An almost morbid impressibility of imagination is energetically stamped, and universally recognised in the Thane, and I think, sir, that it warrants, to a certain extent, a _sincerity_ of the mental movements. He really sees a fantastical dagger--he really hears fantastical voices--perhaps he really sees a fantastical Ghost. All this in him is Nature--not artifice--and a nature deeply, terribly, tempestuously commoved by the near contact of a murder imminent--doing--done. It is more like a murderer a-making than a murderer made. SEWARD. See, sir, how precisely this characteristic is proposed. BULLER. By whom? SEWARD. By Shakspeare, in that first Soliloquy. The poetry colouring, throughout, his discourse, is its natural efflorescence. NORTH. Talboys, Seward, you have spoken well. BULLER. And I have spoken ill? NORTH. I have not said so. BULLER. We have all Four of us spoken well--we have all Four of us spoken ill--and we have all Four of us spoken but so-so--now and heretofore--in this Tent--hang the wind--there's no hearing twelve words in ten a body says. Honoured sir, I beg permission to say that I cannot admit the Canon laid down by your Reverence, an hour or two ago, or a minute or two ago, that Macbeth's extravagant language is designed by Shakspeare to designate hypocrisy. NORTH. Why? BULLER. You commended Talboys and Seward for noticing the imaginative--the poetical character of Macbeth's mind. There we find the reason of his extravagant language. It may, as you said, be cant and fustian--or it may not--but why attribute to hypocrisy--as you did--what may have flowed from his genius? Poets may rant as loud as he, and yet be honest men. "In a fine frenzy rolling," their eyes may fasten on fustian. NORTH. Good--go on. Deduct. BULLER. Besides, sir, the Stage had such a language of its own; and I cannot help thinking that Shakspeare often, and too frankly, gave in to it. NORTH. He did. BULLER. I would, however, much rather believe that if Shakspeare meant anything by it in Macbeth's Oratory or Poetry, he intended thereby rather to impress on us that last noticed constituent of his nature--a vehement seizure of imagination. I believe, sir, that in the hortatory scene Lady Macbeth really vanquishes--as the scene ostensibly shows--his _ir_resolution. And if Shakspeare means _ir_resolution, I do not know why the _grounds_ thereof which Shakspeare assigns to Macbeth should not be accepted as the true grounds. The Dramatist would seem to me to demand too much of me, if, _under_ the grounds which he expresses, he requires me to discard these, and to discover and express others. SEWARD. I do not know, sir, if that horrible Invocation of _hers_ to the Spirits of Murder to unsex her, be held by many to imply that she has no need of their help? NORTH.