“Banquo. What! can the devil speak truth? Macbeth. The thane of Cawdor lives: why do you dress me In borrowed robes?”
Mark how that reception is in either case precisely the reverse of that given to the prophecy itself. Here Banquo starts. But what is here done for Banquo, by the coincidence of the prophecy with the truth, has been already done for Macbeth, by the coincidence of his thought with the prophecy. Accordingly, Macbeth is calm enough to play the hypocrite, when he must otherwise have experienced surprise far greater than that of Banquo, because he is much more nearly concerned in the source of it. So far indeed from being overcome with astonishment, Macbeth still continues to dwell upon the prophecy, by which his peace of mind is afterwards constantly disturbed,
“Do you not hope your children shall be kings, When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me Promised no less to them?”
Banquo's reply to this question has been one of the chief sources of the interpretation, the error of which we are now endeavouring to expose. He says,
“That, trusted home, Might yet enkindle you unto the crown, Besides the thane of Cawdor. But, 'tis strange; And often times, to win us to our harm, The instruments of darkness tell us truths, Win us with honest trifles, to betray us In deepest consequence.”
Now, these words have usually been considered to afford the clue to the entire nature and extent of the supernatural influence brought into play upon the present tragedy; whereas, in truth, all that they express is a natural suspicion, called up in the mind of Banquo, by Macbeth's remarkable deportment, that such is the character of the influence which is at this moment being exerted upon the soul of the man to whom he therefore thinks proper to hint the warning they contain.
The soliloquy which immediately follows the above passage is particularly worthy of comment:
“This supernatural soliciting Cannot be ill; cannot be good:—if ill, Why hath it given me earnest of success, Commencing in a truth? I am thane of Cawdor: If good, why do I yield to that suggestion, Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair, And make my seated heart knock at my ribs Against the use of nature? Present fears Are less than horrible imaginings. My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, Shakes so my single state of man, that function Is smothered in surmise, and nothing is, But what is not.”
The early portion of this passage assuredly indicates that Macbeth regards the communications of the witches merely in the light of an invitation to the carrying out of a design pre-existent in his own mind. He thinks that the spontaneous fulfilment of the chief prophecy is in no way probable; the consummation of the lesser prophecy being held by him, but as an “earnest of success” to his own efforts in consummating the greater. From the latter portion of this soliloquy we learn the real extent to which “metaphysical aid” is implicated in bringing about the crime of Duncan's murder. It serves to assure Macbeth that that is the “nearest way” to the attainment of his wishes;—a way to the suggestion of which he now, for the first time, “yields,” because the chances of its failure have been infinitely lessened by the “earnest of success” which he has just received.
After the above soliloquy Macbeth breaks the long pause, implied in Banquo's words, “Look how our partner's rapt,” by exclaiming,