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Act 4, Scene 1

Double, double toil and trouble,
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble

This is a famous incantation that the three witches repeat three times in Act 4, Scene 1, as they stand over a cauldron mixing a magic potion. With its emphasis on “toil and trouble,” the phrase is symbolic of the havoc that the witches have brought (and will continue) to bring to Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, and Scotland itself.

 

By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes.

In this section, as the witches are brewing a magic potion, Macbeth comes to ask them for more information about what will happen to him. The second witch says to her sisters, “Something wicked this way comes,” meaning Macbeth himself. Read more about this passage in Quotes by Character: The Three Witches (the fourth quote).

 

Be bloody, bold, and resolute. Laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.

In Act 4, Scene 1, the witches summon three apparitions to delivery prophecies and advice to Macbeth.  The first apparition simply tells Macbeth to fear Macduff. In this passage, the second apparition (a bloody child) gives Macbeth more information. The prophecy carries two key parts – the first, directing Macbeth to carry out his violent deeds with confidence, and the second, implying that no man can harm him. These words reassure Macbeth, despite the first apparition’s warning, and lead him to behave even more recklessly. Unfortunately for Macbeth, he misunderstands the crucial caveat that no man “of woman born” can defeat him.

 

Be lion-mettled, proud, and take no care
Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are.
Macbeth shall never vanquished be until
Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane Hill
Shall come against him.

In Act 4, Scene 1, the third apparition further emboldens Macbeth with these words that suggest to him that he will be invincible in battle until the woods themselves join the fight against him. Feeling confident that under no circumstances could the inanimate woods ever join the battle, Macbeth believes that he is unbeatable—in the same way that he believes that the second apparition’s prophecy that no man “of woman born” can ever defeat him.

 

From this moment
The very firstlings of my heart shall be
The firstlings of my hand.
And even now,
To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done...
No boasting like a fool.
This deed I’ll do before this purpose cool.

In this passage spoken by Macbeth near the end of Act 1, Scene 4, he vows to act in accordance with the second apparition’s advice to be “bloody, bold and resolute.” The word “firstling” is an agricultural term meaning the first harvest or offspring, but Macbeth uses it here to mean both “impulses” (“firstlings of my heart”) and “actions” (“firstlings of my hand”). Macbeth makes his plan to raid Macduff’s castle, seize his town of Fife, and kill his wife and children, and rushes off to put it into action. These lines  convey that going forward, Macbeth will choose to act first and ask questions later.

 

Act 4, Scene 3

Each new morn
New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows
Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds
As if it felt with Scotland and yelled out
Like syllable of dolor.

In this quote from early in Act 4, Scene 3, Macduff laments the impact of Macbeth’s disastrous rule on Scotland. Read more about this passage in Quotes by Setting Scotland (the first quote).

 

Bleed, bleed, poor country!
Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,
For goodness dare not check thee.

Again, in Act 4, Scene 3, Macduff deplores Macbeth’s terrible actions as king as he fears the impact they will have on his family and Scotland in general. Read more about this quote in Quotes by Character: Macduff (the second quote) and Quotes by Theme: The Difference Between Kingship and Tyranny (the third quote).

 

 

I think our country sinks beneath the yoke.
It weeps, it bleeds, and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds.
 

Malcolm speaks these lines in Act 4, Scene 3, when Macduff has come to England to enlist the support of the exiled Malcolm in overthrowing Macbeth. Malcolm, bemoaning Scotland’s fate, personifies his beloved country and uses the graphic language of bondage to describe its suffering under the tyrant Macbeth.

 

 

O nation miserable,
With an untitled tyrant bloody-sceptered,
When shalt thou see thy wholesome days again,
Since that the truest issue of thy throne
By his own interdiction stands accursed,
And does blaspheme his breed?

This quote from Act 4, Scene 3, is Macduff’s emotional response to Malcolm’s provocative and untruthful statements that he believes himself unworthy to rule Scotland. By responding with this deep lament for the country he loves, Macduff passes the test of loyalty that Malcolm has set up for him. Read more about this quote and Macduff and Malcolm’s meeting in England in Quotes by Theme: The Difference Between Kingship and Tyranny (the fourth quote).

 

 

Alas, poor country!
Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
Be called our mother, but our grave, where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rend the air
Are made, not marked; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy.

In Act 4, Scene 3, the nobleman Ross dramatically expresses how nightmarish Scotland has become under Macbeth’s violent and tyrannical rule. Read more about this passage in Quotes by Setting: Scotland (the second quote).

 

 

All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?

Here, the warrior Macduff reacts with disbelief and sorrow upon receiving the news that Macbeth has savagely slaughtered his wife and children in Act 4, Scene 3. Read more about this quote in Quotes by Theme: The Role of Children in Political Struggles (the third quote).

 

 

I shall do so,
But I must also feel it as a man.
I cannot but remember such things were
That were most precious to me.

Near the end of Act 4, Scene 3, right after Macduff has responded with grief to the news that his wife and children have been slaughtered, Malcolm advises him to “Dispute it like a man.” This passage is Macduff’s response to Malcolm’s suggestion. Macduff asserts that being a man means more than just resorting to violence, and that it’s just as manly to feel grief for those he loves as it is to take action to avenge their murders.

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