Macbeth (AQA GCSE English Literature): Exam Questions

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 valour of my tongue

All that impedes thee from the golden round,

Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem

To have thee crowned withal.

BANQUO

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. –

Cousins, a word, I pray you.

MACBETH [Aside]

Two truths are told,

As happy prologues to the swelling act

Of the imperial theme. – I thank you, gentlemen. –

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.

CAPTAIN

                                              Doubtful it stood,
As two spent swimmers that do cling together
And choke their art. The merciless Macdonald –
Worthy to be a rebel, for to that

The multiplying villainies of nature

Do swarm upon him – from the Western Isles

Of kerns and galloglasses is supplied,

And Fortune on his damnèd quarrel smiling,

Showed like a rebel’s whore. But all’s too weak,

For brave Macbeth – well he deserves that name –

Disdaining Fortune, with his brandished steel,

Which smoked with bloody execution,

Like Valour’s minion carved out his passage

Till he faced the slave,

Which ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,

Till he unseamed him from the nave to th’chaps

And fixed his head upon our battlements.

LADY MACBETH Out, damned spot! Out, I say! One, two. Why

then, 'tis time to do't. Hell is murky. Fie, my lord, fie, a soldier,

and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can 

call our power to account? Yet who would have thought the old Man to have had so much blood in him.

DOCTOR Do you mark that?

LADY MACBETH The thane of Fife had a wife. Where is she now? What, will these hands ne'er be clean? No more o' that,  my lord, no more o' that. You mar all with this starting.

DOCTOR Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.

GENTLEWOMAN She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of That. Heaven knows what she has known.

LADY MACBETH Here's the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. O, O, O. 

DOCTOR What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.

GENTLEWOMAN I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the dignity of the whole body.

DOCTOR Well, well, well,--

GENTLEWOMAN Pray God it be, sir.

DOCTOR This disease is beyond my practise: yet I have known

those which have walked in their sleep who have died holily in 

their beds.

LADY MACBETH Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look not so Pale. I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried; he cannot come out on's grave.

DOCTOR Even so?

LADY MACBETH To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come, come, come, come, give me your hand; what's done cannot be undone. To bed, to bed, to bed. 

MACBETH Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘Sleep no more:

Macbeth does murder sleep’, the innocent sleep,

Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care,

The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath,

Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,

Chief nourisher in life’s feast.

LADY MACBETH What do you mean?

MACBETH Still it cried, ‘Sleep no more’ to all the house;

‘Glamis hath murdered sleep’, and therefore Cawdor

Shall sleep no more: Macbeth shall sleep no more.

LADY MACBETH Who was it, that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,

You do unbend your noble strength to think

So brain-sickly of things. Go get some water

And wash this filthy witness from your hand.

Why did you bring these daggers from the place?

They must lie there. Go carry them and smear

The sleepy grooms with blood.

MACBETH I’ll go no more.

I am afraid to think what I have done;

Look on’t again, I dare not.

LADY MACBETH Infirm of purpose!

Give me the daggers. The sleeping and the dead

Are but as pictures; ’tis the eye of childhood

That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,

I’ll gild the faces of the grooms withal,

For it must seem their guilt.

MACBETH 

                                    To be thus is nothing,

But to be safely thus. Our fears in Banquo

Stick deep; and in his royalty of nature

Reigns that which would be feared. ‘Tis much he dares,

And to that dauntless temper of his mind,

He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour

To act in safety. There is none but he,

Whose being I do fear; and under him,

My Genius is rebuked; as it is said,

Mark Antony's was by Caesar. He chid the sisters

When first they put the name of king upon me

And bade them speak to him. Then prophet-like,

They hail'd him father to a line of kings. 

Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown

And put a barren sceptre in my gripe,

Thence to be wrench'd with an unlineal hand,

No son of mine succeeding. If 't be so,

For Banquo's issue have I filed my mind;

For them the gracious Duncan have I murdered, 

Put rancours in the vessel of my peace

Only for them, and mine eternal jewel

Given to the common enemy of man,

To make them kings, the seeds of Banquo kings. 

Rather than so, come fate into the list.

And champion me to the utterance! Who’s there? 

MACBETH Seyton! – I am sick at heart, 

When I behold – Seyton, I say! – this push 

Will cheer me ever or disseat me now. 

I have lived long enough. My way of life 

Is fall’n into the sere, the yellow leaf, 

And that which should accompany old age, 

As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,

I must not look to have; but in their stead, 

Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath 

Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not. 

Seyton! 

Enter SEYTON 

SEYTON What’s your gracious pleasure? 

MACBETH                                                What news more? 

SEYTON All is confirmed, my lord, which was reported. 

MACBETH I’ll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked. 

Give me my armour. 

SEYTON ’Tis not needed yet. 

MACBETH I’ll put it on; 

Send out more horses; skirr the country round. 

Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine armour. 

How does your patient, doctor? 

DOCTOR                                  Not so sick, my lord, 

As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies 

That keep her from her rest. 

MACBETH                          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 stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff 

Which weighs upon the heart?

LADY MACBETH

These deeds must not be thought

After these ways; so, it will make us mad.

MACBETH

Methought I heard a voice cry “Sleep no more!

Macbeth does murder sleep”—the innocent sleep,

Sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care,

The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath,

Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,

Chief nourisher in life’s feast.

LADY MACBETH

What do you mean?

MACBETH

Still it cried “Sleep no more!” to all the house.

“Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore

Cawdor

Shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more.”

LADY MACBETH

Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,

You do unbend your noble strength to think

So brainsickly of things. Go get some water

And wash this filthy witness from your hand.—

Why did you bring these daggers from the place?

They must lie there. Go, carry them and smear

The sleepy grooms with blood.

MACBETH

I’ll go no more.

I am afraid to think what I have done.

Look on ’t again I dare not.

LADY MACBETH
Thy letters have transported me beyond

This ignorant present, and I feel now

The future in the instant.

MACBETH

My dearest love,

Duncan comes here tonight.

LADY MACBETH

And when goes hence?

MACBETH

Tomorrow, as he purposes.

LADY MACBETH

O, never

Shall sun that morrow see!

Your face, my thane, is as a book where men

May read strange matters. To beguile the time,

Look like the time. Bear welcome in your eye,

Your hand, your tongue. Look like th’ innocent

flower,

But be the serpent under ’t. He that’s coming

Must be provided for; and you shall put

This night’s great business into my dispatch,

Which shall to all our nights and days to come

Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.

MACBETH

We will speak further.

LADY MACBETH

Only look up clear.

To alter favor ever is to fear.

Leave all the rest to me.

OLD MAN

Threescore and ten I can remember well,

Within the volume of which time I have seen

Hours dreadful and things strange, but this sore

night

Hath trifled former knowings.

ROSS

Ha, good father,

Thou seest the heavens, as troubled with man’s act,

Threatens his bloody stage. By th’ clock ’tis day,

And yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp.

Is ’t night’s predominance or the day’s shame

That darkness does the face of earth entomb

When living light should kiss it?

OLD MAN

’Tis unnatural,

Even like the deed that’s done. On Tuesday last

A falcon, tow’ring in her pride of place,

Was by a mousing owl hawked at and killed.

ROSS

And Duncan’s horses (a thing most strange and

certain),

Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,

Turned wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,

Contending ’gainst obedience, as they would

Make war with mankind.

OLD MAN

’Tis said they eat each

other.

ROSS

They did so, to th’ amazement of mine eyes

That looked upon ’t.

BANQUO

What, sir, not yet at rest? The King’s abed.

He hath been in unusual pleasure, and

Sent forth great largess to your offices.

This diamond he greets your wife withal,

By the name of most kind hostess, and shut up

In measureless content.

He gives Macbeth a jewel.

MACBETH

Being unprepared,

Our will became the servant to defect,

Which else should free have wrought.

BANQUO

All’s well.

I dreamt last night of the three Weïrd Sisters.

To you they have showed some truth.

MACBETH

I think not of

them.

Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,

We would spend it in some words upon that

business,

If you would grant the time.

BANQUO

At your kind’st leisure.

MACBETH

If you shall cleave to my consent, when ’tis,

It shall make honor for you.

BANQUO

So I lose none

In seeking to augment it, but still keep

My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,

I shall be counseled.

MACDUFF

He has no children. All my pretty ones?

Did you say “all”? O hell-kite! All?

What, all my pretty chickens and their dam

At one fell swoop?

MALCOLM

Dispute it like a man.

MACDUFF

I shall do so,

But I must also feel it as a man.

I cannot but remember such things were

That were most precious to me. Did heaven look on

And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,

They were all struck for thee! Naught that I am,

Not for their own demerits, but for mine,

Fell slaughter on their souls. Heaven rest them now.

MALCOLM

Be this the whetstone of your sword. Let grief

Convert to anger. Blunt not the heart; enrage it.

MACDUFF 

O, I could play the woman with mine eyes

And braggart with my tongue! But, gentle heavens,

Cut short all intermission! Front to front

Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and myself.

Within my sword’s length set him. If he ’scape,

Heaven forgive him too.

LADY MACBETH

Was the hope drunk

Wherein you dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?

And wakes it now, to look so green and pale

At what it did so freely? From this time

Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard

To be the same in thine own act and valor

As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that

Which thou esteem’st the ornament of life

And live a coward in thine own esteem,

Letting “I dare not” wait upon “I would,”

Like the poor cat i’ th’ adage?

MACBETH

Prithee, peace.

I dare do all that may become a man.

Who dares do more is none.

LADY MACBETH

What beast was ’t,

then,

That made you break this enterprise to me?

When you durst do it, then you were a man;

And to be more than what you were, you would

Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place

Did then adhere, and yet you would make both.

They have made themselves, and that their fitness

now

Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know

How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me.

I would, while it was smiling in my face,

Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums

And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you

Have done to this.

MACBETH

If we should fail —

LADY MACBETH

We fail?

But screw your courage to the sticking place

And we’ll not fail.