Macbeth (and Stramonium)

by William Shakespeare
Act Five
Scene 1 Dunsinane, Macbeth’s Castle

Enter a DOCTOR OF PHYSIC and a  WAITING-GENTLEWOMAN

Doctor
I have two nights watch’d with you, but can perceive no truth in your report. When was it she last walk’d?

Gentlewoman
Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, throw her nightgown upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon it, read it, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yes all this while in a most fast sleep.

Doctor
A great perturbation in nature, to receive at once the benefit of sleep and do the effects of watching! In this slumb’ry agitation, besides her walking and other actual performances, what, at any time, have you heard her say?

Gentlewoman

That , sir, which I will not report after her.

Doctor
You may to me; and ‘tis most meet you should.

Gentlewoman
Neither to you or to anyone, having no witness to confirm my speech.

Enter LADY MACBETH, with a taper

Lo you, her she comes! This is her very guise; and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.

Doctor
How came she by that light?

Gentle woman
Why, it stood by her. She has light by her constantly; ‘tis her command.

Doctor
You see her eyes are open.

Gentlewoman
Ay. but their sense is shut.

Doctor
What is it she does now? Look how she rubs her hands

Gentlewoman
It is an accustomed action with her, to see this washing her hands: I have her continue in this a quarter of an hour.

Lady Macbeth

Yes here’s the spot.

Doctor
Hark, she speaks. I will set down what comes from her, to satisfy my remembrance more strongly.

Lady Macbeth
Out, damned spot? Out, I say! One, two, why then ‘tis time to do’t. Hell is murky. Fie, my lord, fie!A soldier, and afear’   qd? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our pow’r to account? Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?

Doctor
Do you mark that?

Lady Macbeth

The Thane of Fife had a wife; where is she now? What, will these hands ne’er be clean? No more o’ that, my lord, no more o’ that; you mar all with this starting

Doctor
Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.

STRAMONIUM(Datura)

Lived through terror STRAMONIUM. The idea of STRAMONIUM is we have lived through a night of terror. The horror movies: Vampires shun light can’t stand mirrors. The plant DATURA grows in grave yards.

TERROR AND VIOLENCE, there is a lot of description of the externalised expressed violence of the acute or end stage state but more commonly the terror is internalised. There have been acts of aggression to them. There is a conflict on the one side rage, anger, violence, attacking, biting, killing and on the other FEAR of death, isolation, black objects, the dark.

It is the remedy archetypically fundamental to our existence, related to birth and death, coming from the darkness into the light. Separation from the source of life. Rub: Forsaken, alone, desertion (actual or fear of). There is a great desire for light and company.

Del: dead on one side, Del: double. Problems with knives, the symbol of cutting, dividing, at birth, at death.

BIRTH fear of rushing water, long dark corridor with light at end,  fear of bright objects, fear people with knives.

Aetiology of twins, especially if one died, asthma from circumcision, fast births. Big asthma remedy, related to suffocating love or being abandoned. CAMPHOR is only Rx more abandoned: DEL: alone in a cold unfriendly world. DEL: at bottom of a grave and turning to dust, strong feeling of worthlessness. May want to suffer and live like a saint, desire to die.

Fear of dogs, dogs guard the entrance to Hades, the undead, ideas around the Dracula legend,  Fear of reflections on water, mirrors.
Write backwards (mirror image). The remedy can be very useful in  ADHD and Autism when the child is terrorised by the state, or feels abandoned with it. The practitioner would have to differentiate with DPT which has more of the anit-social behavior, not able to reach out and communicate. In DPT the maintaining factor is the state of AUTISM in STRAMONIUM it is the fear.

Aversion to light (Lady Macbeth). Skin complaints < in sun. Macbeth is a play of black and red, of twilight and the night. Lord Macbeth is a soldier, good with a sword. These are the themes that run through STRAMONIUM. Children prefer swords to guns and can be anxious about sharp things.

Macbeth is a play of a country at war and STRAMONIUM holds the effects of social terror. Countries under a dictator or after nuclear discharge (something unseen that kills). Europe was cut into two one part buried the other alive. And at the family level parents separate, the child is cut into two.

Fear of being exposed, vulnerable to attack, desire to hide. Isolated in society, buries one’s past, interested in new things (e.g. religions).

Dreams of animals, dreams in black and white

CHILDREN active after school (something shared with LYCOPODIUM which is the chronic remedy of STRAMONIUM), stutters, bites nails, hungry but doesn’t eat, sleep walks and talks. Children are often fascinated with war and knives, will carry a sword with them.