It is a broken speech in which only part of the thought is expressed, and may be paraphrased thus: _The queen is dead_. Macbeth. _Her death should have been deferred to some more peaceful hour; had she liv'd longer_, there would at length have been a time for the _honours due to her as a queen, and that respect which I owe her for her fidelity and love. Such is the_ world--such is the condition of human life, that we always think_ to-morrow _will be happier than to-day, but to-morrow and to-morrow steals over us unenjoyed and unregarded, and we still linger in the same expectation to the moment appointed for our end. All these days, which have thus passed away, have sent multitudes of fools to the grave, who were engrossed by the same dream of future felicity, and, when life was departing from them, were, like me, reckoning on to-morrow_. Such was once my conjecture, but I am now less confident. Macbeth might mean, that there would have been a more convenient _time_ for such a _word_, for such _intelligence_, and so fall into the following reflection. We say we send _word_ when we give intelligence. V.v.21 (524,8) To the last syllable of recorded time] _Recorded time_ seems to signify the time fixed in the decrees of Heaven for the period of life. The _record_ of _futurity_ is indeed no accurate expression, but as we only know transactions past or present, the language of men affords no term for the volumes of prescience, in which future events may be supposed to be written. V.v.23 (524,9) The way to dusty death] _Dusty_ is a very natural epithet. The second folio has, _The way to_ study _death_.-- which Mr. Upton prefers, but it is only an errour by an accidental transposition of the types. V.v.42 (525,2) I pull in resolution, and begin/To doubt the equivocation of the fiend,/ That lies like truth] Though this is the reading of all the editions, yet, as it is a phrase without either example, elegance or propriety, it is surely better to read, _I_ pall _in resolution,-- I languish in my constancy, my confidence begins to forsake as_. It is scarcely necessary to observe how easily _pall_ might be changed into _pull_ by a negligent writer, or mistaken for it by an unskilful printer. With this emendation Dr. Warburton and Mr. Heath concur. (see 1765, VI,478,8) V.viii.9 (529,3) the intrenchant air] That is, air which cannot be cut. V.viii.20 (529,5) That palter with us in a double sense] That _shuffle_ with ambiguous expressions. V.viii.48 (531,7) Had I as many sons as I have hairs, I would not wish them to a fairer death] This incident is thus related from Henry of Huntingdon by Camden in his _Remains_, from which our authour probably copied it.