Knocking within

Knock, knock! Who's there, in the other devil's
name? Faith, here's an equivocator, that could
swear in both the scales against either scale;
who committed treason enough for God's sake,
yet could not equivocate to heaven: O, come
in, equivocator.

Knocking within

Knock, knock, knock! Who's there? Faith, here's an
English tailor come hither, for stealing out of
a French hose: come in, tailor; here you may
roast your goose.

Knocking within

Knock, knock; never at quiet! What are you? But
this place is too cold for hell. I'll devil-porter
it no further: I had thought to have let in
some of all professions that go the primrose
way to the everlasting bonfire.

Knocking within

Anon, anon! I pray you, remember the porter.
Opens the gate

Notes and Glossary
Act 2 Scene 3 This scene is connected even more closely with the previous one by the continued knocking, which becomes louder as we move into the open air and the knockers become more impatient. The Porter, like other characters in the play, suggests, by an ironic play on words, the universal significance of the action. Although the Porter does provide some 'comic relief' , this is not his only function. Equivocation is at the heart of the plays evil: the witches equivocate with Macbeth in order to destroy him with half-truths, and Macbeth equivocates with his conscience in order to bring himself to commit murder. But the Porter is there to remind us that the equivocator could not 'equivocate to heaven'. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 702 Old. Here, and elsewhere, used to express 'abundant,' or 'excessive' work. This short scene of the Porter has traditionally been strongly denounced; some critics going so far as to affirm that it is not Shakespeare's writing. Yet there are many grounds for believing it to have been not only his composition, but his maturedly considered introduction at this point of the tragedy. In the first place, it serves to lengthen out dramatic time; and, in the second place, its repulsively coarse humour serves powerfully to contrast, yet harmonise, with the base and gory crime that has been perpetrated. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 703 Knock, knock, knock! Who's there. ...He is amusing himself by grotesquely fulfilling the office he has supposed, as "porter of hell-gate". He imagines, in turn, three candidates for admittance there, the "farmer," the "equivocator," and the "tailor." ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 704 Here's a farmer. ..This seems to have been a jocular accusation against greed -a farmer grain-hoarding; for in Hall's "Satires" (1597-8) we find: "Each muckworme will be rich with lawless gaine, Altho' he smother up mowes of seven yeares graine, And hang'd himselfe when come grows cheap agame." ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 705 Come in time. Equivalent to Shakespeare's expression, "Come apace, " and to the phrase 'Come early, come early!' ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 707 Equivocator. A popular consociation of " Jesuit" and "equivocator", in that they allude to the notorious trial, in 1606, of Jesuit Father Garnet for his involvement the treasonous Gunpowder Plot. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 710 An English tailor come hither, for stealing out of a French hose. Meaning, so dexterous a rogue that he could contrive to steal surplus cloth from French attire, which rather baggy in fashion. See Act I "Merchant of Venice." and Act iii "Henry V." ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 719 The second cock. 'The second cock-crowing.' This seems to have been a familiar expression for an early hour in the morning; and by the passage referred to in Act iv "Romeo and Juliet" it is defined to be about 'three-o-clock. ' Shakespeare also uses the term "the first cock" in "First Part Henry IV" Act ii sc.1. and in "Lear" Act iii, sc 4; signifying the earliest hour of morning. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 722 Nose-painting. It reddens the nose. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 731 To cast him. Here there is a play upon the word "cast" in its senses of' reject after swallowing,' 'throw up' and 'throw, as in wrestling.' See Act ii "Tempest."# ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 739 Timely. Early. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 740 Slipped the hour. Missed the time. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 747 Tis my limited service. "Limited" is here used for 'appointed.' ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 749 Did appoint so. The change to the past-tense is significant. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 755 The obscure bird. 'The owl. ' Lady Macbeth has twice during the night adverted to its continuous cry; "It was the owl that shrieked" and "I heard the owl scream. " The elemental terror and portentous signs which accompanied a regicidal act similar to Macbeth's midnight murder of Duncan, are recorded by Holinshed; but the adoption and appropriation of the historian's record to suit the purposes of his tragedy were thus judiciously made by the dramatist. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 757 Feverous. ..shake. A common explanation of earthquakes at the time. The metaphor links the natural world with human disorders. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 763 Cannot conceive nor name thee. A double negative, used to give additional force of denial. See Act ii "Henry VIII.2 ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 765 Confusion. Chaos, utter ruin. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 766 Sacrilegious. ..temple. The 'Lord's' anointed temple is Duncan's body, anointed with oil at his coronation. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 772 A new Gorgon. The Gorgons were three sisters -Stheno, Euryale, and Medusa -so horrific in appearance that they turned to stone all who gazed upon them. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 777 Death's counterfeit. Sleep imitates death. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 779 The great doom's image. ' A foreshadowing of the horrors of doomsday.' [Bell rings]. The heavy alarm bell of the castle, which would toll confusedly,adding to the turmoil. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 783 Parley. Discussion between two opposing forces in a battle. For Macbeth the bell sounds like a trumpet summoning a parley. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 787 Repetition. Recital. ACT 2 Scene 3Line 792 What. ..house? .A difficult line for an actress; is it inept or cunning? ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 793 Too. ..anywhere. Is this a rebuke? ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 796 Chance. Unexpected misfortune. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 798 Mortality .Mortal life. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 799 Toys. Triviality. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 800 Lees. Dregs. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 812 They. ..distracted. Perhaps the after-effects of Lady Macbeth's drug. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 816 Wherefore. ..so? Is he suspicious? ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 819 Expedition. Haste, impetuousity . ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 820 Pauser. That which makes one pause and trunk. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 822 Breach in nature. As if nature itself had been wounded by the death of the King. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 825 Unmannerly breeched. Indecently clothed. ACT 2 Scene3 Line 828 Help me hence. Her fainting may be genuine, or feigned to cause a diversion because she fears that her husband is being carried away and is overplaying his part. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 835 Our tears are not yet brew'd. A contemptuous allusion to the feigned lamentation of the host and hostess, which the young princes evidently see through. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 839 And when we have, etc. ' And when we have fully clothed our half-dressed bodies, that risk danger to health by exposure to the open air.' This serves well to denote the hasty summons they have had by the ringing of the alarm bell, and to indicate the keen northern atmosphere of the castle courtyard, where the scene occurs. The words put into the Porter's mouth have already drawn attention to the same point: "This place is too cold." By such indirect touches as these the dramatist constantly manages to keep the spectator in mind of the localities of the action ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 844 Pretence. 'Intention, , 'design, , 'purpose.' ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 848 Briefly. Quickly. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 851 Consort. Mix. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 852 Office. Duty ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 856 The near in blood, the nearer bloody. Donalbain shows by this that he suspects Macbeth, who was next of kin to Duncan and his two sons. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 858 This murderous shaft that's shot hath not yet lighted. Meaning that it has not yet fallen upon all against whom it is directed. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 861 Dainty. Particular about manners. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 862 Shift. Slip. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 862 Warrant. Justification. ACT 2 Scene 3 Line 862 This scene rounds off the first part of the play by filling in the plot and making explicit the most important characteristic of the murder, its unnaturalness. Many of the unnatural events referred to -and perhaps the storm described in II.III -are taken from Holinshed's account of the murder of King Duff.

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LENNOX
The night has been unruly: where we lay,
Our chimneys were blown down; and, as they say,
Lamentings heard i' the air; strange screams of death,
And prophesying with accents terrible
Of dire combustion and confused events
New hatch'd to the woeful time: the obscure bird
Clamour'd the livelong night: some say, the earth
Was feverous and did shake.

MACBETH
'Twas a rough night.

LENNOX
My young remembrance cannot parallel
A fellow to it.

Re-enter MACDUFF

MACDUFF
O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart
Cannot conceive nor name thee!

MACBETH

LENNOX
What's the matter.

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MACDUFF
Your royal father 's murder'd.

MALCOLM
O, by whom?

LENNOX
Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done 't:
Their hands and faces were an badged with blood;
So were their daggers, which unwiped we found
Upon their pillows:
They stared, and were distracted; no man's life
Was to be trusted with them.

MACBETH
O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
That I did kill them.

MACDUFF
Wherefore did you so?

MACBETH
Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,
Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:
The expedition my violent love
Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin laced with his golden blood;
And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature
For ruin's wasteful entrance: there, the murderers,
Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers
Unmannerly breech'd with gore: who could refrain,
That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make 's love known?

LADY MACBETH
Help me hence, ho!

MACDUFF
Look to the lady.

MALCOLM

Aside to DONALBAIN

Why do we hold our tongues,
That most may claim this argument for ours?

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MACDUFF
And so do I.

ALL
So all.

MACBETH
Let's briefly put on manly readiness,
And meet i' the hall together.

ALL
Well contented.

Exeunt all but Malcolm and Donalbain

MALCOLM
What will you do? Let's not consort with them:
To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.

DONALBAIN
To Ireland, I; our separated fortune
Shall keep us both the safer: where we are,
There's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood,
The nearer bloody.

MALCOLM
This murderous shaft that's shot
Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way
Is to avoid the aim. Therefore, to horse;
And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
But shift away: there's warrant in that theft
Which steals itself, when there's no mercy left.

Exuent

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