Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks, that rent the air, / Are made, not mark’d; where violent sorrow seems / A modern ecstasy.
Act IV, Scene 3
Context
Ross continues describing Scotland's nightmarish conditions, explaining that suffering has become so commonplace that no one even notices individual tragedies anymore.
Analysis
The parallel structure 'made, not mark'd' uses sonic similarity (alliteration) to emphasize a devastating distinction—suffering is produced but not registered. The phrase 'modern ecstasy' is deliberately paradoxical: 'modern' here means ordinary or commonplace, so extreme grief ('ecstasy' as intense passion) has become routine. This oxymoron captures how tyranny normalizes horror, making the extraordinary ordinary through sheer repetition.
Essay Tip
Use this to argue that Ross's description reveals tyranny's deepest violence isn't spectacular brutality but the numbing of moral response—when 'violent sorrow' becomes 'modern,' the population loses its capacity to recognize evil, which is how dictatorships sustain themselves.