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Blake's watercolor illustrates a passage from the beginning of Act I, scene vii of Macbeth, where Macbeth in a soliloquy debates the contemplated murder of Duncan, who, he says, Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been So clear in his great office, that his virtues Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued against The deep damnation of his taking-off; And pity, like a naked new-born babe Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubin horsed Upon the sightless couriers of the air, Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye That tears shall drown the wind. Blake worked out the composition of this print in two preliminary pencil sketches, both now in the British Museum. In the first drawing the horses of the cherubim rise at a steeper angle. In the second sketch the horses gallop as they do now in an almost horizontal line, but the figure of the woman is partially raised. Only in this final version does she lie completely flat on the ground and look up at the "sightless couriers" (Johnson 217-18). Blake thus unites Shakespeare's two images of pity--the babe striding the blast and heaven's cherubin on horseback--in this single, striking illustration of the text.
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