Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter,
Giving more light than heat," extinct in both,

Even in their promise, as it is a making,
You must not take for fire. From this time,
Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence:
Set your entreatments at a higher rate,
Than a command to parley. For lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him, that he is young;
And with a larger tether may be walk,
Than may be given you. In few, Ophelia,
Do not believe his vows, for they are brokers
Not of that die which their investments show,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,
The better to beguile. This is for all,

I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment's leisure,
As to give words or talk with the lord Hamlet.
Look to 't, I charge you; come your ways.
Oph. I shall obey, my lord.

SCENE IV.

The Platform.

Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MARCELLUS.

Ham. The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.
Hor. It is a nipping, and an eager air.

Ham. What hour now?
Hor.

Mar. No, it is struck.

39

[Exeunt. |

40

I think, it lacks of twelve.

Hor. Indeed? I heard it not: it then draws near the season, Wherein the spirit held his wonted walk.

A Flourish of Trumpets, and Ordnance shot off, within. What does this mean, my lord?

Ham. The king doth wake to night, and takes his rouse, Keeps wassel, and the swaggering up-spring reels;

And as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,

The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out

The triumph of his pledge.

Hor.

Ham. Ay, marry, is 't:

Is it a custom ?

But to my mind, though I am native here,

And to the manner born, it is a custom

More honour'd in the breach, than the observance. |
This heavy-headed revel, east and west

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Makes us traduc'd and tax'd of other nations:

They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase
Soil our addition; and, indeed, it takes

From our achievements, though perform'd at height,
The pith and marrow of our attribute.

So, oft it chances in particular men,

That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As, in their birth, (wherein they are not guilty,
Since nature cannot choose his origin)
By their o'ergrowth of some complexion,

Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason;
Or by some habit, that too much o'er-leavens
The form of plausive manners;
that these men,

Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect
Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,
Their virtues else, be they as pure as grace,
As infinite as man may undergo,

Sball in the general censure take corruption
From that particular fault: the dram of ill
Doth all the noble substance, of a doubt,
To his own scandal

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Hor.

-1

Enter Ghost.

Look, my lord! it comes,

Ham. Angels and ministers of grace defend us!

Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn'd,

Bring with thee airs from heaven, or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked, or charitable,

Thou com'st in such a questionable shape,

That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee, Hamlet,
King, Father, Royal Dane: O! answer me:,

Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell,
Why thy canoniz'd bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements? why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly in-urn'd,
Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again? What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in complete steel,
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature,
So horridly to shake our disposition,
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do?
The Ghost beckons HAMLET. |

43 Hor. It beckons you to go away with it,

As if it some impartment did desire

To you alone.

Mar.
Look, with what courteous action
It waves you to a more removed ground:

But do not go with it.

Hor.

No, by no means,

Ham. It will not speak; then, will I follow it.
Hor. Do not, my lord.

Ham.

Why, what should be the fear?

I do not set my life at a pin's fee;

And, for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?

It waves me forth again: I'll follow it.

Hor. What, if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord, Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff,

That beetles o'er his base into the sea,

And there assume some other horrible form,

Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason,
And draw you into madness? think of it:
The very place puts toys of desperation,
Without more motive, into every brain
That looks so many fathoms to the sea,
And hears it roar beneath.

Ham.

Go on, I'll follow thee.

It waves me still:

Mar. You shall not go, my lord.
Ham.

Hold off your hands.

My fate cries out,

Hor. Be rul'd: you shall not go.
Ham.
And makes each petty artery in this body!
As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve,
Still am I call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen,

[Ghost beckons.

[Breaking from them. By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me: say, away! Go on, I'll follow thee.

[Exeunt Ghost and HAMLET.

Hor. He waxes desperate with imagination.

Mar. Let's follow; 't is not fit thus to obey him,
Hor. Have after. To what issue will this come ?
Mar. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Hor. Heaven will direct it.
Mar.

Nay, let's follow him.

[Exeunt.]

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SCENE V.

A more remote Part of the Platform.

Enter Ghost and HAMLET.

Ham. Where wilt thou lead me? speak, I'll go no farther.
Ghost. Mark me.

Ham.

Ghostla

גי

When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames

I will.

My hour is almost come,

Alas, poor ghost!

Must render up myself.

Ham.

Ghost. Pity me not; but lend thy serious hearing To what I shall unfold.

Ham.

Speak, I am bound to hear.

Ghost. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear.
Ham. What?

Ghost. I am thy father's spirit;

Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,

And for the day confin'd to fast in fires,

Till the foul crimes, done in my days of nature,

Are burnt and purg'd away. But that. I am forbid

46 To tell the secrets of my prison-house,

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I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word

Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,
Thy knotted and combined locks to part,

And each particular hair to stand an end,
Like quills upon the fretful porpentine:

But this eternal blazon must not be

To ears of flesh and blood.

List, list, O list!

Ghost. Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.

Ham. Murder?

Ghost. Murder most foul, as in the best it is;

But this most foul, strange, and unnatural. |

Ham. Haste me to know 't, that I, with wings as swift As meditation, or the thoughts of love,

May sweep to my revenge.

I find thee apt;

Ghost.
And duller should'st thou be, than the fat weed
That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,
Would'st thou not stir in this: now, Hamlet, hear.
'T is given out, that sleeping in mine orchard,

A serpent stung me: so the whole ear of Denmark
Is by a forged process of my death

Rankly abus'd; but know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life!
Now wears his crown.

Ham. O, my prophetic soul! my uncle!

Ghost. Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,
(O wicked wit, and gifts, that have the power
So to seduce!) won to his shameful lust
The will of my most seeming virtuous queen. [
O, Hamlet, what a falling off was there!
From me, whose love was of that dignity,
That it went hand in hand even with the vow
I made to her in marriage; and to decline
Upon a wretch, whose natural gifts were poor
To those of mine!

But virtue, as it never will be mov'd,

Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven,
So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd,
Will sate itself in a celestial bed,

And prey on garbage.

But, soft! methinks, I scent the morning air:

Brief let me be. | Sleeping within mine orchard,

My custom always in the afternoon,

Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of cursed hebenon in a phial,
And in the porches of mine ears did pour
The leperous distilment; whose effect.
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That, swift as. quicksilver, it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body;
And with a sudden vigour it doth posset,
And curd, like eager droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine;
And a most instant tetter bark'd' about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust
All my smooth body.

Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's band,

Of life, of crown, of queen, at once despatch'd;
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd;

No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head:
O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!

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