Macbeth Act IV Quotes

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1. Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Speaker: The three witches
Audience: Themselves
Meaning/Significance: This couplet is repeated three times in the scene. It has no literal meaning, though it does say that the witches are concocting trouble and hardship. “Double” is an allusion to Macbeth’s “doubly redoubled” sword attacks as well as Lady Macbeth con-vincing her guests. It used assonance of the “ou” sound, rhyme, and repetition to make the couplet stand out as one of the most famous and important lines in the play and in litera-ture. Anything repeated three times has added emphasis.
Location: Act IV, Scene i, Line Numbers 10–11, 20–21, 35–36

2. Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! Beware Macduff!
Beware the Thane of Fife. Dismiss me: enough.
Speaker: First Apparition
Audience: Macbeth
Meaning/Significance: The First Apparition tells Macbeth to fear Macduff and then leaves. This foreshadows how Macbeth will be killed by Macduff. By juxtaposing their similar names, their differences are highlighted. Macbeth has an uncontrollable ambition and de-sire to stay king, whereas Macduff wants retribution for all the damage and deaths that Macbeth has done. Macduff’s state, Fife, also foreshadows Macduff killing Macbeth be-cause a fife is used in warfare.
Location: Act IV, Scene i, Line Numbers 71–72

3. Be bloody, bold, and resolute! Laugh to scorn
The pow’r of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.
Speaker: Second Apparition
Audience: Macbeth
Meaning/Significance: The Second Apparition tells Macbeth that he should remain strong and vicious and that none of women born shall hurt Macbeth. However, that leaves those who weren’t “born” but rather were delivered by C-section. This foreshadows someone who was born of C-section to kill Macbeth. The use of “bloody” alludes to all the other times bloody was used to describe a murder.
Location: Act IV, Scene i, Line Numbers 79–81

4. …Macbeth shall never vanquished be until
Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane Hill
Shall come against him.
Speaker: Third Apparition
Audience: Macbeth
Meaning/Significance: The Third Apparition states that nobody can defeat Macbeth until the Great Birnam Wood and high Dunsinane Hill come against him. Historically, the forest was the hiding area of Malcolm’s army and the hill is where Malcolm’s army defeated Mac-beth’s. This foreshadows Macbeth’s demise.
Location: Act IV, Scene i, Line Numbers 92–94

5. …His flight was madness. When our actions do not,
Our fears do make us traitors.
Speaker: Lady Macduff
Audience: Ross
Meaning/Significance: Lady Macduff believes that Macduff shouldn’t have left and that he is a traitor. This is dramatic irony because the audience knows that Macduff is not a traitor. This causes her words to take on a different meaning, one that makes her words apply to Macbeth. When she calls Macduff cowardly and a traitor, it applies more to Macbeth be-cause he is one.
Location: Act IV, Scene ii, Line Numbers 3–4

6. Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
Savagely slaughtered. To relate the manner,
Were, on the quarry of these murdered deer,
To add the death of you.
Speaker: Ross
Audience: Macduff
Meaning/Significance: Ross tells Macduff that his castle was attacked and his wife and children have been killed. He also says that the murderers would have killed Macduff if he were there. The alliteration of “savagely slaughtered” shows how the slaying of them was unnecessary and brutal. Ross compares them to deer, which are gentle animals that don’t eat other animals. “Surprised” shows how the killing of Lady Macduff and her son was unex-pected and unpredictable.
Location: Act IV, Scene iii, Line Numbers 204–207

7. All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?
Speaker: Macduff
Audience: Ross
Meaning/Significance: Macbeth is astounded at the murder of his family. He compares Macbeth to a bird of prey, exemplifying the bird motif. Here, the bird of prey swoops down and attacks innocent “chickens,” which represent Lady Macduff and her son. Birds also show how word travels fast and that the scene before Ross was talking to Lady Macduff. “Chickens” are important because they are like women and lay eggs for children.
Location: Act IV, Scene iii, Line Numbers 216–219

8. Be comforted.
Let’s make us med’cines of our great revenge,
To cure this deadly grief.
Speaker: Malcolm
Audience: Macduff
Meaning/Significance: Malcolm tries to console Macduff by telling him to turn that grief in-to anger and seek vengeance. This marks a shift in Malcolm’s attitude. Before they learned of Lady Macduff and her son’s deaths, he was mournful and suspicious of Macduff’s real in-tentions. Now he is commanding Macduff and bold, qualities that king should exhibit. This foreshadows how he will take rightful control of his country.
Location: Act IV, Scene iii, Line Numbers 213–215

9. This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,
Was once thought honest: you have loved him well;
He hath not touched you yet.
Speaker: Malcolm
Audience: Macduff
Meaning/Significance: Malcolm says the Macbeth is a now a tyrant but was once a respect-able man. Malcolm then tells Macduff that Macbeth has not harmed him. This is an exam-ple of dramatic irony. The audience knows that Macbeth has “touched” Macduff because he killed his wife and son. This shows how cruel and savage it was to kill them.
Location: Act IV, Scene iii, Line Numbers 12–14

10. Nay, had I pow’r, I should
Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell…
…Come to my woman’s breasts,
And take my milk for gall…
Speaker: Malcolm; Lady Macbeth
Audience: Macduff; Lady Macbeth
Meaning/Significance: Malcolm says that if he had power then he would add agreement to hell. Lady Macbeth wants for Macbeth to take some of her, her “milk,” so that he can have the audacity to kill Duncan. Both passages show how milk is symbolic. Milk is a nourishing drink that is white in color and comes from women. White symbolizes innocence and purity so in Lady Macbeth’s passage it is contradictory to “gall,” which means the audacity. Also, agreement into hell would make hell not “pure.” Lady Macbeth calls for Macbeth to drink for Lady Macbeth’s breasts, showing how Macbeth was at the beginning of the play not very much like a man. Malcolm wanting to use milk shows his effeminate side.
Location: Act IV, Scene iii, Line Numbers 97–98; Act I, Scene v, Line Numbers 97–98

11. [A show of eight Kings and Banquo, last king with a glass in his hand.]
Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo. Down!
Thy crown does sear mine eyelids. And thy hair,
Thou other gold-bound brow, is like the first.
A third is like the former. Filthy hags!
Why do you show me this? A fourth! Start, eyes!
What, will the line stretch out to th’ crack of doom?
Another yet! A seventh! I’ll see no more.
And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass
Which shows me many more: and some I see
That twofold balls and treble scepters carry:
Horrible sight! Now I see ‘tis true;
For the blood-boltered Banquo smiles upon me,
And points at them for his.
Speaker: Macbeth
Audience: Himself
Meaning/Significance: The last of the apparitions fulfills the last of the witches’ prophecies: that Banquo’s sons will become kings. Instead of listening to the witches’ prophecy, Mac-beth tries to go against. At this point makes the climax. However, Macbeth did not have to kill Banquo. He could have accepted that Fleance would become king after him and die happily. The “twofold balls and treble scepters” is homage to King James because he joined Scotland and England when he became king of England.
Location: Act IV, Scene i, Line Numbers 112–124

12. …for the poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds, will fight,
Her young ones in her nest, against the owl.
Speaker: Lady Macduff
Audience: Ross
Meaning/Significance: Lady Macduff says that she is like a poor, defenseless bird because Macduff less and now she has to fight off all the dangers. This continues the bird motif be-cause Macbeth is portrayed as an owl because he kills defenseless animals at night. Mac-beth’s victims are portrayed as defenseless birds because they are blindsided or unneces-sary.
Location: Act IV, Scene ii, Line Numbers 9–11