NORTH.
Nor I. This seems to look from them—"so pressed by outward besiegings, I have not capacity to entertain the blow as it requires to be entertained. With a free soul I could have measured it. Now I cannot."
TALBOYS.
Give us, sir, a commentary on the Revelations of the Sleeping Spectre.
NORTH.
I dare not. Let's be cheerful. I ask this—when you see and hear Kemble-Macbeth—and Siddons-Macbeth—whom do you believe that you see and hear? I affirm that you at one and the same instant—(or at the most in two immediately successive instants—yet I believe in one and the same instant)—know that you see and hear Kemble—or if that accomplished gentleman and admirable actor—Macready be performing the part—then Macready;—and yet believe that you see and hear Lord Macbeth. I aver that you entertain a mixt—confused—self-contradictory state of mind—that two elements of thought which cannot co-subsist do co-subsist.
TALBOYS.
De jure they cannot—DE FACTO they do.
NORTH.
Just so.