Here another awful deed of her husband flashes across her recollection. But still rubbing, still toiling—still with a perseverance which shows how frightfully she is under the dominion of horror at her crime, she is striving and ever striving to efface its mark, and through all with the perception that it is in vain. Then she is at the banquet, where Macbeth’s phrenzy conjures up the ghost of Banquo, and half betrays them.
The Doctor has now seen and heard enough to show him the nature of the secret which is destroying the life of his patient, and his horror overflows immediately in a sort of confidential communication with the waiting woman.
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. Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh!
Doctor. What a sight is there! The heart is sorely charg’d.
Gent. I would not have such a heart in my bosom, for the dignity of the whole body.
Here we have the moral of this grand mighty scene. Guilt—successful guilt—guilt in the bosom, of a scoffer—an atheist—a blasphemer—guilt in the strongest impersonation of earthliness—of nerve—courage—self-confidence—power, philosophy—profound sense, and a high order of human genius. Lady Macbeth had obviously all these. She impresses you powerfully with a haughty superiority over every one around her. She would do to lead an army—to defend a citadel. Her mind is that of a Spartan dame—or a Roman matron: and the courage and understanding she displays are such as, if rightly used, if guided by the spirit of virtue and religion, might have elevated her to the dignity of a great historical heroine. None can rationally hope to bear up by philosophy and strength of intellect alone, against the consciousness of sin, if Lady Macbeth, in those rude times, could not.
Here, then, we have successful guilt. Painted by a historian, perhaps she might have excited the envy of the lowly. We should have seen her surrounded by splendor and luxury. The glittering crown upon her brow—a circle of courtiers bending around her—as she presided at state councils or gay banquets. The historian would have shown her situation, and we might have exclaimed, “see how guilt triumphs.” But Shakspeare gives us a view into her heart—her secret thoughts—her midnight dreams. If any thing could heighten the picture as he had previously drawn it, it would be these few words, “Here’s the smell of the blood still.” The smell of the blood! How deeply imbued is her imagination with the ideal! The heart sickens at it. Great as has been the crime, we are compelled to acknowledge that the poet has at a glimpse shown us the process of a penalty as great, and, with a sweetness of art peculiar to him and nature, has mingled, with our abhorrence which would be too violent by itself, a certain touch of sympathy and when that beautiful and heart-rending exclamation falls with almost the last life-drops from her utterly subdued and crushed heart—
All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh!