Hamlet (16 page)
Authors: William Shakespeare
cannot play upon me.— God bless you, sir!
To the entering Polonius
Enter Polonius
POLONIUS
My lord, the queen would speak with you, and
HAMLET
Do you see that cloud that’s almost in shape like a
camel?
POLONIUS
By th’mass
358
, and it’s like a camel indeed.
HAMLET
Methinks it is like a weasel.
POLONIUS
It is backed like a weasel.
HAMLET
Or like a whale?
POLONIUS
Very like a whale.
HAMLET
Then will I will come to my mother by and by.—
Aside
They
fool me to the top of my bent
364
.— I will come by and by.
POLONIUS
I will say so.
Exit
HAMLET
‘By and by’ is easily said.
Leave me, friends.
[
Exeunt all but Hamlet
]
’Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood
And do such bitter business as the day
Would quake to look on. Soft, now to my mother.
O heart, lose not thy
nature
373
; let not ever
The soul of
Nero
374
enter this firm bosom:
Let me be cruel, not unnatural.
I will speak daggers to her, but use none.
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites:
How in my words
somever
378
she be shent,
To
give them seals
379
never my soul consent!
[
Exit
]
running scene 9
Enter King, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
KING
I like
him
1
not, nor stands it safe with us
To let his madness range. Therefore prepare you:
I your commission will forthwith
dispatch
3
,
And he to England shall along with you.
The
terms of our estate
5
may not endure
Hazard so dangerous as doth hourly grow
Out of his lunacies.
GUILDENSTERN
We will ourselves
provide
8
:
Most holy and religious
fear
9
it is
To keep those many many bodies safe
That live and feed upon your majesty.
ROSENCRANTZ
The
single and peculiar
12
life is bound
With all the strength and armour of the mind
To keep itself from
noyance
14
, but much more
That spirit upon whose
weal
15
depends and rests
The lives of many. The
cease
16
of majesty
Dies not alone, but like a
gulf
17
doth draw
What’s near it with it: it is a
massy
18
wheel
Fixed on the summit of the highest mount,
To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things
Are
mortised
21
and adjoined, which, when it falls,
Each small
annexment
,
petty consequence
22
,
Attends
the
boist’rous
23
ruin. Never alone
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.
KING
Arm you
25
, I pray you, to this speedy voyage,
For we will fetters put upon this fear,
Which now goes too free-footed.
BOTH
We will haste us.
Exeunt Gentlemen
[
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
]
Enter Polonius
POLONIUS
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
31
,
And, as you said, and wisely was it said,
’Tis
meet
33
that some more audience than a mother,
Since nature makes them partial, should o’erhear
The speech,
of vantage
35
. 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
39
, it smells to heaven:
It hath the
primal eldest curse
40
upon’t,
A brother’s murder. Pray can I not,
Though
inclination be as sharp as will
42
:
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent,
And like a man to double business
bound
44
,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
And both neglect. What if this cursèd hand
Were thicker than itself with brother’s blood,
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens
To wash it white as snow?
Whereto serves mercy
49
But to confront the visage of offence?
And what’s in prayer but this two-fold force,
To be
forestallèd
52
ere we come to fall,
Or pardoned being down? Then I’ll look up:
My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer
Can serve my
turn
55
? ‘Forgive me my foul murder’?
That cannot be, since I am still possessed
Of those
effects
57
for which I did the murder:
My crown, mine own ambition and my queen.
May one be pardoned and retain
th’offence
59
?
In the corrupted
currents
60
of this world
Offence’s
gilded
hand may shove
by
61
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
64
In his true nature, and we ourselves compelled,
Even
to the teeth and forehead
66
of our faults,
To
give in
evidence. What then? What
rests
67
?
Try what repentance can. What can it not?
Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?
O, wretched state! O, bosom black as death!
O,
limèd
71
soul that, struggling to be free,
Art more engaged! Help, angels, make
assay
72
!
Bow, stubborn knees, and heart with strings of steel,
Kneels
Be soft as sinews of the newborn babe!
All may be well.
Enter Hamlet
HAMLET
Now might I do it
pat
76
, now he is praying:
Draws
And now I’ll do’t. And so he goes to heaven,
And so am I revenged. That
would be scanned
78
:
A villain kills my father, and for that,
I, his
foul
80
son, do this same villain send
To heaven.
O, this is
hire and salary
82
, not revenge.
He took my father
grossly, full of bread
83
,
With all his crimes
broad blown
84
, as fresh as May,
And how his
audit
85
stands who knows save heaven?
But in our
circumstance and course of thought
86
’Tis
heavy
87
with him: and am I then revenged,
To
take him
88
in the purging of his soul,
When he is fit and
seasoned
for his
passage
89
?
No.
Puts up his sword
Up, sword, and know thou a more horrid
hent
91
:
When he is
drunk asleep
92
, or in his rage,
Or in th’incestuous pleasure of his bed,
At gaming, swearing, or about some act
That has no
relish
95
of salvation in’t,
Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven,
And that his soul may be as damned and black
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother
stays
98
.
This
physic
99
but prolongs thy sickly days.
Exit
KING
My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:
Words without thoughts never to heaven go.
Exit
running scene 10
Enter Queen and Polonius
POLONIUS
He will come
straight
. Look you
lay home
1
to him:
Tell him his pranks have been too
broad
2
to bear with,
And that your grace hath screened and stood between
Much
heat
4
and him. I’ll silence me e’en here.
Pray you, be
round
5
with him.
Within
HAMLET
Mother, mother, mother!
GERTRUDE
I’ll warrant you,
Fear me not: withdraw, I hear him coming.
Polonius hides behind the arras
Enter Hamlet
HAMLET
Now, mother, what’s the matter?
GERTRUDE
Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
HAMLET
Mother, you have my father much offended.
GERTRUDE
Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
HAMLET
Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
GERTRUDE
Why, how now, Hamlet?
HAMLET
What’s the matter now?
GERTRUDE
Have you forgot me?
HAMLET
No, by the
rood
18
, not so:
You are the
queen
19
, your husband’s brother’s wife,
But — would you were not so — you are my mother.
GERTRUDE
Nay, then, I’ll set those to you that can speak.
HAMLET
Come, come, and sit you down, you shall not budge:
You go not till I set you up a
glass
23
Where you may see the inmost part of you.
GERTRUDE
What wilt thou do? Thou wilt not murder me?
Help, help, ho!
Behind the arras
POLONIUS
What, ho? Help, help, help!
HAMLET
How now? A rat?
Dead, for a ducat, dead
28
!
Draws
[
Hamlet
]
kills Polonius
POLONIUS
O, I am slain!
GERTRUDE
O me, what hast thou done?
HAMLET
Nay, I know not: is it the king?
GERTRUDE
O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!
HAMLET
A bloody deed: almost as bad, good mother,
As kill a king and marry with his brother.
GERTRUDE
As kill a king?
HAMLET
Ay, lady, ’twas my word.—
Discovers Polonius
Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell.
I took thee for thy better: take thy fortune;
Thou find’st to be too
busy
39
is some danger.—
Leave wringing of your hands. Peace. Sit you down,
And let me wring your heart, for so I shall,
If it be made of penetrable stuff,
If damnèd custom have not
brazed
43
it so
That it is
proof
and bulwark against sense
44
.
GERTRUDE
What have I done, that thou dar’st wag thy tongue
In noise so
rude
46
against me?
HAMLET
Such an act
That blurs the grace and blush of modesty,
Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love
And sets a blister there, makes marriage vows
As false as dicers’ oaths: O, such a deed
As from the body of
contraction
53
plucks
The very soul, and sweet religion makes
A
rhapsody
of words. Heaven’s face doth
glow
55
:
Yea,
this solidity and compound mass
56
With
tristful
visage,
as against the doom
57
,
Is thought-sick at the act.
GERTRUDE
Ay me, what act,
That roars so loud and thunders in the
index
60
?
HAMLET
Look here, upon this picture, and on this,