|
|
King
|
I like him not, nor stands it safe with us |
|
4
|
|
To let his madness range. Therefore prepare
you; |
|
|
|
I your commission will forthwith dispatch, |
|
|
|
And he to England shall along with you. |
|
|
|
The terms of our estate may not endure |
|
8
|
|
Hazard so dangerous as doth hourly grow |
|
|
|
Out of his lunacies. |
|
|
Guildenstern
|
We will ourselves provide. |
|
|
|
Most holy and religious fear it is |
|
12
|
|
To keep those many many bodies safe |
|
|
|
That live and feed upon your majesty. |
|
|
Rosencrantz
|
The single and peculiar life is bound |
|
|
|
With all the strength and armour of the mind |
|
16
|
|
To keep itself from noyance; but much more |
|
|
|
That spirit upon whose weal depend and rest |
|
|
|
The lives of many. The cease of majesty |
|
|
|
Dies not alone, but, like a gulf doth draw |
|
20
|
|
What’s near it with it; it is a massy wheel, |
|
|
|
Fix’d on the summit of the highest mount, |
|
|
|
To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things |
|
|
|
Are mortis’d and adjoin’d; which,
when it falls, |
|
24
|
|
Each small annexment, petty consequence, |
|
|
|
Attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone |
|
|
|
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan. |
|
|
King
|
Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage; |
|
28
|
|
For we will fetters put upon this fear, |
|
|
|
Which now goes too free-footed. |
|
|
Rosencrantz & Guildenstern
|
We will haste us. [Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.] |
|
|
|
Enter POLONIUS. |
|
32
|
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; |
|
|
|
And, as you said, and wisely was it said, |
|
36
|
|
’Tis meet that some more audience than
a mother, |
|
|
|
Since nature makes them partial, should o’er-hear |
|
|
|
The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege: |
|
|
|
I’ll call upon you ere you go to bed |
|
40
|
|
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; |
|
44
|
|
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, |
|
48
|
|
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 |
|
52
|
|
To wash it white as snow? Whereto 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, |
|
56
|
|
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 |
|
60
|
|
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 |
|
64
|
|
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 |
|
68
|
|
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? |
|
72
|
|
Yet what can it, when one can not repent? |
|
|
|
O wretched state! O bosom black as death! |
|
|
|
O limed soul, that struggling to be free |
|
|
|
Art more engaged! Help, angels! make assay; |
|
76
|
|
Bow, stubborn knees; and heart with strings
of steel |
|
|
|
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe. |
|
|
|
All may be well. [Retires and kneels. |
|
|
|
Enter HAMLET. |
|
80
|
Hamlet
|
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: |
|
|
|
A villain kills my father; and for that, |
|
84
|
|
I, his sole son, do this same villain send |
|
|
|
To heaven. |
|
|
|
Why, this is hire and salary, not revenge. |
|
|
|
He took my father grossly, full of bread, |
|
88
|
|
With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May; |
|
|
|
And how his audit stands who knows save heaven? |
|
|
|
But in our circumstance and course of thought |
|
|
|
’Tis heavy with him. And am I then reveng’d, |
|
92
|
|
To take him in the purging of his soul, |
|
|
|
When he is fit and season’d for his passage? |
|
|
|
No. |
|
|
|
Up, sword, and know thou a more horrid hent; |
|
96
|
|
When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, |
|
|
|
Or in the incestuous pleasure 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.] |
|
104
|
|
The KING rises and advances. |
|
|
King
|
My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: |
|
|
|
Words without thoughts never to heaven go. [Exit.] |
