MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS
ON THE
TRAGEDY OF MACBETH:

WITH REMARKS ON SIR T. HANMER'S EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE.

FIRST PRINTED IN THE YEAR 1745.

[Transcriber's note: There are two footnote systems in use in this
section. The numbered footnotes in square brackets, [1], [2], etc, are
those of the editor, and are to be found at the end of the section.
The lettered footnotes in round brackets, (a), (b), etc, are Johnson's,
and are to be found at the end of each Note.]


NOTE I.

ACT I. SCENE I.

_Enter three Witches._

In order to make a true estimate of the abilities and merit of a writer,
it is always necessary to examine the genius of his age, and the
opinions of his contemporaries. A poet, who should now make the whole
action of his tragedy depend upon enchantment, and produce the chief
events by the assistance of supernatural agents, would be censured as
transgressing the bounds of probability; he would be banished from the
theatre to the nursery, and condemned to write fairy tales instead of