Thou find'ft, to be too bufie is fome danger.
Leave wringing of your hands, peace, fit you down,
And let me wring your heart, for fo I fhall
If it be made of penetrable stuff;
If damned cuftom have not braz'd it fo,
That it is proof and bulwark against sense.
Queen. What have I done, that thou dar'ft wag thy tongue' In noife fo rude against me?
That blurs the grace and blush of modefty,
Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love,
And fets a blifter there; makes marriage-vows
As falfe as dicers oaths. O fuch a deed,
As from the body of contraction plucks
The very foul, and fweet religion makes
A thapfody of words.
Heav'n's face doth glow;
Yea, this folidity and compound mass,
With triftful vifage as against the doom,
Is thought-fick at the act.
Queen, Ah me! what act,
That roars fo loud, and thunders in the index?
Ham. Look here upon this picture, and on this,
The counterfeit prefentment of two brothers:
See what a grace was feated on this brow,
Hyperion's curls, the front of Jove himself;
An eye like Mars, to threaten or command ;
A ftation like the herald Mercury
New-lighted on a heaven-kiffing hill;
A combination, and a form indeed,
Where every God did feem to fet his feal,
To give the world affurance of a man.
This was your husband.-Look you now what follows,
Here is your husband, like a mildew'd ear,
Blafting his wholfome brother. Have you eyes?
Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,
And batten on this moore? ha! have you eyes?
You cannot call it love; for at your age,
By contraction here is meant the fame thing as we understand now by contract: namely, a folemn promife or ingagement.
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment; and what judgment
Would ftep from this to this? what devil was't,
That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind?
O fhame! where is thy blush? rebellious heat,
If thou canst mutiny in a matron's bones,
To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,
And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shame,
When the compulfive ardour gives the charge,
Since froft it felf as actively doth burn,
And reafon panders will.
Queen. O Hamlet, speak no more.
Thou turn'ft mine eyes into my very foul,
And there I fee fuch black and grained spots
As will not leave their tinct.
Ham. Nay, but to live
In the rank fweat of an incestuous bed,
Stew'd in corruption, honying and making love
Over the nafty sty
Queen. Oh fpeak no more,
These words like daggers enter in mine ears.
No more, fweet Hamlet.
Ham. A murderer and a villain! ·
A flave, that is not twentieth part the tythe
Of your precedent Lord. A vice of Kings,
A cutpurfe of the empire and the rule,
That from a fhelf the precious diadem ftole
And put it in his pocket.
Ham. A king of fhreds and patches
Save me! and hover o'er me with your wings, [Starting up. You heav'nly guards! what would your gracious figure? Queen. Alas, he's mad.
Ham. Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
That laps'd in time and paffion, lets go by
Th' important acting of your dread command?
O fay.
Ghot. Do not forget: this vifitation
Is but to whet thy almoft blunted purpose.
But look! amazement on thy mother fits;
Oftep between her and her fighting foul:
Conceit in weakest bodies ftrongest works.
Speak to her, Hamlet.
Ham. How is it with you, Lady?
Queen. Alas, how is't with you,
That thus you bend your eye on vacancy,
And with th' incorporal air do hold difcourfe?
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep,
And as the fleeping foldiers in th' alarm,
Your bedded hairs, like life in excrements,
Start up and ftand on end. O gentle fon,
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper
Sprinkle cool patience. Whercon do you look?
Ham. On him! on him!-look you how pale he glares ¡
His form and caufe conjoin'd, preaching to ftones,
Would make them capable. Do not look on me,
Left with this piteous action you convert
My ftern effects; then what I have to do,
Will want true colour; tears perchance for blood.
Queen. To whom do you speak this?
Ham. Do you fee nothing there? [Pointing to the Ghoft.
Queen. Nothing at all, yet all that is I fee.
Ham. Nor did you nothing hear?
Queen. No, nothing but ourselves.
Ham. Why, look you there! look how it steals away!
My father in his habit as he lived!
Look where he goes ev'n now out at the portal. [Exit Ghoft. Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain,
This bodilefs creation Ecftafie
Is very cunning in.
Ham. What ecftafie ?
My pulfe, as yours, doth temp'rately keep time,
And makes as healthful mufick. "Tis not madness
That I have utter'd; bring me to the teft,
And I the matter will re-word; which madness
Would gambol from. Mother, for love of grace,
Lay not that flattering unction to your foul,
That not your trefpafs, but my madness speaks :
In this Author the Hair is often call'd an excrement,
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place,
Whilft rank corruption mining all within,
Infects unfeen. Confefs your felf to heav'n,
Repent what's paft, avoid what is to come,
And do not spread the compoft on the weeds
To make them ranker. Forgive this my virtue,
For in the fatness of these purfie times,
Virtue it felf of vice muft pardon beg,
Yea, courb, and wooe, for leave to do it good.
Queen. Oh Hamlet! thou haft cleft my heart in twain.
Ham. O throw away the worfer part of it,
And live the purer with the other half.
Good night; but go not to mine uncle's bed.
Affume a virtue if you have it not.
That monfter cuftom, who all sense doth eat
Of habits evil, is angel yet in this
That to the use of actions fair and good,
He likewife gives a frock or livery
That aptly is put on: Refrain to-night,
And that fhall lend a kind of eafiness
To the next abftinence; the next more eafie;
For ufe can almoft change the ftamp of nature,
And mafter ev'n the devil, or throw him out
With wondrous potency. Once more, good night!
And when you are defirous to be bleft,
I'll bleffing beg of you. For this fame Lord,
[Pointing to Polonius.
I do repent: but the heavens have pleas'd it fo
To punish him with me, and me with this
That I must be their scourge and minister.
I will bestow him, and will answer well
The death I gave him; fo again, good night!
I must be cruel, only to be kind;
Thus bad begins, and worfe remains behind.
Queen. What fhall I do?
Ham. Not this by no means that I bid you do.
Let the fond King tempt you again to bed,
Pinch wanton on your cheek, call you his mouse,
And let him for a pair of reechy kiffes,
Or padling in your neck with his damn'd fingers,
Make you to ravel all this matter out,
That I effentially am not in madness,
But mad in craft. 'Twere good you let him know.
For who that's but a Queen, fair, fober, wife,
Would from a paddock, from a bat, a gibbe,
Such dear concernings hide? who would do fo?
No, in defpight of sense and secrecy,
Unpeg the basket on the house's top,
Let the bird's fly; and like the famous ape
To try conclufions in the basket creep,
And break your own neck down.
Queen. Be thou affur'd, if words be made of breath, And breath of life, I have no life to breathe
What thou haft faid to me.
Ham. I muft to England, you know that.
Queen. Alack, I had forgot; 'tis fo concluded.
Ham. There's letters feal'd, and my two fchool-fellows,
(Whom I will truft as I will adders fang'd,)
They bear the mandate; they muft fweep my way
And marshal me to knavery: let it work,
For 'tis the fport to have the engineer
Hoift with his own petar: and't shall go hard
But I will delve one yard below their mines,
And blow them at the moon. O'tis moft sweet
When in one line two crafts directly meet!
This man fhall fet me packing;
I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room;
Mother, good night! Indeed this counsellor
Is now moft ftill, moft fecret, and moft grave,
Who was in life a foolish prating knave.
Come, Sir, to draw toward an end with you.
Good night, mother! [Exeunt, Hamlet tugging out Pol.
ACT IV. SCENE I.
A Royal Apartment.
Enter King and Queen.
King. THERE's matter in these fighs; these profound
You must tranflate, 'tis fit we understand them.
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