P. King. 'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too;

My operant powers their functions leave to do:
And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,
Honour'd, belov'd; and, haply, one as kind
For husband shalt thou-

P. Queen.
O, confound the rest!
Such love must needs be treason in my breast:
In second husband let me be accurst!

None wed the second, but who kill'd the first.
Ham. That's wormwood.

P. Queen. The instances,2 that second marriage

move,

Are base respects of thrift, but none of love;
A second time I kill my husband dead,

When second husband kisses me in bed.

P. King. I do believe, you think what now you

speak:

But, what we do determine, oft we break.
Purpose but the slave to memory;

Of violent birth, but poor validity:

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;
But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.
Most necessary 'tis, that we forget
To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:
What to ourselves in passion we propose,
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
The violence of either grief or joy
Their own enactures with themselves destroy :
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
This world is not for aye 4 nor 'tis not strange,
That even our loves should with our fortunes change;
For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,
Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.
The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;
The poor advanc'd makes friends of enemies.
And hitherto doth love on fortune tend:
For who not needs, shall never lack a friend;
And who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.

But, orderly to end where I begun,—
Our wills, and fates, do so contráry run,
That our devices still are overthrown;
Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:
So think thou wilt no second husband wed;
But die thy thoughts, when thy first lord is dead.

P. Queen. Nor earth to give me food, nor heaven
light!

Sport and repose lock from me, day and night!
To desperation turn my trust and hope!
An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope!
Each opposite, that blanks the face of joy,
Meet what I would have well, and it destroy!
Both here, and hence, pursue me lasting strife,
If, once a widow, ever I be wife!
Ham. If she should break it now,

[To Oph

P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here a while;

My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile
The tedious day with sleep.

[Sleeps. P. Queen. Sleep rock thy brain; And never come mischance between us twain! [Exit.

Ham. Madam, how like you this play?
Queen. The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

(1) Active. (2) Motives. (3) Determinations. (4) Ever. (5) Anchoret's.

(6)

-the thing In which he'll catch the conscience of the king.

Ham. O, but she'll keep her word. King. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in't?

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence i'the world.

King. What do you call the play?

Ham. The Mouse-trap.6 Marry, how? Tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: But what of that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: Let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.—

-The croaking raven

Doth bellow for revenge.

Luc. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing;
Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,
With Hecate's bans thrice blasted, thrice infected,
Thy natural magic and dire property,
On wholesome life usurp immediately.

[Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears. Ham. He poisons him i'the garden for his estate. His name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ ten in very choice Italian: You shall see anon, how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago's wife. Oph. The king rises.

Ham. What! frighted with false fire?
Queen. How fares my lord?
Pol. Give o'er the play.

King. Give me some light:-away!
Pol. Lights, lights, lights!

[Exeunt all but Hamlet and Horatio. Ham. Why, let the strucken deer go weep, The hart ungalled play:

For some must watch, while some must sleep;

Thus runs the world away.

Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers? (if the rest of my fortunes turn Turk10 with me,) with two Provencial roses on my razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry12 of players, sir?

Hor. Half a share.
Ham. A whole one, I.

For thou dost know, O Damon dear,
This realm dismantled was

Of Jove himself; and now reigns here
A very, very-peacock,

Hor. You might have rhymed.

Ham. O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pound. Didst perceive?

Hor. Very well, my lord.

Ham. Upon the talk of poisoning,

Hor. I did very well note him.

Ham. Ah, ha!-Come, some music; come, recorders.

the

Each small annexment, petty consequence,
Attends the boist'rous ruin. Never alone
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.
King. Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy

age;

For we will fetters put upon this fear,
Which now goes too free-footed.
Ros. Guil.
We will haste us.
[Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

Enter Polonius.

Pol. My lord, he's going to his mother's closet:
Behind the arras! I'll convey myself,
To hear the process; I'll warrant, she'll tax him
home :

And, as you said, and wisely was it said,
'Tis meet, that some more audience, than a mother,
Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear
The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege;
I'll call upon you ere you go to bed,
And tell you what I know.
King.
Thanks, dear my lord.
[Exit Polonius.
O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon't,
A brother's murder!-Pray can I not,
Though inclination be as sharp as will;
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;
And, like a man to double business bound,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
And both neglect. What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood?
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens,
To wash it white as snow? Where to serves mercy,
But to confront the visage of offence?
And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force,-
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall,
Or pardon'd, being down? Then I'll look up;
My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer
Can serve my turn? Forgive me my foul murder!-
That cannot be; since I am still possess'd
Of those effects for which I did the murder,
My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen.
May one be pardon'd, and retain the offence?
In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law: But 'tis not so above:
There is no shuffling, there the action lies
In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd,
Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
To give in evidence. What then? what rests?
Try what repentance can: What can it not?
Yet what can it, when one can not repent?
O wretched state! O bosom, black as death!
O limed2 soul; that struggling to be free,
Art more engag'd! Help, angels, make assay !
Bow, stubborn knees! and, heart with strings of
steel,

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe;
All may be well.

No.
Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent
When he is drunk, asleep, or in his rage;
Or in the incestuous pleasures of his bed;
At gaming, swearing; or about some act
That has no relish of salvation in't:
Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven;
And that his soul may be as damn'd, and black,
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays:
This physic but prolongs thy sickly days. [Exit.
The King rises and advances.

King. My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: Words, without thoughts, never to heaven go. [Exit. SCENE IV-Another room in the same. Enter Queen and Polonius.

Pol. He will come straight. Look, you lay home

to him:

Enter Hamlet.

Ham. Now might I do it, pat, now he is praying;
And now I'll do't; and so he goes to heaven:
And so am I reveng'd? That would be scann'd :3
A villain kills my father; and, for that,
I, his sole4 son, do this same villain send
To heaven.

Why, this is hire and salary,5 not revenge.
He took my father grossly, full of bread;

(1) Tapestry. (2) Caught as with bird-lime. (3) Should be considered. (4) Only.

Pol. [Behind.] What, ho! help! Ham. How now! a rat? [Draws Dead, for a ducat, dead.

[Hamlet makes a pass through the arras

Pol. [Behind.]

O, I am slain.

[Falls, and dies

Nay, I know not

Queen. O me, what hast thou done?

Ham.

Is it the king?

[Lifts up the arras, and draws forth Polonius

(5) Reward.

(6) Seize him at a more horrid time. (7) Cross.

This bodiless creation ecstasy!
Is very cunning in.
Ham. Ecstasy!

My pulse, as yours, doth temperately keep time,
And makes as healthful music: It is not madness,
That I have utter'd: bring me to the test,
And I the matter will re-word; which madness
Would gambol from. Mother, for love of
grace,
Lay not that flattering unction to your soul,
That not your trespass, but my madness, speaks:
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place;
Whiles rank corruption, mining all within,
Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven;
Repent what's past; avoid what is to come;
And do not spread the compost2 on the weeds,
To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue:
For in the fatness of these pursy times,
Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg;
Yea, curb3 and woo, for leave to do him good.
Queen. O Hamlet! thou hast cleft my heart in
twain.

Ham. O, throw away the worser part of it,
And live the purer with the other half.
Good night: but go not to my uncle's bed;
Assume a virtue, if you have it not.

That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat
Of habit's devil, is angel yet in this;
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock, or livery,
That aptly is put on: Refrain to-night;
And that shall lend a kind of easiness

To the next abstinence: the next more easy:
For use almost can change the stamp of nature,
And either curb the devil, or throw him out
With wondrous potency. Once more, good night!
And when you are desirous to be bless'd,
I'll blessing beg of you.-For this same lord,
[Pointing to Polonius.
I do repent: But heaven hath pleas'd it so,-
To punish me with this, and this with me,
That I must be their scourge and minister.
I will bestow him, and will answer well

The death I gave him. So, again, good night!
I must be cruel, only to be kind:

Thus bad begins, and worse remains behind.--
But one word more, good lady.
Queen.
What shall I do?
Ham. Not this, by no means, that I bid you do:
Let the bloat king tempt you again to bed;
Pinch wanton on your cheek; call you, his mouse;4
And let him, for a pair of reechy kisses,
Or paddling in your neck with his damned fingers,
Make you to ravel all this matter out,
That I essentially am not in madness,
But mad in craft. 'Twere good, you let him know:
For who, that's but a queen, fair, sober, wise,
Would from a paddock,6 from a bat, a gib,7
Such dear concernings hide? who would do so?
No, in despite of sense, and secrecy,
Unpeg the basket on the house's top,
Let the birds fly; and, like the famous ape,
To try conclusions,8 in the basket creep,
And break your own neck down.

I had forgot; 'tis so concluded on.
Ham. There's letters seal'd: and my two school
fellows,-

Whom I will trust, as I will adders fang'd,9-
They bear the mandate; they must sweep my way,
And marshal me to knavery: Let it work;
For 'tis the sport, to have the engineer
Hoist with his own petar:10 and it shall
go hard,
But I will delve one yard below their mines,
And blow them at the moon: O, 'tis most sweet,
When in one line two crafts directly meet.—
This man shall set me packing.

I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room:-
Mother, good night.-Indeed, this counsellor
Is now most still, most secret, and most grave,
Who was in life a foolish prating knave.
Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you :-
Good night, mother.

[Exeunt severally; Hamlet dragging in
Polonius.

ACT IV.

SCENE I-The same.

Enter King, Queen,

Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern.

King. There's matter in these sighs; these profound heaves;

You must translate: 'tis fit we understand them: Where is your son?

Queen. Bestow this place on us a little while.[To Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who go out. Ah, my good lord, what have I seen to-night!

King. What, Gertrude? how does Hamlet? Queen. Mad as the sea, and wind, when both contend

Which is the mightier: In his lawless fit,
Behind the arras hearing something stir,
Whips out his rapier, cries, A rat! a rat!
And, in this brainish apprehension, kills
The unseen good old man.

King.

O heavy deed! It had been so with us, had we been there : His liberty is full of threats to all; To you yourself, to us, to every one. Alas! how shall this bloody deed be answer'd? It will be laid to us, whose providence Should have kept short, restrain'd, and out of haunt,il This mad young man: but, so much was our love, We would not understand what was most fit; But, like the owner of a foul disease, To keep it from divulging, let it feed Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone?

Queen. To draw apart the body he hath kill'd: O'er whom his very madness, like some ore, Among a mineral13 of metals base, Shows itself pure; he weeps for what is done.

King. O, Gertrude, come away!

The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch, But we will ship him hence: and this vile deed We must, with all our majesty and skill,