--wither'd Murther,
--thus with hia stealthy pace,
With Tarquin's ravishing strides, tow'rds his design
moves like a ghost.--]
This was the reading of this passage [ravishing sides] in all the
editions before that of Mr. Pope, who for _sides_, inserted in the text
_strides_, which Mr. Theobald has tacitly copied from him, though a more
proper alteration might perhaps have been made. A _ravishing stride_ is
an action of violence, impetuosity, and tumult, like that of a savage
rushing at his prey; whereas the poet is here attempting to exhibit an
image of secrecy and caution, of anxious circumspection and guilty
timidity, the _stealthy pace_ of a _ravisher_ creeping into the chamber
of a virgin, and of an assassin approaching the bed of him whom he
proposes to murder, without awaking him; these he describes as _moving
like ghosts_, whose progression is so different from _strides_, that it
has been in all ages represented te be, as Milton expresses it,
_Smooth sliding without step_.
This hemiatic will afford the true reading of this place, which is, I
think, to be corrected thus:
--_and wither'd Murder_.
--_thus with his_ stealthy _pace_.
_With Tarquin ravishing_, slides _tow'rds his design_,
_Moves like a ghost_.--
_Tarquin_ is in this place the general name of a ravisher, and the sense
is, Now is the time in which every one is a-sleep, but those who are
employed in wickedness; the witch who is sacrificing to Hecate, and the
ravisher, and the murderer, who, like me, are stealing upon their prey.
When the reading is thus adjusted, he wishes with great propriety, in
the following lines, that the _earth_ may not _hear his steps_.
II.i.59 (439,3) And take the present horrour from the time,/Which now
suits with it] Of this passage an alteration was once proposed by me, of
which I have now a less favourable opinion, yet will insert it, as it
may perhaps give some hint to other critics:
_And take the present horrour from the time,
Which now suits with it_.--
I believe every one that has attentively read this dreadful soliloquy is
disappointed at the conclusion, which, if not wholly unintelligible, is,
at least, obscure, nor can be explained into any sense worthy of the
authour. I shall therefore propose a slight alteration:
--_Thou sound and firm-set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear
Thy very stones prate of my where-about,
And talk--the present horrour of the time!
That now suits with it_.--
Macbeth has, in the foregoing lines, disturbed his imagination by
enumerating all the terrors of the night; at length he is wrought up to
a degree of frenzy, that makes him afraid of some supernatural discovery
of his design, and calls out to the stones not to betray him, not to
declare where he walks, nor _to talk_.--As he is going to say of what,
he discovers the absurdity of his suspicion, and pauses, but is again
overwhelmed by his guilt, and concludes, that such are the horrors of
the present night, that the stones may be expected to cry out against
him: