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.

Queen.
I'll warrant you, fear me not.
Withdraw, I hear him coming. [Polonius hides himself behind the Arras. Enter Hamlet.

Ham.
Now, mother, what's the matter?

Queen.
Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.

Ham.
Mother, you have my father much offended.

Queen.
Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.

Ham.
Go, go, you question with ^{s note}a wicked tongue.

Queen.
Why how now, Hamlet?

Ham.
What's the matter now?

Queen.
Have you forgot me?

Ham.
No, by the rood, not so;
You are the Queen, your husband's brother's wife,
And (would it 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.

Queen.
What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murther me?
Help, ho.

Pol.
What ho, help. [Behind the Arras.

Ham.
How now, a rat? dead for a ducate, dead.

Pol.
Oh I am slain. [Ham. kills Polonius.

Queen.
Oh me, what hast thou done?

Ham.
Nay I know not: is it the King?

Queen.
Oh, 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, farewel, [To Polonius.
I took thee for thy better; take thy fortune;
Thou find'st, to be too busie, is some danger.
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;
If damned custom have not braz'd it so,
That it is proof and bulwark against sense.

Queen.
What have I done, that thou dar'st wag thy tongue
In noise so rude against me?

Ham.
Such an act,
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 dicers oaths. O such a deed,
As from the body of contraction plucks
The very soul, and sweet religion makes
A rhapsody of words. Heav'n's face doth glow
O'er this solidity and compound mass,
With tristful visage as against the doom.
'Tis thought-sick at the act.

Queen.
Ay 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 this brow,
Hyperion's curles, the front of Jove himself,
An eye like Mars, to threaten or command,
A station like the herald Mercury
New-lighted on a heav'n-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. 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,
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,

And waits upon the judgment; and what judgment
Would step from this to this? what devil was't,
That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman blind?
O shame! where is thy blush? rebellious hell,
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 compulsive ardour gives the charge,
Since frost it self as actively doth burn,
And reason ^{t note}pardons will.

Queen.
O Hamlet, speak no more.
Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul,
And there I see such black and grained spots
As will not leave their tinct.

Ham.
Nay, but to live
In the rank sweat of an incestuous bed,
Stew'd in corruption, honying and making love
Over the nasty sty.

Queen.
Oh speak no more,
These words like daggers enter in mine ears.
No more, sweet Hamlet.

Ham.
A murderer, 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. Enter Ghost.
A King of shreds 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 passion, lets go by
Th' important acting of your dread command? O say.—

Ghost.
Do not forget: this visitation
Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.
But look! amazement on thy mother sits;
O step between her and her fighting soul:
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest 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 discourse?
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep,
And as the sleeping soldiers in th' alarm,
Your bedded hairs, like life in excrements,
Start up, and stand an end. 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 on me,
Lest with this pitious 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? [Pointing to the Ghost.

Queen.
Nothing at all, yet all that is I see.

Ham.
Nor did you nothing hear?

Queen.
No, nothing but our selves.

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 Ghost.

Queen.
This is the very coinage of your brain,

This bodiless creation Ecstasie
Is very cunning in.

Ham.
What ecstasie?
My pulse, as yours, doth temp'rately keep time,
And makes as healthful musick. 'Tis not madness
That I have utter'd; bring me to the test
And I the matter will re-word; which madness
Would gamboll from. Mother, for love of grace,
Lay not that flattering unction to your soul,
That not your trespass, but my madness speaks:
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place,
Whilst rank corruption ^{t note}running all within,
Infects unseen. Confess your self to heav'n,
Repent what's past, avoid what is to come,
And do not spread the compost on the weeds
To make them ranker. Forgive this my virtue,
For in the fatness of these pursie times,
Virtue it self of vice must pardon beg,
Yea, curb, and wooe, for leave to do it good.

Queen.
Oh Hamlet! thou hast cleft my heart in twain.

Ham.
O throw away the worser part of it,
And live the purer with the other half.
Good night; but go not to mine uncle's bed.
Assume a virtue, if you have it not.
That monster custom, who all sense doth eat,
Of habit's devil, is angel yet in this;
That to the use of actions fair and good,
He likewise gives a frock or livery
That aptly is put on: Refrain to-night,
And that shall lend a kind of easiness
To the next abstinence; the next more easie;
For use can almost change the stamp of nature,
And master ev'n the devil, or throw him out

With wondrous potency. Once more, good night!
And when you are desirous to be blest,
I'll blessing beg of you. For this same lord, [Pointing to Pol.
I do repent: but heav'n hath pleas'd it so,
To punish me with this, and this with me,
That I must be their scourge and minister.
I will bestow him, and will answer well
The death I gave him; so again, good night.
I must be cruel, only to be kind;
Thus bad begins, and worse remains behind.

Queen.
What shall I do?

Ham.
Not this by no means that I bid you do.
† ^noteLet 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 kisses,
Or padling in your neck with his damn'd fingers,
Make you to ravel all this matter out,
That I essentially am not in madness,
But mad in craft. 'Twere good you let him know.
For who that's but a Queen, fair, sober, wise,
Would from a paddock, from a bat, a gibbe,
Such dear concernings hide? who would do so?
No, in despight of sense and secrecy,
Unpeg the basket on the house's top,
Let the birds fly, and like the famous ape
To try conclusions; in the basket creep,
And break your own neck down.

Queen.
Be thou assur'd, if words be made of breath,
And breath of life: I have no life to breathe
What thou hast said to me.

Ham.
I must to England, you know that?

Queen.
Alack, I had forgot; 'tis so concluded on.

† ^noteHam.
There's letters seal'd, and my two school-fellows,
(Whom I will trust as I will adders fang'd,)
They bear the mandate; they must sweep my way
And marshal me to knavery: let it work—
For 'tis the sport to have the engineer
Hoist with his own petar: an't shall go hard
But I will delve one yard below their mines,
And blow them at the moon. O 'tis most sweet
When in one line two crafts directly meet!
This man shall set me packing;
I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room;
Mother, good night. Indeed this counsellor
Is now most still, most secret, and most grave,
Who was in life a foolish prating knave.
Come, Sir, to draw toward an end with you.
Good night, mother. [Exit Hamlet, tugging in Polonius.

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