Macbeth Quotes

Question 1

Macbeth quote linking to the first seen of the play

Answer 1

‘So foul and fair a day I have not seen’ (MacBeth)

Question 2

Quote from banquo

Answer 2

‘Live you, or are you aught

That man may question?’ (Banquo)

Question 3

Banquo questioning the witches

Answer 3

‘you should be women,
And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
That you are so’ (Banquo)

Question 4

Macbeths meeting with the witches

Answer 4

‘All hail MacBeth, hail to thee, Thane of Glamis.’
‘All hail MacBeth, hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor.’
‘All hail MacBeth, hail to thee, that shalt be king hereafter.’ (Witches)

Question 5

His descendent will be king (banquo)

Answer 5

‘Lesser than MacBeth, and greater.’
‘Not so happy, yet much happier.’
‘Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none.’ (Witches)

Question 6

Ross

Answer 6

‘He bade me, from him, call thee Thane of Cawdor’

Ross

Question 7

Soliloquy about him being thane of glamis and cawdor

Answer 7

(Aside) ‘Glamis, and Thane of Cawdor:

The greatest is behind’ (MacBeth)

Question 8

Macbeth does not know what to think

Answer 8

(Aside) ‘This supernatural soliciting

Cannot be ill, cannot be good’ (MacBeth)

Question 9

He does not want to act against duncan

Answer 9

‘If chance will have me king, why chance may crown me

Without my stir’ (MacBeth)

Question 10

Favourite cousin

Answer 10

‘worthiest cousin’ (Duncan)

Question 11

Macbeth doesn’t want a reward

Answer 11

‘The service and the loyalty I owe,

In doing it, pays itself’ (Macbeth)

Question 12

He must kill Duncan’s son as well

Answer 12

(Aside) ‘The Prince of Cumberland: that is a step

On which I must fall down, or else o’erleap’ (Macbeth)

Question 13

Macbeth is to honest

Answer 13

yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness
To catch the nearest way’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 14

He could be great

Answer 14

thou wouldst be great;
Art not without ambition, but without
The illness should attend it’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 15

The raven knows he will die

Answer 15

The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 16

Take everything that makes me a woman and let me help macbeth

Answer 16

Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty!’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 17

Help me kill Duncan

Answer 17

Come to my woman’s breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 18

He wont the the sun tomorrow

Answer 18

O, never

Shall sun that morrow see!’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 19

Don’t show your true intentions.

Answer 19

‘look like the innocent flower,

But be the serpent under’t’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 20

Macbeth is saying that the murder of Duncan is just the beginning.

Answer 20

If it were done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well

It were done quickly’ (Macbeth)

Question 21

His actions will come back to haunt him.

Answer 21

we but teach
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
To plague the inventor’ (Macbeth)

Question 22

He is predicting that they will be killed next

Answer 22

our poison’d chalice

To our own lips’ (Macbeth)

Question 23

I cant kill Duncan, I am his subject and his host. I should be protecting him from harm.

Answer 23

He’s here in double trust;
First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,
Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,
Who should against his murderer shut the door,
Not bear the knife myself’ (Macbeth)

Question 24

He has no reason to kill Macbeth except his ambition.

Answer 24

I have no spur
To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself
And falls on the other.’ (Macbeth)

Question 25

Macbeth has come to a final conclusion.

Answer 25

We will proceed no further in this business’ (Macbeth)

Question 26

Was it a drunken man’s promise

Answer 26

Was the hope drunk

Wherein you dress’d yourself?’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 27

He wont be a man if he does this

Answer 27

I dare do all that may become a man;

Who dares do more is none.’ (Macbeth)

Question 28

Lady Macbeth is questioning his masculinity.

Answer 28

When you durst do it, then you were a man;
And, to be more than what you were, you would
Be so much more the man.’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 29

Lady Macbeth would rather kill her child than to lie to Macbeth.

Answer 29

I have given suck, and know
How tender ‘tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck’d my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash’d the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 30

Macbeth is worried about the consequences

Answer 30

If we should fail?’ (Macbeth)

Question 31

Lady Macbeth reassuring Macbeth

Answer 31

We fail!
But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
And we’ll not fail’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 32

Macbeth comes to a decision again

Answer 32

I am settled, and bend up
Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.
Away, and mock the time with fairest show:
False face must hide what the false heart doth know’ (Macbeth)

Question 33

An apparition appears in front of Macbeth

Answer 33

Is this a dagger which I see before me,

The handle toward my hand?’ (Macbeth)

Question 34

Macbeth mentions a bell that will be the end of Duncan

Answer 34

A bell rings
‘I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.
Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven or to hell.’ (Macbeth)

Question 35

Lady Macbeth backing away from killing Duncan

Answer 35

Had he not resembled

My father as he slept, I had done’t.’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 36

Macbeth distancing himself from religion

Answer 36

‘I had most need of blessing, and ‘Amen’

Stuck in my throat.’ (Macbeth)

Question 37

Macbeth killing Duncan in his sleep.

Answer 37

Sleep no more!

Macbeth does murder sleep’ (Macbeth)

Question 38

He wont sleep

Answer 38

Macbeth shall sleep no more.’ (Macbeth)

Question 39

Will their guilt ever wash away

Answer 39

Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood

Clean from my hand?’ (Macbeth)

Question 40

Lady Macbeth calling Macbeth cowardly, and showing her own guilt.

Answer 40

My hands are of your colour; but I shame

To wear a heart so white.’ (Lady Macbeth)

Question 41

Duncan can no longer wake

Answer 41

Knocking within

‘Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!’ (Macbeth)