Macbeth: Act 2, Scene 4 – Analysis

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Scene Profile – At a Glance

• Location: Outside Macbeth's castle, the day after the murder.
• What Happens: Ross and an Old Man discuss the unnatural omens that have accompanied Duncan's death. Macduff arrives and reports that the murder is being blamed on the fled princes, that Macbeth has been named king, and that he himself will not attend the coronation.
• Key Characters: Ross, the Old Man, and Macduff.
• Dramatic Function: A choric scene that closes Act 2. It confirms Macbeth's accession, registers the unnatural disorder his crime has caused, and plants Macduff's first quiet act of resistance.
• Famous Quote:
  "Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
  Threaten his bloody stage..."
  (Ross, Act 2, Scene 4)
• Why It Matters: The scene shows the murder rippling outwards into the natural world and the kingdom. Macbeth has won the crown, but Macduff's refusal to go to Scone signals the resistance that will eventually bring him down.

Scene Summary

Outside the castle, an Old Man tells Ross that in seventy years he has never known a night as terrible as the one just passed. Ross agrees, observing that the heavens themselves seem disturbed: although it is daytime, darkness covers the earth. The Old Man recalls a falcon being killed by a lowly owl, and Ross reports that Duncan's fine horses turned wild, broke their stalls, and even ate one another.

Macduff arrives, and Ross asks him for news. Macduff confirms that the murder is being pinned on the two guards Macbeth killed, who are thought to have been bribed by Duncan's sons, Malcolm and Donalbain. Because the princes have fled, suspicion has fallen on them, and Macbeth has already been named king and gone to Scone to be crowned.

Ross prepares to travel to Scone for the coronation, but Macduff says he will return home to Fife instead. His parting words – a wish that the old order may prove better than the new – hint at his unease. The Old Man blesses them both, and the act closes on a note of foreboding.

The World Turned Upside Down

The scene's first movement is a catalogue of unnatural events. Ross and the Old Man trade reports of a world that has come loose from its order: day has turned to darkness, a falcon has been killed by a mousing owl, and the king's horses have run mad. These are not random portents but a pattern, each one an inversion of the natural hierarchy.

Original
A falcon, towering in her pride of place,
Was by a mousing owl hawked at and killed.
(Old Man, Act 2, Scene 4)

Shakespeare Retold (Modern Verse)
A falcon, soaring high above the earth,
Was savaged by an owl that feeds on mice.

The falcon killed by a "mousing owl" is the central image of the scene's disorder. A noble bird of prey, master of the skies, is brought down by a low creature that should never threaten it – an exact mirror of a king murdered by his subject. Shakespeare draws on the Elizabethan belief in a "great chain of being", an ordered hierarchy running from God down through king, man, and beast. When Macbeth murders Duncan, he breaks that chain, and the natural world convulses to match the crime. The omens are nature's verdict on the murder before any human court has spoken.

Macbeth Crowned, Macduff Wary

The second movement brings the political news. Macduff reports the official story – that Malcolm and Donalbain bribed the guards and have fled in guilt – and confirms that Macbeth is to be crowned at Scone. But his own response to the news quietly sets him apart.

Original
Well, may you see things well done there: adieu!
Lest our old robes sit easier than our new!
(Macduff, Act 2, Scene 4)

Shakespeare Retold (Modern Verse)
Well, may you see things well done there: adieu!
In case our old king’s better than the new!

Macduff's decision to go home to Fife rather than attend the coronation is his first act of resistance, however muted. His parting couplet, hoping that the "old robes" will not prove better than the "new", voices a doubt about Macbeth's kingship that he dare not say openly. The robe imagery – the idea that Macbeth wears a crown that does not fit him – runs through the play, and here Macduff plants the seed of the opposition that will eventually destroy the new king. He says little, but his absence speaks loudly.

Language and Technique

• Choric scene: Ross and the Old Man act almost as a chorus, standing outside the action to comment on its larger meaning and the disorder it has caused.
• Pathetic fallacy: The unnatural darkness at midday makes the heavens themselves seem ashamed of the murder, mirroring human crime in the natural world.
• The great chain of being: The falcon killed by an owl and the horses turning wild dramatise the breaking of the natural hierarchy when a king is murdered.
• Dramatic irony: The characters discuss the omens without knowing the murderer's identity, while the audience knows exactly whose crime has unsettled nature.
• Rhyming couplets: The scene's speeches close on couplets that give it a formal, summarising quality, rounding off the act.

Key Quotes from Act 2, Scene 4

Quote 1

Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, 'tis day,
And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp...
(Ross, Act 2, Scene 4)

Shakespeare Retold (Modern Verse)
Look at the skies: they’re black, caused by man’s actions,
And threaten us with storms. Although it’s daytime,
It’s dark as night, as though the sun’s extinguished...

Quote Analysis: Ross reads the sky as a moral commentary on human action. The heavens are "troubled with man's act" and the daylight is "strangled" by darkness, an image of violence done to the natural order. The word "stage" is telling: Ross calls the earth a "bloody stage", as though the murder were a piece of dark theatre being played out under a sky that recoils from it. The unnatural eclipse is the cosmos refusing to shine on a kingdom where a king has been killed, and it sets the tone of disorder that will hang over Macbeth's reign.

Quote 2

And Duncan's horses – a thing most strange and certain –
Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,
Turned wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Contending 'gainst obedience, as they would make
War with mankind.
(Ross, Act 2, Scene 4)

Shakespeare Retold (Modern Verse)
And Duncan’s horses–this is really strange–
Pure thoroughbreds, both fast and beautiful,
Turned wild and feral, breaking from their stables,
Ignoring all their orders, like they were
At war with man.

Quote Analysis: The image of Duncan's prize horses turning savage continues the theme of nature in revolt. These are the finest, best-trained beasts, "the minions of their race", yet they break loose and "make war with mankind", even devouring one another. Obedient creatures suddenly turned wild mirror the rebellion at the heart of the play: a trusted subject has risen against his king. The detail that they "eat each other" is the most grotesque of the omens, suggesting a world that has begun to consume itself once its natural order is broken.

Quote 3

Thriftless ambition, that wilt ravin up
Thine own life's means! Then 'tis most like
The sovereignty will fall upon Macbeth.
(Ross, Act 2, Scene 4)

Shakespeare Retold (Modern Verse)
Wasteful ambition, choosing to destroy
The one that gave them life! And so it’s likely
Macbeth will now become our sovereign king.

Quote Analysis: Ross condemns the "thriftless ambition" he believes drove the princes to murder their own father – an ambition so wasteful it devours "thine own life's means", the very source of one's life. The irony is sharp and unintended: the words apply perfectly to Macbeth, the real murderer, whose ambition will indeed consume the kingdom that sustains him. In the same breath Ross notes that the crown "will fall upon Macbeth", joining the central theme of ambition to the news of the usurpation, so that the line both misjudges the crime and names its true beneficiary.

Key Takeaways

• Nature mirrors the crime: Darkness at noon, a falcon killed by an owl, and the king's horses turning wild show the natural order overthrown by the murder.
• The great chain of being is broken: Killing the king disrupts a whole hierarchy, and the omens are the cosmos registering that rupture.
• Macbeth has the crown: The fled princes are blamed for the murder, and Macbeth has gone to Scone to be made king.
• Macduff begins to resist: His choice to go home to Fife rather than to the coronation is a quiet but pointed sign of distrust.
• A choric close to Act 2: Ross and the Old Man stand outside events to weigh their meaning, ending the act on disorder and foreboding.

Study Questions and Analysis

What is the purpose of the unnatural omens in this scene?

The omens dramatise the idea that Duncan's murder is not just a human crime but a violation of the entire natural order. Ross and the Old Man report darkness at midday, a falcon killed by a lowly owl, and the king's horses turning wild and eating one another. Each of these inverts the proper order of things, mirroring the inversion that has taken place in the kingdom, where a subject has murdered his king.

Behind this lies the Elizabethan and Jacobean belief in a divinely ordered universe, the "great chain of being", in which everything has its appointed place. A crime as monstrous as regicide tears that fabric, and nature responds with chaos. For Shakespeare's first audiences, watching under a king who himself wrote about kingship and witchcraft, these portents would have carried real force: the murder of an anointed king was understood to shake heaven and earth alike. Dramatically, the omens deepen the atmosphere of dread and prepare us for the diseased, disordered Scotland of Macbeth's reign.

Why does Macduff decide not to go to the coronation?

When Ross says he will travel to Scone for Macbeth's coronation, Macduff pointedly chooses instead to go home to Fife. It is a small decision, but a significant one. Attending the coronation would signal loyalty and acceptance of the new king; staying away is a quiet refusal to endorse him.

Macduff's parting words make his unease plain. He hopes "our old robes" will not prove easier to wear than the new, a wish that the late king's rule may not turn out to have been better than what follows. This is the first hint of the suspicion that will harden into open opposition. Macduff is the character who first named the murder as sacrilege, and here he becomes the first to hold back from the murderer's court. His absence at Scone is the seed of the resistance that will, by the play's end, bring Macbeth down.

How does the scene function as a chorus, and why end the act this way?

Act 2, Scene 4 works almost like a choric interlude. Ross and the Old Man are minor figures who stand a little outside the main action, and their conversation steps back from the murderers to take in the wider meaning of what has happened. Rather than advancing the plot through dramatic confrontation, the scene reflects on it, gathering up the act's events into a picture of a kingdom and a cosmos thrown out of joint.

Ending Act 2 in this way is deliberate. The audience has just lived through the murder and its frantic discovery; this quieter, more reflective scene lets the consequences settle and widen. We learn the outcome – Macbeth crowned, the princes blamed and fled, Macduff wary – while the omens remind us of the moral cost. The act closes not on triumph but on darkness and unease, with the Old Man's blessing on "those that would make good of bad" pointing forward to the long struggle to set Scotland right.

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