The renunciation; the forgiving

Before Prospero's cell. Ariel reports that the courtiers are all gathered, frozen by Prospero's spell, weeping. Prospero decides he has gone far enough. "The rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance." He puts on his magic robe one last time, draws a circle on the ground, and Ariel leads the company in: Alonso, Sebastian, Antonio, Gonzalo, all standing as if charmed. Prospero, invisible to them, addresses each in turn. He speaks the renunciation: "this rough magic I here abjure... I'll break my staff, bury it certain fathoms in the earth, and deeper than did ever plummet sound I'll drown my book." The charm dissolves. The courtiers wake to find Prospero standing in the dukely robes Ariel has dressed him in.

Alonso, dazed, recognizes him. Prospero embraces him. Alonso resigns the dukedom of Milan, asks pardon, and is given it openly. Then Prospero turns to Sebastian and Antonio. To Sebastian he says he could, if he chose, "justify you traitors" — name, in front of the king, what was attempted on the beach — and chooses not to. To Antonio he says, "for you, most wicked sir, whom to call brother would even infect my mouth, I do forgive thy rankest fault... and require my dukedom of thee, which perforce, I know, thou must restore." Antonio gives the dukedom back. He says nothing else. The line over which more critical ink has been spilled than perhaps any other in the play is the line Antonio does not speak.

Prospero draws back the curtain to his cell and reveals Ferdinand and Miranda playing chess. Alonso, who has spent the day believing his son drowned, weeps for joy. Miranda, seeing the courtiers behind him, gives the play's most-quoted line: "O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, that has such people in't!" Prospero, who knows exactly what kind of people these are, says quietly, "tis new to thee." The Boatswain arrives with news that the ship is whole. Ariel drives in Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo in their stolen robes; Caliban, looking at his father's old enemy, says, "I'll be wise hereafter, and seek for grace. What a thrice-double ass was I, to take this drunkard for a god." Prospero promises one last night's hospitality and a fair voyage home in the morning. Then, alone with Ariel, he releases him: "to the elements be free, and fare thou well." Ariel exits singing.