I am afraid to think what I have done;
Look on't again, I dare not.

LADY M.

Infirm of purpose!

Give me the daggers: The sleeping, and the dead,
Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood,
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal,

For it must seem their guilt."

MACB.

[Exit. Knocking within. Whence is that knocking?

How is't with me, when every noise appals me? What hands are here? Ha! they pluck out mine

eyes!

Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood

'tis the eye of childhood,

G

That fears a painted devil.] So, in Vittoria Corombona,

1612:

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Terrify babes, my lord, with painted devils.”

-gild the faces of the grooms withal,

STEEVENS.

For it must seem their guilt.] Could Shakspeare mean to play upon the similitude of gild and guilt? JOHNSON.

· This quibble too frequently occurs in the old plays. A few instances (for I could produce a dozen at least) may suffice:

"Cand. You have a silver beaker of my wife's?

"Flu. You say not true, 'tis gilt.

"Cand. Then you say true:

"And being gilt, the guilt lies more on you."

Again, in Middleton's comedy of A mad World my Masters, 1608:

Though guilt condemns, 'tis gilt must make us glad." And, lastly, from Shakspeare himself:

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England shall double gild his treble guilt." Henry IV. P. II. Again, in King Henry V:

"Have for the gilt of France, O guilt indeed!"

STEEVENS.

• Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood &c.] "Suscipit, ô Gelli, quantum non ultima Tethys, "Nec genitor nympharum abluit oceanus."

Catullus in Gellium, 88.