the default 1cpu/2048MB RAM
docker-machine stop
VBoxManage modifyvm default --cpus 2
VBoxManage modifyvm default --memory 4096
docker-machine start
You can then check your settings:
VBoxManage showvminfo default | grep Memory
VBoxManage showvminfo default | grep CPU
or a brute-force method
docker-machine rm default
docker-machine create -d virtualbox --virtualbox-cpu-count=8 --virtualbox-memory=4096 --virtualbox-disk-size=50000 default
And for docker-machine inspect to report the correct state of things, edit ~/.docker/machine/machines/default/config.json to reflect your changes.