And he befeech'd me to entreat your majesties KING. With all my heart, and it doth much content me To hear him fo inclin❜d. Good gentlemen, give him a further edge, And drive his purpose into these delights. Ros. We fhall, my lord. KING. Sweet Gertrude leave us too; Her father, and myself, lawful espials, QUEEN. I fhall obey you: And for my part, Ophelia, I do wish, That your good beauties be the happy cause Of Hamlet's wildness! fo fhall I hope, your virtues To both your honours, OP H. Madam, I wish it may. POL. Ophelia, walk you here. [Exeunt. [Exit Queen. -Gracious, so please ye, We will bestow ourselves-Read on this book, [To Ophelia. That shew of fuch an exercise may colour The devil himself, KING. Oh, 'tis true. How smart a lash that speech doth give my confcience ! The harlot's cheek, beautied with plastring art, Oh heavy burden! POL. I hear him coming; let's withdraw, my lord. [Afide. [Exeunt all but Ophelia. SCENE II. Enter Hamlet. HAM. To be, or not to be? that is the question.- To fleep? perchance, to dream. Ay, there's the rub; For who would bear the whips and fcorns of time, To groan and sweat under a weary life, And makes us rather bear those ills we have, [Seeing Ophelia with a book. The fair Ophelia ? Nymph, in thy orifons OP H. Good my lord, How does your honour for this many a day? HAM. I humbly thank you, well. OPH. My lord, I have remembrances of yours, That I have longed long to re-deliver. I pray you, now receive them. HAM. No, I never gave you aught. 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; that perfume loft, Take these again; for to the noble mind Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove unkind. HAM. Ha, ha! are you honeft? OPH. My lord. HAM. Are you fair? OPH. What means your lordship? 1 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 fooner transform honefty from what it is, to a bawd; than the force of honefty can tranflate beauty into its likeness. This was sometime a paradox, but now the time gives its proof. I did love you once. OP H. Indeed, my lord, you made me believe fo. HAM. You should not have believed me. For virtue cannot fo inoculate our old stock, but we shall relish of it. I lov'd you not. OPH. I was the more deceiv'd. HAM. Get thee to a nunnery. Why wouldst thou be a breeder of finners? I am myself indifferent honeft; but yet I could accuse me of fuch things, that it would be 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 fuch fellows, ac I, do crawling hetween heav'n and earth? we are errant knaves, believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where's your father? OPH. At home, my lord. HAM. Let the the doors be fhut upon him, that he may play the fool no where but in's own house. Farewel. OPн. Oh help him, you sweet heav'ns! HAM. If thou doft marry, I'll give thee this plague for thy dowry. Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou fhalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, farewel; or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wife men know well enough what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go, and quickly too. Farewel. OP н. Heav'nly powers restore him! HAM. I have heard of your painting too, well enough. God has given you one face, and you make yourselves another. You jig, you amble, and you lifp, and nick-name God's creatures, and make your wantonnefs your ignorance. Go to, I'll no more on't, it hath made me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages. Those that are married already, all but one, fhall live; the reft fhall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go. [Exit Hamlet. OP H. Oh, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown! The courtier's, foldier's, fcholar's, eye, tongue, sword; Th' expectancy and rofe of the fair state, The glass of fashion, and the mould of form, Th' observ'd of all obfervers! quite, quite down! T' have seen what I have seen; fee what I fee. SCENE III. Enter King and Polonius. KING. Love! his affections do not that way tend, |