The Family Shakspeare

Enter KING, QUEEN, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN.

King. And can you, by no drift of conference Get from him, why he puts on this confusion; Grating so harshly all his days of quiet With turbulent and dangerous lunacy?

Ros. He does confess, he feels himself distracted; But from what cause he will by no means speak. Guil. Nor do we find him forward to be sounded; But with a crafty madness, keeps aloof, When we would bring him on to some confession Of his true state.

Queen.

Did he receive you well?

To hear him so inclin'd.

Good gentlemen, give him a further edge,
And drive his purpose on to these delights.
Ros. We shall, my lord.

[Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and Guildenstern.
King.
Sweet Gertrude, leave us too.
For we have closely sent for Hamlet hither;
That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia :

Her father, and myself (lawful espials 8),

Will so bestow ourselves, that, seeing, unseen,
We may of their encounter frankly judge;
And gather by him, as he is behav'd,
If't be the affliction of his love, or no,
That thus he suffers for.

Queen.
I shall obey you:
And, for your part, Ophelia, I do wish,
That your good beauties be the happy cause
Of Hamlet's wildness: so shall I hope, your virtues
Will bring him to his wonted way again,
To both your honours.
Oph.

Madam, I wish it may.

[Exit QUEEN.

Pol. Ophelia, walk you here: - - Gracious, so please you,

We will bestow ourselves: - Read on this book; [TO OPHELIA. That show of such an exercise may colour Your loneliness. We are oft to blame in this, — 'Tis too much prov'd 9,—that, with devotion's visage, The devil himself. And pious action, we do sugar o'er

King.

O, 'tis too true! how smart

A lash that speech doth give my conscience!
The harlot's cheek, beautied with plastering art,
Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it,
Than is my deed to my most painted word:
O heavy burden!

[Aside. Pol. I hear him coming; let's withdraw, my lord [Exeunt KING and POLONIUS. Enter HAMLET.

Ham. To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune;
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And, by opposing, end them? To die,
sleep,

No more; - and, by a sleep, to say we end The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation Devoutly to be wish'd. To die; to sleep :

To sleep! perchance to dream;-ay, there's the rub;

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: There's the respect,
That makes calamity of so long life:

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despis'd love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus + make
With a bare bodkin? 5 Who would fardels 6 bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life!
But that the dread of something after death, -
The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn 7
No traveller returns, - puzzles the will;
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprizes of great pith and moment,
With this regard, their currents turn awry,

9 Too frequent. 1 Stir, bustle. 2 Consideration.
4 Quiet.

I never gave you aught.

No, not I:

Oph. My honour'd lord, you know right well, you did;

And, with them, words of so sweet breath compos'd
As made the things more rich: their perfume lost,
Take these again; for to the noble mind,
Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove unkind.
There, my lord.

Ham. Ha, ha! are you honest?
Oph. My lord?

Ham. Are you fair?

Oph. What means your lordship?

Ham. That if you be honest and fair, you should admit no discourse to your beauty. Oph. Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty?

Ham. Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner debase honesty from what it is, than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness; this was some time a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love you once.

Oph. Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. Ham. You should not have believed me: for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock, but we shall relish of it: I lov'd you not.

Oph. I was the more deceived.

Ham. Get thee to a nunnery; Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could accuse me of such things, that it were better my mother had not borne me: I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at my beck, than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in: What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven! We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us: Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where's your father?

Oph. At home, my lord.

Ham. Let the doors be shut upon him; that he may play the fool no where but in 's own house. Farewell.

Oph. O, help him, you sweet heavens ! Ham. If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague for thy dowry; Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery; farewell: Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough, what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go; and quickly too. Farewell.

you

Oph. Heavenly powers, restore him! Ham. I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; Nature hath given you one face, and make yourselves another: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nick-name God's creatures, and make your wantonness your ignorance: Go to; I'll no more of 't; it hath made me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages; those that are married already, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go. [Exit HAMLET.

8 Prayers.

Oph. O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown! The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword:

The expectancy and rose of the fair state,

The glass of fashion, and the mould of form,

The observed of all observers ! quite, quite down!
And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,
That suck'd the honey of his musick vows,
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;
That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth,
Blasted with ecstasy 9; O, woe is me!

To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!
Re-enter KING and POLONIUS.

King. Love! his affections do not that way tend; Nor what he spake, though it lack'd form a little, Was not like madness. There's something in his soul,

O'er which his melancholy sits on brood;
And, I do doubt, the hatch, and the disclose,
Will be some danger: Which for to prevent,
Thus set it down; He shall with speed to England.
I have, in quick determination,
For the demand of our neglected tribute:
Haply, the seas, and countries different,
This something-settled matter in his heart;
With variable objects, shall expel
Whereon his brains, still beating, puts him thus
From fashion of himself. What think you on't?
Pol. It shall do well: but yet I do believe,
The origin and commencement of his grief
How now Opbelia,
Sprung from neglected love.
You need not tell us what lord Hamlet said;
We heard it all. — My lord, do as you please;
But, if you hold it fit, after the play,
Let his queen mother all alone entreat him
To show his grief; let her be round with him;
Of all their conference: If she find him not,
And I'll be plac'd, so please you in the ear,
To England send him : or confine him, where
Your wisdom best shall think.
It shall be so:
Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go.
[Exeunt.

King.

SCENE II.

A Hall in the same.

Enter HAMLET, and certain Players.

Ham. Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue : but if you mouth it, as many of our players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus; but use all gently; for in the very torrent, tempest, and (as I may say) whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance, that may give it smoothness. O, it offends me to the soul, to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings 2; who, for the most part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb shows and noise: I would have such a fellow whipt for o'er-doing Termagant; it out-herods Herod3: Pray you, avoid it.

1 Play. I warrant your honour.

Ham. Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the

9 Alienation of mind.

1 Reprimand him with freedom.

2 The meaner people then seem to have sat in the pit. 3 Herod's character was always violent.

Something too much of this.
There is a play to-night before the king;
One scene of it comes near the circumstance,
Which I have told thee of my father's death.
I pr'ythee, when thou seest that act afoot,
Even with the very comment of thy soul
Observe my uncle: if his occulted 7 guilt
Do not itself unkennel in one speech,
It is a damned ghost that we have seen;
And my imaginations are as foul
As Vulcan's stithy.8 Give him heedful note:
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face :
And, after, we will both our judgments join
In censure 9 of his seeming.
Hor.
Well, my lord:

word, the word to the action; with this special | As I do thee.
observance, that you o'er-step not the modesty of
nature for any thing so overdone is from the pur-
pose of playing, whose end, both at the first, and
now, was, and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirrour up
to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn
her own image, and the very age and body of the
time, his form and pressure. Now this, overdone,
or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful
laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the
censure of which one, must, in your allowance 5,
o'er-weigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be
players, that I have seen play, and heard others
praise, and that highly, — not to speak it profanely,
that, neither having the accent of Christians, nor
the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so
strutted, and bellowed, that I have thought some
of nature's journeymen had made men, and not
made them well, they imitated humanity so abomi-
nably.

1 Play. I hope, we have reformed that indifferently with us.

Ham. O, reform it altogether. And let those, that play your clowns, speak no more than is set down for them: for there be of them, that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too; though, in the mean time, some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that's villainous; and shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. [Exeunt Players. Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUIL

Hor. Here, sweet lord, at your service.
Ham. Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man
As e'er my conversation cop'd withal.
Hor. O, my dear lord,

Ham.

Nay, do not think I flatter:
For what advancement may I hope from thee,
That no revenue hast, but thy good spirits,
To feed, and clothe thee? Why should the poor be
flatter'd ?

No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp;
And crook the pregnant 6 hinges of the knee,
Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear?
Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish her election,
She hath seal'd thee for herself: for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing;
A man, that fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and bless'd are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well co-mingled, |
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please: Give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,
⚫ Approbation.

4 Iropression, resemblance. 6 Quick, ready.

If he steal aught, the whilst this play is playing,
And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft.
Ham. They are coming to the play; I must be
idle:

Get you a place.

Danish March. A Flourish. Enter KING, QUEEN,
POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDEN-
STERN, and others.

King. How fares our cousin Hamlet?
Ham. Excellent, i' faith; of the camelion's dish:
I eat the air, promise-crammed: You cannot feed
capons so.

King. I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these words are not mine.

Ham. No, nor mine now. My lord, - you played once in the university, you say? [TO POLONIUS. Pol. That did I, my lord: and was accounted a good actor.

Ham. And what did you enact?

Pol. I did enact Julius Cæsar; I was kill'd i' the Capitol; Brutus killed me.

Ham. It was a brute part of him, to kill so capital a calf there. - Be the players ready?

Ros. Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience.
Queen. Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.
Ham. No, good mother, here's metal more
attractive.

[Lying down at OPHELIA's Feet. Pol. O ho! do you mark that? [To the KING, Oph. You are merry, my lord.

Oph. Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord.

Ham. So long? Nay, then let the devil wear black, for I'll have a suit of sables. O heavens ! die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there's hope, a great man's memory may outlive his life half a year: But he must build churches then : or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horse; whose epitaph is, For, 0, for, 0, the hobby-horse is forgot.

Enter Prologue.

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

But, what we do determine, oft we break.
Purpose is 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 8 with themselves destroy :
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
This world is not for aye; nor 'tis not strange,

Ham. We shall know by this fellow: the players That even our loves should with our fortunes change; cannot keep counsel; they'll tell all.

Oph. Will he tell us what this show meant?
Ham. Ay.

Oph. I'll mark the play.

Pro. For us, and for our tragedy,

Here stooping to your clemency,

We beg your hearing patiently.

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.

Ham. Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? But, orderly to end where I begun, —
Oph. 'Tis brief, my lord.

Ham. As woman's love.

Enter a King and a Queen.

P. King. Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart
gone round

Neptune's salt wash, and Tellus' 3 orbed ground;
And thirty dozen moons, with borrow'd sheen 4,
About the world have times twelve thirties been;
Since love our hearts, and Hymen did our hands,
Unite commutual in most sacred bands.

P. Queen. So many journeys may the sun and

moon •

Make us again count o'er, ere love be done!
But, woe is me, you are so sick of late,

So far from cheer, and from your former state,
That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust,
Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must:
For women fear too much, even as they love;
And women's fear and love hold quantity;
In neither aught, or in extremity.
Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd 3, my fear is so.
Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
P. King. 'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and
shortly too;

My operant 6 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.

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 9 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,

P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn.
here a while;

[To OPHELIA. Sweet, leave me

[Exit.

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

P. Queen. The instances 7, that second marriage that have free souls, it touches us not: Let the

move,

Are base respects of thrift, but none of love;

A second time I kill my husband dead,
When second husband wins me to his bed.

2 Secret wickedness. 3 The earth.

4 Shining, lustre. 5 In proportion to the extent of my love. • Active. 7 Motives.

galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.

Ham. Begin, murderer; faces, and begin. Come;

The croaking raven

Doth bellow for revenge.

Ham. You are welcome.

Guil. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother's com

Luc. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and mandment: if not, your pardon, and my return,

time agreeing;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing;

Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,
With Hecat's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,
Thy natural magick 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 Turk with me,) with two
Provencial roses on my razed 2 shoes, get me a fel-
lowship in a cry 3 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 the poisoning,

Hor. I did very well note him.

Ham. Ah, ah! Come, some musick; come, the recorders.4

For if the king like not the comedy,

Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy. 5—

Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.

Come, some musick.

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Ros. She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed.

Ham. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us?

Ros. My lord, you once did love me.

Ham. And do still, by these pickers and stealers. Ros. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, but bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny your griefs to your friend.

Ham. Sir, I lack advancement.

Ros. How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark? Ham. Ay, sir, but While the grass grows,― the proverb is something musty.

Enter the Players, with Recorders. O, the recorders: let me see one. To withdraw with you: Why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil? Guil. O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too unmannerly.

Ham. I do not well understand that. Will you play upon this pipe?

Guil. My lord, I cannot.

Ham. I pray you.

Guil. Believe me, I cannot.
Ham. I do beseech you.

Guil. I know no touch of it, my lord.

Ham. 'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages 6 with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent

Guil. Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with musick. Look you, these are the stops.

you.

Ham. Sir, a whole history.

Guil. The king, sir,

Ham. Ay, sir, what of him?

Guil. But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony; I have not the skill.

Ham. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me? You would play upon me; you

Guil. Is, in his retirement, marvellous distem- would seem to know my stops; you would pluck

pered.

Ham. With drink, sir?

Guil. No, my lord, with choler.

Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer, to signify this to the doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation, would, perhaps, plunge him into more choler.

Guil. Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame, and start not so wildly from my affair. Ham. I am tame, sir:-) - pronounce. Guil. The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.

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