Macbeth

(written about ) by William Shakespeare

• When shall we three meet again in thunder, lightning, or in rain? ~ First Witch, I.i

• When the hurlyburly's done, when the battle's lost and won. ~ Second Witch, I.i

• Fair is foul, and foul is fair: hover through the fog and filthy air. ~ Witches, I.i

• So foul and fair a day I have not seen. ~ Macbeth, I.iii

• Yet do I fear thy nature; it is too full o' the milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way. ~ Lady (Gruoch) Macbeth, I.v

• 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. ~ Lady Macbeth, I.v

• Come to my woman's breasts, and take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers, wherever in your sightless substances you wait on nature's mischief! ~ Lady Macbeth, I.v

• If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly ~ Macbeth, I.vii

• I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition, which o'er-leaps itself and falls on the other. ~ Macbeth, I.vii

• 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 pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums, and dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you have done to this. ~ Lady Macbeth, I.vii

• Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible to feeling as to sight? Or art thou but a dagger of the mind, a false creation, proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain? I see thee yet, in form as palpable as this which now I draw. ~ Macbeth, II.i

• Methought I heard a voice cry "Sleep no more! Macbeth does murder sleep." ~ Macbeth, II.ii

• 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. ~ Macbeth, II.ii

• I pray you, remember the porter. ~ Porter, II.iii

• Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes, and unprovokes; it provokes the desire, but it takes away the performance: therefore, much drink may be said to be an equivocator with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates him in a sleep, and, giving him the lie, leaves him. ~ Porter, II.iii - on alcohol

• What's done is done. ~ Lady Macbeth, III.ii

• I am in blood
  Step't in so far that, should I wade no more,
  Returning were as tedious as go o'er. ~ Macbeth, III.iv

• Double, double toil and trouble
  Fire burn and cauldron bubble. ~ Witches, IV.i {See also List of misquotations}

• By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes. ~ Second Witch, IV.i

• Laugh to scorn the power of man, for none of woman born shall harm Macbeth. ~ Second Apparition, IV.i

• Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be until great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill shall come against him. ~ Third Apparition, IV.i

• What, you egg! ~ Murderer, IV.ii

• Out, damned spot! out, I say! ~ Lady Macbeth, V.i

• All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. ~ Lady Macbeth, V.i

• What's done cannot be undone. ~ Lady Macbeth, V.i

• 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. ~ Macbeth, V.v

• Turn, hell-hound, turn! ~ Macduff, V.viii

• Despair thy charm; and let the angel whom thou still hast served tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb untimely ripp'd. ~ Macduff, V.viii

• Lay on, Macduff, And damn'd be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!' ~ Macbeth, V.viii