MACBETH [To Banquo] Do you not hope your children shall be kings,
When those that gave the Thane of Cawdor to me
Promised no less to them?
BANQUO That, trusted home,
Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,
Besides the Thane of Cawdor. But ’tis strange;
And oftentimes to win us to our harm
The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
Win us with honest trifles, to betray’s
In deepest consequence.
[To Ross and Angus] Cousins, a word, I pray you. (1.3.113-122)
This is a moment of division, when a crack definitely appears in the relationship between Macbeth and Banquo. They have responded to the witches in fundamentally different ways: Macbeth is shocked to the core, new possibilities whirring in his brain; the possibility of not taking the witches’ words seriously or, even if believing them, ignoring them, turning away from them, seems not to have occurred to him. He can’t quite believe that Banquo’s not similarly struck and transformed: do you not hope your children shall be kings, when those that gave the Thane of Cawdor to me promised no less to them? How can you stay so calm? Can’t you see this changes everything? It’s all got to be true, all of it, all or nothing; something and so, all. Banquo’s so reasonable: well, if we trusted everything that they said completely, especially given the now-fulfilled prophecy of your becoming Thane of Cawdor—that might yet enkindle you unto the crown. It might put ideas into your head, make you hopeful that that could happen too. Enkindle is a fabulous verb here: a spark, a flame (a lightning strike?) taking hold; small enough, initially, to be stamped out, snuffed out like a candle—or fanned and tended. A fire in the eyes, a burning desire—the sense that Macbeth has internalised, absorbed these possibilities; has already (in the language of sin) properly entertained them, in a way that Banquo has not, will not, cannot. Banquo too speaks truth; here he articulates the play’s crisis moment: ’tis strange (yes, master of understatement); and oftentimes to win us to our harm the instruments of darkness tell us truths, win us with honest trifles, to betray’s in deepest consequence. That’s it, that’s the play’s psychology. It’s interested in nudges, tipping points, the power of the seemingly inconsequential or even superficially benign, honest trifles. The tiny things that lead, inexorably, to too far, no turning back. Obsession. And it seems that Banquo is convinced, or as good as, that the witches are instruments of darkness, creatures of hell, doing the devil’s work. That’s how evil works, he says. It snares you with little trivial truths, gains your confidence. That way damnation lies, the loss of everything, life and soul. (A potent little reminder of Othello there? the honest trifles, honest Iago the voice of reason, niggling and gnawing away, the wretched handkerchief, the trifle light as air. There are, not impossibly, the same actors, and Othello still in repertory…) The instruments of darkness (chillingly abstract, much better than evil or Satan; the conjuring of darkness is central to this play) win us to our harm. They don’t do things to us directly; they make us do things to ourselves, harness our will, nudge us into thinking terrible things and making terrible choices.
Easy, perhaps, to skip over this little bit, because Macbeth has a cracker of a speech a line or two later. But Banquo’s absolutely got it, here, and Macbeth’s going to ignore him, and spend the rest of the play proving him right.
