And lastly, in the moment of extremest horror comes that unexpected touch of feeling, so startling, yet so wonderfully true to nature-- Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done it! Thus in one of Weber's or Beethoven's grand symphonies, some unexpected soft minor chord or passage will steal on the ear, heard amid the magnificent crash of harmony, making the blood pause, and filling the eye with unbidden tears. It is particularly observable, that in Lady Macbeth's concentrated, strong-nerved ambition, the ruling passion of her mind, there is yet a touch of womanhood: she is ambitious less for herself than for her husband. It is fair to think this, because we have no reason to draw any other inference either from her words or actions. In her famous soliloquy, after reading her husband's letter, she does not once refer to herself. It is of him she thinks: she wishes to see her husband on the throne, and to place the sceptre within _his_ grasp. The strength of her affections adds strength to her ambition. Although in the old story of Boethius we are told that the wife of Macbeth "burned with unquenchable desire to bear the name of queen," yet in the aspect under which Shakspeare has represented the character to us, the selfish part of this ambition is kept out of sight. We must remark also, that in Lady Macbeth's reflections on her husband's character, and on that milkiness of nature, which she fears "may impede him from the golden round," there is no indication of female scorn: there is exceeding pride, but no egotism in the sentiment or the expression;--no want of wifely and womanly respect and love for _him_, but on the contrary, a sort of unconsciousness of her own mental superiority, which she betrays rather than asserts, as interesting in itself as it is most admirably conceived and delineated. Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be What thou art promised:--Yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o' the milk of human kindness, To catch the nearest way. Thou would'st be great, Art not without ambition; but without The illness should attend it. What thou would'st highly That would'st thou holily; would'st not play false. And yet would'st wrongly win: thou'dst have, great Glamis, That which cries, _Thus thou must do, if thou have it; And that which rather thou dost fear to do, Than wishest should be undone_. Hie thee hither, That I may pour my spirits in thine ear; And chastise with the valor of my tongue All that impedes thee from the golden round, Which fate and metaphysical[114] aid doth seem To have thee crowned withal