Macbeth — Act 1, Scene 4in modern English, side by side

Forres. A Room in the Palace · Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain, Lennox, Macbeth, Banquo, Ross, Angus

At the royal palace at Forres, Duncan hears how the traitor Cawdor died, then welcomes Macbeth and Banquo home as heroes. The witches' second prophecy has already come true — Macbeth is Thane of Cawdor — and the question hanging over the scene is the third.

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Flourish. Enter Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain, Lennox and Attendants

Duncan

Is execution done on Cawdor?

Has the execution been carried out on Cawdor?

Are not

Those in commission yet return’d?

Aren't the officers I assigned to it back yet?

Malcolm

My liege,

They are not yet come back.

My lord, they haven't returned yet.

But I have spoke

With one that saw him die, who did report,5

That very frankly he confess’d his treasons,

Implor’d your Highness’ pardon, and set forth

A deep repentance.

But I spoke with someone who watched him die, and he reported that Cawdor confessed his treasons very openly, begged your Highness's forgiveness, and showed deep repentance.

Nothing in his life

Became him like the leaving it;

Nothing in his life suited him as well as the way he left it:

he died

As one that had been studied in his death,10

To throw away the dearest thing he ow’d

As ’twere a careless trifle.

he died like a man who had rehearsed his own death, throwing away the most precious thing he owned as if it were a worthless trinket.

Duncan

There’s no art

To find the mind’s construction in the face:

There's no skill that can read a man's mind in his face.

He was a gentleman on whom I built15

An absolute trust.

He was a gentleman I built an absolute trust on.

Enter Macbeth, Banquo, Ross and Angus

Duncan

O worthiest cousin!

O worthiest cousin!

The sin of my ingratitude even now

Was heavy on me.

The sin of my own ingratitude was weighing on me just now.

Thou art so far before,

That swiftest wing of recompense is slow20

To overtake thee.

You've run so far ahead of me that the swiftest wing of reward is too slow to catch up with you.

Would thou hadst less deserv’d;

That the proportion both of thanks and payment

Might have been mine!

I almost wish you had deserved less, so that my thanks and payment could have matched what I owe!

only I have left to say,

More is thy due than more than all can pay.

All that's left to say is this: I owe you more than more than everything could ever pay.

Macbeth

The service and the loyalty I owe,25

In doing it, pays itself.

The service and loyalty I owe you pays for itself in the doing.

Your Highness’ part

Is to receive our duties:

Your Highness's part is simply to receive our duties

and our duties

Are to your throne and state, children and servants;

Which do but what they should, by doing everything

Safe toward your love and honour.30

— and our duties to your throne and state are like children and servants, who only do what they should when they do everything to protect your love and honor.

Duncan

Welcome hither:

Welcome here.

I have begun to plant thee, and will labour

To make thee full of growing.

I have begun to plant you, and I'll work to make you grow tall and full.

—Noble Banquo,

That hast no less deserv’d, nor must be known

No less to have done so, let me infold thee35

And hold thee to my heart.

— Noble Banquo, you deserve no less, and it must be known that you did no less: let me embrace you and hold you to my heart.

Banquo

There if I grow,

The harvest is your own.

If I grow there, the harvest is yours.

Duncan

My plenteous joys,

Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves40

In drops of sorrow.

My joys are so overflowing, so extravagant in their fullness, that they try to hide themselves in tears of sorrow.

—Sons, kinsmen, thanes,

And you whose places are the nearest, know,

We will establish our estate upon

Our eldest, Malcolm; whom we name hereafter

The Prince of Cumberland:45

— Sons, kinsmen, thanes, and you whose places are closest to me: know that we are settling the succession of our kingdom on our eldest son, Malcolm, whom we now name Prince of Cumberland.

which honour must45

Not unaccompanied invest him only,

But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine

On all deservers.

But that honor won't be worn by him alone: marks of nobility will shine like stars on everyone who deserves them.

—From hence to Inverness,

And bind us further to you.

— Now, on to Inverness, to bind me even closer to you.

Macbeth

The rest is labour, which is not us’d for you:50

Any rest I take that isn't spent serving you is hard labor.

I’ll be myself the harbinger, and make joyful

The hearing of my wife with your approach;

I'll ride ahead myself as your herald and make my wife's ears glad with the news of your arrival.

So, humbly take my leave.

And so I humbly take my leave.

Duncan

My worthy Cawdor!

My worthy Cawdor!

Aside.

Macbeth

The Prince of Cumberland!55

(To himself) The Prince of Cumberland!

—That is a step55

On which I must fall down, or else o’erleap,

For in my way it lies.

That's a step lying in my path — I must either trip over it and fall, or leap right over it.

Stars, hide your fires!

Stars, hide your fires!

Let not light see my black and deep desires.

Don't let any light see my black, deep desires.

The eye wink at the hand, yet let that be,

Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.60

Let my eye look away from what my hand does — and yet let the thing be done, the thing the eye will be afraid to look at once it's finished.

_Exit._

Duncan

True, worthy Banquo!

Truly, worthy Banquo —

He is full so valiant;

And in his commendations I am fed.

It is a banquet to me.

he's every bit that brave, and hearing him praised is food to me: it's a banquet.

Let’s after him,

Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome:

Let's follow the man whose thoughtfulness has ridden ahead to prepare our welcome.

It is a peerless kinsman.65

He's a kinsman without equal.

_Flourish. Exeunt._

Famous lines in this scene

“Nothing in his life / Became him like the leaving it” line 8

Malcolm reports that Cawdor died better than he lived — repentant, dignified, throwing life away 'as 'twere a careless trifle.' The line is the play's model of a good death, often contrasted with Macbeth's own end, and it prompts Duncan's rueful admission that treachery cannot be read in a face.

“There's no art / To find the mind's construction in the face” line 14

Duncan admits no skill can read a person's thoughts from their appearance — said about the first Cawdor at the exact moment Macbeth, the new Cawdor and his next betrayer, walks in. The line states the play's appearance-versus-reality theme and is a textbook case of dramatic irony.

“Stars, hide your fires! / Let not light see my black and deep desires.” line 57

Once Malcolm is named heir to the throne, Macbeth stops pretending to himself: he has 'black and deep desires' and asks the stars to go dark so nothing — not even his own eye — sees them. The couplet is his first open embrace of the murder, and it begins the play's pattern of calling on darkness before each crime.

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