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Ham. They are coming to the play; I must be ( Behind the arras I'll convey myself

idle:

Get you a place.

Enter KING, QUEEN, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, RO-
SENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and other Lords
attendant with his Guard, carrying torches.
Danish March. Sound a flourish.

me.

Queen. Come hither, my good Hamlet, sit by

To hear the process; I'll warrant she'll tax him
home,

And, as you said, and wisely was it said,
'Tis meet, that some more audience than a mother,
Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear
The speech of vantage. Fare you well, my liege :
I'll call upon you ere you go to bed,

And tell you what I know.
King.

Ham. No, good mother, here's metal more atThanks, dear my lord. [Exit POL. tractive. [Lying down at OPHELIA'S feet., my offence is rank, it smells to heaven; Pol. O, ho! do you mark that? [To the KING. It hath the primal eldest curse upon't, A brother's murther!-Pray can I not, Hautboys play. Enter a King and Queen very lovingly; the Though inclination be as sharp as will; Queen embracing him. She kneels, and makes show My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent; of the protestation unto him. He takes her up, and And, like a man to double business bound, declines his head upon her neck; lays him down I stand in pause where I shall first begin, And both neglect. What if this cursed hand upon a bank of flowers; she, seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his Were thicker than itself with brother's blood? crown, kisses it, and pours poison in the King's Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens, To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy, ears, and exit. The Queen returns; finds the King dead, and makes passionate action. The But to confront the visage of offence? poisoner, with some two or three mutes, comes in And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force,again, seeming to lament with her. The dead To be forestalled, ere we come to fall, body is carried away. The poisoner woos the Queen with gifts: she seems louth and unwilling awhile, but, in the end, accepts his love.

Oph. Belike this show imports the argument of the play. 'Tis brief, my lord.

Ham. As woman's love.

King. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in't?

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest no offence i' the world,

King. What do you call the play?

;

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 mur-
ther!-

That cannot be; since I am still possess'd
Of those effects for which I did the murther,
My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen.
May one be pardon'd, and retain the offence?
In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself

:

Ham. The mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropi-Buys out the law but 'tis not so above: cally. This play is the image of a murther done There is no shuffling, there the action lies in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke's name; his wife, In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd, Baptista; you shall see anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: But what of that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it toucheth us not: Let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung. Enter LUCIANUS.

Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
To give in evidence. When, then? what rests?
Try what repentance can: What can it not?
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,
He Art more engag'd! Help, angels, make assay !
Bow, stubborn knees! and, heart, with strings of
steel,

This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king. poisons him ' the garden for his estate. His name's Gonzago; the story is extant, and writ in choice Italian: You shall see anon, how the murtherer gets the love of Gonzaga's wife.

Oph. The king rises.

Ham. What! frighted with false fire!
Queen. How fares my lord?
Pol. Give o'er the play.

King. Give me some light: away!
All. Lights, lights, lights!

[Exeunt all but HAM.
Ham.
Soft; now to my mother.
O, heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever
The soul of Nero enter his 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.

SCENE.-A Room in the same.
Enter KING and POLONIUS.

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe :
All may be well!

[Retires and kncels.

Enter HAMLET.

Ham. 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,
I, his sole son, do this same villain send
To heaven.

O, this is hire and salary, not revenge.

He took my father grossly, full of bread;
With all his crimes broad blown, as fresh as May;
And, how his audit stands, who knows, save
heaven?

[Exit. But, in our circumstance and course of thought,
'Tis heavy with him: And am I then reveng'd,
To take him in the purging of his soul,
When he is fit and season'd for his passage?

Pol, My lord, he's going to his mother's closet; No.

Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent:*
When he is drunk, asleep, or in his rage;
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 damned, and black
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays:
This physic but prolongs thy sickly days. [Exit.
The KING rises and advances.

King. My words fly up, my thoughts remain

below:

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Pol. He will come straight. Look, you lay home to him:

Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with;

And that your grace hath screen'd and stood between

Much heat and him. I'll silence me e'en here. Pray you, be round with him.

Ham. [Within.] Mother! mother! mother! Queen. I'll warrant you, Fear me not-withdraw, I hear him coming. [POLONIUS hides himself. Enter HAMLET.

Queen. Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.

Ham. Mother, you have my father much offended.

You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife; But would you were not so! You are my mother. Queen. Nay, then I'll set those to you that can speak.

Ham. Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge,

You go not, till I set you up a glass

Where you may see the inmost part of you.

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.

Queen. What have I done that thou dar'st wag thy tongue

In noise so rude against me?

Such an act,

Ham. 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 dicer's oaths.

Queen.
Ah me, what act,
That roars so loud, and thunders in the index?
Ham. Look here, upon this picture, and on this;
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.
See what a grace was seated on his brow:
Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;
An eye like Mars, to threaten or command;
A station like the herald Mercury,
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;
A combination and a form, indeed,
Where every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man:
This was your husband,-look you now what
follows:

Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear,
Blasting his wholesome brother.
Queen.

O, speak to me no more;
These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears;
No more, sweet Hamlet.

Ham.

A murtherer, and a villain, A slave, that is not twentieth part the tythe Of your precedent lord :-a vice of kings: A cutpurse of the empire and the rule; That from a shelf the precious diadem stole, And put it in his pocket! Queen. No more. Enter Ghost.

Ham.

Of shreds and patches

:

A king

Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings, Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not You heavenly guards!-What would you, gracious

murther me?

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Is it the king?
[Lifts up the arras, and draws forth POLONIUS.
Queen. O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!
Ham. A bloody deed! almost as bad, good
mother,

As kill a king, and marry with his brother.
Queen. As kill a king!
Ham.
Ay, lady, 'twas my word.--
Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!
[To POL.
I took thee for thy betters; take thy fortune:
Thou find'st, to be too busy is some danger.-

* Seize him at a more horrid time.

figure?

Queen. Alas! he's mad! O gentle son, Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look? Ham. On him! on him!-Look you, how pale

he glares!

His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones, Would make them capable.-Do not look upon

me;

Lest, with this piteous action, you convert
My stern 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 see nothing there?
Queen. Nothing at all; yet all that is I see.
Ham. Why, look you there! look, how it steals
away!

My father, in his habit as he lived!

Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal! [Exit Ghost. Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain, † Station means the act of standing, the bearing. Capable means intelligent.

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Macb. I have almost forgot the taste of fears: The time has been, my senses would have cool'd To hear a night shriek; and my fell of hair Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir, As life were in't: I have supp'd full with horrors: Direness, familiar to my slaught'rous thoughts, Cannot once start me.- Wherefore was that cry? Sey. The queen, my lord is dead.

Macb. She would have died hereafter; There should have been a time for such a word.— To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle: Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, That struts and frets his hour the stage, upon And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.

Enter a Messenger.

Thou com'st to use thy tongue; thy story quickly. Mess. Gracious my lord,

I should report that which I say I saw,

But know not how to do it.

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[Striking him. Mess. Let me endure your wrath if't be not so; Within this three mile may you see it coming; I say, a moving grove. Macb.

I

If thou speak'st false,
Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive,
Till famine cling thee: if thy speech be sooth,
I care not if thou dost for me as much.-
I pull in resolution; and begin

To doubt the equivocation of the fiend,"
That lies like truth: "Fear not, till Birnam wood
Do come to Dunsinane ;"-and now a wood
Comes toward Dunsinane.-Arm, arm, and out!
If this which he avouches does appear,
There is nor flying hence, nor tarrying here.
I 'gin to be a-weary of the sun,

And wish the estate o' the world were now undone..
Ring the alarum-bell:-Blow wind! come wrack!
At least we'll die with harness on our back.

SCENE.-The same. A Plain before the Castle. Enter, with drums and colours, MALCOLM, old SIWARD, MACDUFF, &c., and their Army, with boughs.

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Mal. Now, near enough; your leavy screens
throw down,
And show like those you are:-You, worthy uncle,
Shall, with my cousin, your right noble son,
Lead our first battle: worthy Macduff, and we,
Shall take upon us what else remains to do,
According to our order.

Siw.
Fare you well.-
Do we but find the tyrant's power to-night,
Let us be beaten if we cannot fight.

Macd. Make all our trumpets speak; give them all breath, Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death. _ [Exeunt. Alarums continued.

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Enter MACBETH.

Siw.
Rosse. Ay, on the front.

Had he his hurts before?

Siw. Why, then, God's soldier be he. Had I as many sons as I have hairs,

Mach. They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly, I would not wish them to a fairer death: But, bear-like, I must fight the course.

Enter MACDUff.

Macd. Turn, hell-hound, turn.

Macb. Of all men else I have avoided thee: But get thee back, my soul is too much charg'd With blood of thine already.

Macd. I have no words,

My voice is in my sword; thou bloodier villain Than terms can give thee out.

Macb.

I will not yield,

To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet,
And to be baited with the rabble's curse.
Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane,
Yet I will try the last: Before my body
I throw my warlike shield: lay on, Macduff;
And cursed be he that first cries, "Hold, enough."
[Exeunt, fighting.
Retreat. Flourish. Re-enter, with drum and colours,
MALCOLM, old Siward, Rosse, LENOX, ANGUS,
CATHNESS, MENTEITH, and soldiers.

Mal. I would the friends we miss were safe arriv'd.

Siw. Some must go off; and yet, by these I see, So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

Mal. Macduff is missing, and your noble son. Rosse. Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt:

He only liv'd but till he was a man;

The which no sooner had his prowess confirm'd, In the unshrinking station where he fought, But like a man he died.

Siw. Then he is dead?

Rosse. Ay, and brought off the field: your cause of sorrow

Must not be measur'd by his worth, for then
It hath no end.

And so his knell is toll'd. Mal.

He's worth more sorrow,

He's worth no more;

And that I'll spend for him.
Siw.
They say, he parted well, and paid his score:
And so, God be with him!-Here comes newer
comfort.

Re-enter MACDUFF, with MACBETH's head. Macd. Hail, king! for so thou art: Behold, where stands

The usurper's cursed head: the time is free;
I see thee compassed with thy kingdom's pearl,
That speak my salutation in their minds;
Whose voices I desire aloud with mine,-
Hail, King of Scotland!

All.

King of Scotland, hail! [Flourish. Mal. We shall not spend a large expense of time,

Before we reckon with your several loves,
And make us even with you. My thanes and
kinsmen,

Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland
In such an honour nam'd. What's more to do,
Which would be planted newly with the time,-
As calling home our exil'd friends abroad,
That fled the snares of watchful tyranny;
Producing forth the cruel ministers

Of this dead butcher, and his fiend-like queen,
Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands
Took off her life;-this, and what needful else
That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace,
We will perform in measure, time, and place;
So thanks to all at once, and to each one,
Whom we invite to see us crown'd at Scone.
[Flourish. Exeunt.

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Enter the KING, QUEEN, HAMLET, POLONIUS, LAERTES, VOLTIMAND, CORNELIUS, and Lords Attendant.

King. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death

The memory be green; and that it us befitted
To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom
To be contracted in one brow of woe;
Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature,
That we with wisest sorrow think on him,
Together with remembrance of ourselves.
Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen,
The imperial jointress of this warlike state,
Have we, as 'twere, with a defeated joy,
With one auspicious and one dropping eye;
With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage
In equal scale, weighing delight and dole,
Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone
With this affair along:-For all, our thanks.
And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
You told us of some suit? What is't, Laertes ?
Laer.
Dread my lord,

Your leave and favour to return to France;
From whence though willingly I came to Denmark,
To show my duty in your coronation;
Yet now, I must confess, that duty done,
My thoughts and wishes bend again towards
France,

And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon.
King. Have you your father's leave? What

says Polonius ?

Pol. He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave,

By laboursome petition; and, at last,
Upon his will I seal'd my hard consent:
I do beseech you, give him leave to go.

King. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,

But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son,-
And thy best graces spend it at thy will!
Ham. A little more than kin, and less than kind.

[Aside.

King. How is it that the clouds still hang on you ?

Ham. Not so, my lord, I am too much i' the sun. Queen. Good Hamlet, cast thy nightly colour off, And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not, for ever, with thy vailed lids

Seek for thy noble father in the dust :
Thou know'st, 'tis common; all that lives must die,
Passing through nature to eternity.

Ham. Ay, madam, it is common.
Queen.

If it be,

Why seems it so particular with thee?

Ham. Seems, madam! nay, it is; I know not

seems.

'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black,
Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
Nor the dejected 'haviour of the visage,
Together with all forms, moods, shows of grief,
That can denote me truly: These, indeed, seem,
For they are actions that a man might play :
But I have that within which passeth show;
These, but the trappings and the suits of woe.
King. 'Tis sweet and commendable in your
nature, Hamlet,

To give these mourning duties to your father;
But, you must know, your father lost a father;
That father lost, lost his; and the survivor bound
In filial obligation for some term

To do obsequious sorrow: But to persevere
In obstinate condolement, is a course

Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief:

It shows a will most incorrect to heaven;

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