are
these,

So withered
and so wild in their attire,

That look
not like th’inhabitants o’th’earth

And yet are
on’t? Live you? Or are you aught

That man
may question? (1.3.39-43)

You seem to understand me; / By each at once her choppy finger laying / Upon her skinny lips.'You should be women, / And yet your
beards forbid me to interpret / That you are so.” (1.3.45-47)

“They met
me in the day of success; and I have learned by the perfect’st report they

have more
in them than mortal knowledge. When I burnt in desire to question them

further,
they made themselves air, into which they vanished….

…This
have I thought good to deliver to thee,
my dearest partner of greatness,

that thou
mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing by being ignorant of what greatness

is promised thee. Lay it to thy heart, and
farewell.”

Glamis thou
art, and Cawdor and shalt be

What thou art promised. Yet do I fear thy
nature;

It is too
full o’th’milk of human kindness

To catch
the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great,

Art not
without ambition, but without

The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst
highly,

That
wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false,

And yet
wouldst wrongly win. Thou’dst have, great Glamis,

That which cries
“Thus thou must do,” if thou have it,

And that which rather thou dost fear to do

Than
wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither,

That I may
pour my spirits in thine ear

And
chastise with the valor of my tongue

All that impedes thee from the golden round

Which fate
and metaphysical aid doth seem

To have
thee crowned withal.

The raven
himself is hoarse

That croaks
the fatal entrance of Duncan

Under my
battlements. Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here

And fill me
from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst
cruelty! Make thick my blood;

Stop up
th’access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my
fell purpose, nor keep peace between

Th’effect
and it! Come to my woman’s breast

And take my
milk for gall, you murd’ring ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on
nature’s mischief! Come thick night,

And pall
thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my
keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven
peep through the blanket of the dark

To cry
“Hold, hold!”

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

If it were
done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well

It were
done quickly. If th’assassination

Could
trammel up the consequences, 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. But in these cases

We still
have judgement here, that we but teach

Bloody
instructions, which, being taught, return

To plague th’inventor. This evenhanded justice

Commends
th’ingredience of our poisoned chalice

To our own
lips. He’s here in double trust:

First as I
am his kinsman and his subject,

Strong both
against the deed; then, as his host,

Who should
against his murderer shut the door,

Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan

Hath borne
his faculties so meek, hath been

So clear in
his great office, that his virtues

Will plead
like angels, trumpet-tongued, against

The deep damnation
of his taking-off;

And Pity,
like a naked newborn babe

Striding
the blast, or heaven’s cherubin, horsed

Upon the
sightless couriers of the air,

Shall blow
the horrid deed in every eye,

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur

To prick
the sides of my intent, but only

Vaulting
ambition, which o’erleaps itself

And falls
on th’other---

“Dispute it
like a man” (221)

“I shall do
so;

But I must
also feel it as a man” (222-23)

“Art thou afeard

To be the
same in thine own act and valor

As thou art
in desire?” (1.7.40-42)

“What beast
was’t, then,

That made
you break this enterprise to me?” (1.7.48-49)

“And to be
more than what you were, you would

Be so much
more the man”

“I dare do
all that may become a man;

Who dares
do more is none” (1.7.46-47)

Your son,
my lord, has paid a soldier’s debt.

He only
lived but till he was a man,

The which
no sooner had his prowess confirmed

In the
unshrinking station where he fought,

But like a
man he died. (5.8.39-43)

Had he his
hurts before? (5.3.46)

He’s worth
more sorrow,

And that
I’ll spend for him

He’s worth
no more.

They say he
parted well and paid his score,

And so, God
be with him! (5.3.
50-53)

Bring me no
more reports; let them fly all. 


Till Birnam
wood remove to Dunsinane,

I cannot
taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm? 


Was he not
born of woman? The spirits that know

All mortal
consequences have pronounced me thus: 


"Fear
not, Macbeth; no man that's born of woman

Shall e'er
have power upon thee." Then fly, false thanes,

And mingle
with the English epicures!

The mind I
sway by and the heart I bear 


Shall never
sag with doubt nor shake with fear. (5.3.1-10)

Not so
sick, my lord,

As she is
troubled with thick coming fancies,

That keep
her from her rest.

Cure her of that.

Canst thou
not minister to a mind diseased,

Pluck from
the memory a rooted sorrow,

Raze out
the written troubles of the brain

And with
some sweet oblivious antidote

Cleanse the
stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff

Which
weighs upon the heart?

“Out,
damned spot! Out, I say!” (5.1.34)

“The Thane
of Fife had a wife. Where is she now?--What, will these hands ne’er be clean?
(5.1.41-42)

“Here’s the
smell of blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
hand. Oh, oh, oh!” (5.1.49-51)

“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood

Clean from
my hand? No, this my hand will rather

The multitudinous
seas incarnadine,

Making the
green one red.” (2.2.64-67)

“My hands are of your color, but I
shame

To wear a
heart so white.” (2.2.68-69)

“A little
water clears us of this deed.

How easy is
it, then! (2.2.71-72)

It is the
cry of women, my good lord

I have
almost forgot the taste of fears;

The time
has been, my senses would have cool'd

To hear a
night-shriek; and my fell of hair

Would at a
dismal treatise rouse and stir

As life
were in't: I have supp'd full with horrors;

Direness,
familiar to my slaughterous thoughts

Cannot once
start me.

She should
have died hereafter;

There would
have been a time for such a word.

To-morrow,
and to-morrow, and to-morrow,

Creeps in
this petty pace from day to day

To the last
syllable of recorded time,

And all our
yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to
dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life's but a
walking shadow, a poor player

That struts
and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is
heard no more: it is a tale

Told by an
idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying
nothing.