In the first place, why does not _Banquo_ suffer from the fiends? He is with Macbeth when they appear. He even boldly addresses them, and at once—with the frank fearlessness of a noble and virtuous mind, conscious of its honesty, commands them, if they can read the future, to speak to _him_ also. “Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear your favors, nor your hate.” Here is at once a man not to be tampered with. They promise _him_ also as well as Macbeth a dazzling future good—a posterity of kings—but it in no way changes his plans of life, or raises the least idea in his mind of crime or intrigue. Even when, according to the prediction of the witches, Macbeth instantly receives intelligence, of his being thane of Cawdor, Banquo’s _clear-seeing sense of right_, his innocence of nature takes the true and virtuous view of the affair, looks, at a glance, through all the complicated web of the sisters’ plots, and keeps himself unsoiled, unendangered by them. _Banquo._ “But ’tis strange; And often-times, to win us to _our harm_, The instruments of darkness tell us truths; Win us with honest trifles, to betray us In deepest consequence.” And while he is making this just reflection, the obvious impulse of a mind not warped from the erectness of a moral and religious integrity and reverence, Macbeth soliloquizes with a kind of inexpressible anticipatory triumph. “Two truths are told As happy prologues to the swelling act Of the imperial theme.” And he then goes on, like a ready made, long-matured rascal as he is—like one whose mind had no habit of virtuous or religious contemplation, but which has always had a familiarity with evil and a tendency downward: ——“Why do I _yield_ to that suggestion Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair,” etc. The very moment his attention is directed to the subject of his becoming _king_, he conceives the idea of murdering the actual occupant of the throne, notwithstanding the fact that there are two sons living. An innocent man, were he told he would become king of England, would not instantly set about murdering the queen. He would (supposing him to have faith in the prediction) say to himself, as indeed Macbeth does at one time: “If chance will have me king, why chance may crown me, without my stir.” The very first page of the tragedy marks Macbeth for a villain even before he has made his appearance. 1. _Witch._ When shall we three meet again In thunder, lightning, or in rain? 2. _Witch._ When the hurly-burly’s done, When the battle’s lost and won; 3. _Witch._ That will be ere set of sun. 1. _Witch._ Where the place? 2. _Witch._ Upon the heath. 3. _Witch._ _Then to meet with Macbeth._ Why have these fiendish women selected the gallant soldier as their victim? What gathers them about the “battle” that is raging near? _What_ but the _scent_ of _a sinful heart_?