witches, who are related to perform many supernatural acts by the means of unguents, and particularly to fly through the air to the place where they meet at their hellish festivals. In this sense anoint thee, witch, will mean, away, witch, to your infernal assembly. This reading I was inclined to favour, because I had met with the word aroint in no other author; till looking into Hearne's Collections, I found it in a very old drawing, that he has published, in which St. Patrick is represented visiting hell, and putting the devils into great confusion by his presence, of whom one that is driving the damned before him with a prong, has a label issuing out from his mouth with these words, "OUT OUT ARONGT," of which the last is evidently the same with aroint, and used in the same sense as in this passage.

(2) And the very points they blow.

As the word very is here of no other use than to fill up the verse, it is likely that Shakespeare wrote various, which might be easily mistaken for very, being either negligently read, hastily pronounced, or imperfectly heard.

(3) He shall live a man forbid.

Mr. Theobald has very justly explained forbid by accursed, but without giving any reason of his interpretation. To bid is originally to pray, as in this Saxon fragment:

He ir pir bit 3 bote, &c.

He is wise that prays and makes amends.

As to forbid, therefore, implies to prohibit, in opposition to the word bid, in its present sense, it signifies by the same kind of opposition to curse, when it is derived from the same word in its primitive meaning.

NOTE V I.

SCENE V

THE incongruity of all the passages, in which the Thane of Cawdor is mentioned, is very remarkable; in the second

scene the Thanes of Rosse and Angus bring the king an account of the battle, and inform him that Norway,

Assisted by that most disloyal traitor

The Thane of Cawdor, 'gan a dismal conflict.

It appears that Cawdor was taken prisoner, for the king says, in the same scene,

-Go, pronounce his death;

And with his former title greet Macbeth.

Yet though Cawdor was thus taken by Macbeth, in arms against his king, when Macbeth is saluted, in the fourth scene, Thane of Cawdor, by the Weird Sisters, he asks,

But how, of Cawdor? the Thane of Cawdor lives.
A prosp'rous gentleman;-

And in the next line considers the promises, that he should be Cawdor and King, as equally unlikely to be accomplished. How can Macbeth be ignorant of the state of the Thane of Cawdor, whom he has just defeated and taken prisoner, or call him a prosperous gentleman who has forfeited his title and life by open rebellion? Or why should he wonder that the title of the rebel whom he has overthrown should be conferred upon him? He cannot be supposed to dissemble his knowledge of the condition of Cawdor, because he inquires with all the ardour of curiosity, and the vehemence of sudden astonishment; and because nobody is present but Banquo, who had an equal part in the battle, and was equally acquainted with Cawdor's treason. However, in the next scene, his ignorance still continues; and when Rosse and Angus present him from the king with his new title, he cries out,

Rosse and Angus, who were the messengers that, in the second scene, informed the king of the assistance given by Cawdor to the invader, having lost, as well as Macbeth, all

memory of what they had so lately seen and related, make this answer,

-Whether he was

Combin'd with Norway, or did line the rebel
With hidden help and 'vantage, or with both
He labour'd in his country's wreck, I know not.

Neither Rosse knew what he had just reported, nor Macbeth what he had just done. This seems not to be one of the faults that are to be imputed to the transcribers, since, though the inconsistency of Rosse and Angus might be removed, by supposing that their names are erroneously inserted, and that only Rosse brought the account of the battle, and only Angus was sent to compliment Macbeth, yet the forgetfulness of Macbeth cannot be palliated, since what he says could not have been spoken by any other.

NOTE VII.

My thought, whose murther yet is but fantastical,
Shakes so my single state of man,-

The single state of man seems to be used by Shakespeare for an individual, in opposition to a commonwealth, or conjunct body of men.

NOTE VIII.

Macbeth.- -Come what come may,

Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

I suppose every reader is disgusted at the tautology in this passage, time and the hour, and will, therefore, willingly believe that Shakespeare wrote it thus,

-Come what come may,

Time! on!-the hour runs thro' the roughest day.

Macbeth is deliberating upon the events which are to befall him; but finding no satisfaction from his own thoughts, he grows impatient of reflection, and resolves to wait the close without harassing himself with conjectures:

-Come what come may.

But, to shorten the pain of suspense, he calls upon time, in the usual style of ardent desire, to quicken his motion,

Time! on!

He then comforts himself with the reflection that all his perplexity must have an end,

-The hour runs thro' the roughest day.

This conjecture is supported by the passage in the letter to his lady, in which he says, They referr'd me to the coming on of time with, Hail, King that shall be.

Became him like the leaving it. He dy'd,
As one that had been studied in his death,

To throw away the dearest thing he ow'd,
As 'twere a careless trifle.

As the word ow'd affords here no sense, but such as is forced and unnatural, it cannot be doubted that it was originally written, The dearest thing he own'd; a reading which needs neither defence nor explication.

NOTE X.

King.- -There's no art,

To find the mind's construction in the face:

The construction of the mind is, I believe, a phrase peculiar to Shakespeare; it implies the frame or disposition of the mind, by which it is determined to good or ill.

NOTE XI.

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 every thing
Safe tow'rd your love and honour.

VOL. V.

Of the last line of this speech, which is certainly, as it is now read, unintelligible, an emendation has been attempted, which Dr. Warburton and Mr. Theobald have admitted as the true reading:

your

-our duties

Are to throne and state, children and servants,
Which do but what they should, in doing every thing

Fiefs to your love and honour.

My esteem for these criticks, inclines me to believe, that they cannot be much pleased with the expressions, Fiefs to love, or Fiefs to honour; and that they have proposed this alteration, rather because no other occurred to them, than because they approved it. I shall, therefore, propose a bolder change, perhaps, with no better success, but “sua cuique placent." I read thus,

-our duties

Are to your throne and state, children and servants,
Which do but what they should, in doing nothing,

Save tow'rd your love and honour.·

We do but perform our duty, when we contract all our views to your service, when we act with no other principle than regard to your love and honour.

It is probable that this passage was first corrupted by writing safe for save, and the lines then stood thus:

-doing nothing

Safe tow'rd your love and honour.

Which the next transcriber observing to be wrong, and yet not being able to discover the real fault, altered to the present reading.

NOTE XII.

SCENE VII.

-Thou'dst have, great Glamis,

That which cries, "thus thou must do, if thou have it; "And that," &c.

As the object of Macbeth's desire is here introduced speaking of itself, it is necessary to read,

-thou'dst have, great Glamis,

That which cries, "thus thou must do, if thou have me."